Alumni News

Want to sustain our aging Ag workforce with the best and brightest of the next generation? How about try exposing young persons to the wide diversity of careers that are available? Faculty, staff, and volunteers of CTAHR’s Urban Garden Center (UGC) played host to field trips last week from Pearl City High School and Waipahu High School, partnering with the Hawaiʻi Agricultural Foundation (HAF) to promote awareness of agriculture at the high school level. With a grant to cover transportation, UGC and HAF worked together to bring more than 30 PCHS students to the CTAHR facility February 11 for a multisensory event.

Students had an opportunity to: 1) learn about the benefits of flowers, 2) smell the roses, 3) express themselves creatively with plants, 4) harvest, process and taste mamaki tea, 5) use their hands to propagate plants, 6) taste local and unique fruits grown at UGC, 7) convert home waste into a useable fertilizer for plants, 8) take home local roses and their personalized bouquets, and 9) taste how sour lemon can be made into a local treat by using gummies and lemon peel. 

“Vogue 56,” the 56^th Annual Fashion Show, is charging full steam ahead, and our students are working hard to offset the expenses of a full-on production. Come support them at today’s one-day-only pop-up thrift shop! If you’re reading this, that means you’re specially invited to come on down to Campus Center Courtyard by the ATM, today 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., and stop by this fundraising event of the Fashion Design and Merchandising Program of the Dept. of Family and Consumer Sciences. All proceeds from this thrift shop will go toward a successful Fashion Show.

“Give your clothes a second life and save them from landfills; one person’s trash is another person’s treasure!” says undergrad Allison Parten.

For questions, contact Olivia at omaguire@hawaii.edu, Aubrey at aubreyvi@hawaii.edu, or Jada at jrogers3@hawaii.edu.

Stay tuned for details on the upcoming 56^th Annual Fashion Show!

New York Fashion Week, the epicenter for America’s new trends in clothing styles and materials, got an extra helping of Aloha last week when Native Hawaiian models, musicians, and dancers graced the runway. The team highlighted one-of-a-kind creations by Ola Hou Designs’ Sharayah Chun-Lai, alum of the Fashion Design and Merchandising program of the Dept. of Family and Consumer Sciences. She is the first kānaka ʻōiwi wahine to accept an invitation from fashion week producer Runway 7.

“I am humbled and honored to be the First Native Hawaiian wahine to accept an invitation from Runway 7 to showcase Ola Hou Design’s uniquely modern Hawaiian vision at Sony Hall and represent Hawai‘i,” Sharayah said last month before jetting off to the Big Apple.

Read the UH News story. Read the previous CTAHR Notes story.

What is the key factor allowing Hawaiʻi’s small, family-run floriculture operations to compete with the giants in the marketplace? It’s CTAHR’s research and development program under the direction of Dr. Tessie Amore. In last Sunday’s Star Advertiser, long-time CTAHR supporter Eric Tanouye authored an insightful and articulate op-ed about the current state of our floriculture industry. As president of both the 300+ member Hawaiʻi Floriculture and Nursery Association (HFNA) and his own Green Point Nurseries on the Big Island, Tanouye gave special attention to a “professional advisory team” that is fostering collaboration between growers, designers, and scientists.
Led by Tessie of the Dept. of Tropical Plant and Soil Sciences, HFNA, and renowned floral designers from Canada, California and Hawaii, the team will work together to keep the industry vibrant when so many growers are aging out of the workforce.
Read the full article, Nurture a beautiful industry in Hawaii.

If improving sustainable agriculture and food security for Hawaiʻi through research or innovative programing is your thing, invite your undergrad students to join CTAHR’s Food Systems Working Group. Students will work with UH faculty and high school students to explore and identify a potential project on food security and sustainability in Hawaiʻi, as well as apply for funding from the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP). The deadline to apply is March 3.

“Our working group seeks to help address food security in Hawaiʻi,” says Sothy Eng of the Dept. of Family and Consumer Sciences. “We are looking for students who want to be part of the solution! The proposed food systems projects should contribute to one of three major global challenges: population health, economic development, or environmental sustainability.”

The Food Systems Working Group notes that “A food systems approach to food and health encompasses many intricately related factors in getting food from farm to consumer. This includes the inputs, mechanisms, and structures for food production, processing, distribution, acquisition, preparation, and consumption, as well as the farmers, ranchers, fishers, workers, governments, institutional purchasers, communities, and consumers who participate in that system — and their contributions to overall health.

This approach recognizes that complex systems have many inputs and outputs. Health and other outcomes must emerge from the system as a whole, not by focusing on any single component. Interacting parts work synergistically, each as a complement to the other and each supporting the system as a whole.”

Learn more CTAHR’s Food Systems Working Group. For questions, contact Sothy.