Science Educator Project
July 2001

Dr. Marlene Hapai, University of Hawaii


THE ROAD TO BECOMING A SCIENCE EDUCATOR....

..."I am a product of my environment."

Dr. Hapai was raised in a small sugar cane community.  Her uncles were cattle ranchors and raised pigs, one uncle also had a slaughter house.  Dr. Hapai used to watch how cattle were processed and would "help" the meat inspector - he would show her the difference between good and diseased meat.  She said that "dissipated any squeamishness I might have had."

High School Science

During intermediate and high school, Dr. Hapai did science projects, took four years of science and math and was selected for a special program as a junior.  The program was called science seminars and scientists spoke to students monthly to give them exposure to different areas of science.

Dr. Hapai originally did not want to go into teaching.  Her mother was a teacher and as a child, she felt it took time away from her- much time was required to do a good job.  But once in college, teaching seemed to be the thing to do with a Biology degree.  Dr. Hapai new the ropes of teaching from helping her mom and was told by her Student Teacher Supervisor that she was the best student teacher he ever had - she knew she was on the right track.


THE CAREER

Graduate Degrees

After receiving a Biology degree, Dr. Hapai taught for two years.  She then began her masters degree in Entomology, taught for two more years, finished the masters, started her Ph.D. in Entomology, went back and taught another year, finished the Ph.D. and then went on to teach Biology at the community college level.
"I took my graduate degrees in the sciences as I felt this would help me to
further present science from a scientists standpoint to my high school students."
In addition, Dr. Hapai has a Professional Certification in high school biology and chemistry and took a number of education courses.

Achievements - Just to name a few!

While working on her Ph.D., Dr. Hapai was hired by the University Lab School to write science curriculum.  She also wrote for the FAST Program, was director of the Writing Team for the DASH Program and wrote the Insects Books for the Hawaii Nature study Program.  "Bug Play" was written with a music educator to integrate science and the arts!

Dr. Hapai kept in touch with lower education throughout her teaching career - she was one of the leaders in resurrecting the District Science Fair that died 20 years earlier (when she graduated from high school) and started a degree program in Natural Sciences for preparing science teachers and a certificate for strengthening those already in the field.

Associate Dean for Academic and Student Affairs,
College of Tropical Agriculture

Work as associate dean focuses around program planning, recruitment, assessment, and implementation.  The college reorganized just before Dr. Hapai "came on board" and she thought she would be telling the world about all their great programs- only to find they were not in place yet!  After only a year, Dr. Hapai helped produce the college's Academic Program Reorganization Plan- which were approved a week ago.  Now it is time to work on brochures, the web site, and the millions of other details.
"The goals of my position are program excellence,
national recognition and increasing student numbers.
Once you have the program in place, the rest will happen."

At this time, Dr. Hapai is not teaching courses- her day-to-day challenges, on top of starting a new program, include answering faculty and chair problems, answer emails, keep-up with what is going on nationally, and work on long-term projects.  She just submitted a grant proposal to increase the number of Native Hawaiian students in our college and is coordinating a teaching symposium for the entire western region.
.... Just to name a couple of tasks!

"My job is very challenging and I enjoy it."

Dr. Hapai's emails end with the following quote:

"Let our commonalities move us forward,
not our differences hold us back"
This was her explanation-
"I came up with it shortly after I began this new job.  I found many wonderful
people with so much to share unable to work together because of problems of
one sort or the other in the past.  The advantage that I had as a new
administrator that came from the outside was that I was not a part of any
of those problems and thus could move people forward and focus on being a
professional and acting as such, no matter what the personal problem might
be.  Many of these people came from the same culture and ethnic background,
but I guess you could say, subcultures form as time goes by even within the
same group that tend to separate people."

QUESTIONS ASKED

1.  Why did you decide to go into science, more specifically science education?

2.  How would you describe your career and day-to-day activities?  As associate dean, do you still teach classes?

3.  I noticed that you are involved in teacher preparation and enhancement.  Could you go into a little more detail on the projects you are involved with and any additional thoughts.

4.  If there is anything else you would like to share- I would love it!