Wayfinding through the Storm: Speaking Truth to Power at Kamehameha Schools 1993-1999

by Gavan Daws, Na Leo o Kamehameha

Over 150 voices—young students, venerable alumni, movers and shakers, average folk, novice and seasoned teachers, Native Hawaiians, kama'aina and fresh faces from abroad—share their experiences of the 1990s Bishop Estate controversy in Wayfinding through the Storm . This is the human story of a crisis that erupted at Kamehameha Schools in the 1990s and came close to destroying a historic educational community. Wayfinding through the Storm tells the story of ordinary decent people who looked deep inside themselves and found the moral courage to risk everything, to come together and stand up for what they believed to speak truth to power.

Coming into the '90s, Bishop Estate and Kamehameha Schools were flourishing. However, within a matter of just a few years, the all-Hawaiian board of trustees came close to bringing the estate to ruin. Dubious schemes, hatched behind doors in the boardroom, erupted one after the other in public scandals—ethical, moral, sexual, financial, political, legal, crossing the line into indictable crime.

Wayfinding through the Storm focuses on the crisis as it played out at Kamehameha Schools. Presented as an oral history, it is told by people who lived the story, in their own words. The book is comprised of interviews with Kamehameha faculty, staff, students, alumni, parents and friends, combined with court transcripts. The text is supplemented and augmented graphically through historic and contemporary photographs, cartoons and reproductions of documents.

384 pages, Paperback

First published May 22, 2009

About the author

Gavan Daws (b. 1933) is an American writer, historian and filmmaker residing in Honolulu, Hawaii. He writes about Hawaii, the Pacific, and Asia. He is a retired professor of history at University of Hawaii at Manoa.
Daws is originally from Australia and got his B.A. in English and History from the University of Melbourne. He has a Ph.D. in Pacific History from the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
His best-known works are Shoal of Time: A History of the Hawaiian Islands, in print since 1968; Holy Man: Father Damien of Molokai, the biography of a nineteenth-century missionary priest to Hawaii who served leprosy sufferers, and who has recently been canonized; and Prisoners of the Japanese: POWs of World War II in the Pacific. Daws co-produced and co-directed Angels of War: The People of Papua New Guinea and World War II, which won the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Documentary. His other work includes song lyrics and a stage play with music and choreography. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Humanities in Australia, and served as the Pacific member of the UNESCO Commission on the Scientific and Cultural History of Humankind.

Reviews

[Rachelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wasn't living in Hawaii when the "Broken Trust" scandal errupted, and I didn't realize just how much the trustees' actions and attitudes affected Kamehameha Schools staff, teachers, students, and alumni until I read this book. It's powerful, moving, and honest. I appreciate the way the editors let the voices speak for themselves. It is almost like a legal thriller, with secret meetings, closed boardrooms, hit lists, lie detectors, snitches, phone taps, and intimidation.

[Wendie Joy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very telling about what happened to Kamehameha Schools. Interesting to note that very little has changed, no matter how much we'd like to think it has. As an alum it makes me sad. As a teacher who came in at the tail end of the controversy, I just have to hope things can move toward a more open environment focused on EDUCATION- rather than $$$.

[C.L. Walters · Rating 5 out of 5]

So important for those of us who work for this trust. Insightful, relevant, and important by means of institutional history.