Alumni News

With more than half-a-million housing units packed into our tiny state, containerized vegetable gardening is ideal for small spaces: apartments, condominiums, patios, as well as areas with poor soil conditions. With sufficient growing space, soil drainage and aeration, sunlight, adequate nutrients, and irrigation, you can grow vegetables quickly—right at home.

Community support from volunteer club leaders and engaged parents is key to the survival of our Hawai‘i 4-H program. In return, during the COVID-19 pandemic, East Hawai‘i 4-H members from the Super Stars 4-H Club and Hawai‘i Island 4-H Shooting Sports Club are making the best of shelter-in-place orders by sewing face masks for community members who need them.

When community events had to be canceled because of the outbreak, it could have spelled disaster for an assignment in the online class HDFS 331: Infancy and Early Childhood Development. That’s when HDFS instructor Rheta Kuwahara reached out to the CTAHR and Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies ‘ohana to create an online cultural event that students could attend remotely. The support was resounding!

Why and how do plants grow the way they do, and can we change them? This question lies at the heart of Dr. Michael G. Muszynski’s research in CTAHR’s Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences department. Now he’s researching how the shapes of plant leaves can be altered through the plant hormone cytokinin.

Cooperative Extension is pursuing a variety of ways to help communities and stakeholders hit hard by the pandemic. On Moloka‘i, food security is paramount. The largest grocery story on the island is under a 14-day quarantine, and students who depended on free or reduced-price school lunches are struggling. But Extension agent Glenn Teves is hard at work on short- and long-term solutions.