Creating Balance In An Unjust World Conference
In this episode, we speak with the organizers from the Creating Balance in an Unjust World (CBUW) conference. This was CBUW’s 9th conference bringing together educators, parents, students, activists and community members to explore the connections between STEAMM (science, technology, engineering, arts, mathematics, and making) education and social justice. The program was held at the University of Hawaii at Manoa in January 2020.
Creating Balance Website | Facebook | Twitter
Special Thanks
Technical Support: anecessarie film
Background Photo by Sebastian Coman Travel
CBUW Conference Organizers
Conference Organizing Team: Amreen Karmali, Carolee Koehn Hurtado, Eōmailani Kukahiko, Geoffrey Enriquez, Jaime Kent, Jon Yoshioka, Kari Kokka, Mike Britt, Steph Furuta, Taica Hsu, Tara O’Neill, Tol Lau, and Waynele Yu (interviewed)
Episode Mentions
ʻOnipaʻa Peace March - commemorating Queen Liliʻuokalani's forced removal from the throne and mark the moment of the overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom in 1893.
Mauna Kea (TMT) Thirty-meter telescope (Nature article)
Akeakamai: Critical Re-envisioning of STEM Education Through the Lens of Culture and Place- 2020 Conference Program
Transcript (Please Excuse Errors)
[Music Intro ♫]
LaToya [LS]: Hey listeners! Welcome to Abolition Science Radio, we’re your hosts. I’m LaToya Strong-
Atasi [AD]: And I’m Atasi Das. We’re here to talk all things science and math and their relationship to-
LS: Colonialism
AD: Oppression
LS: Resistance
AD: Education
LS: Liberation
AD: And so much more.
[ ♫ Music fade out.]
[0:25]
AD: Hey y’all.
LS: Hey listeners!
AD: (Chuckles) We’re back. Another episode, so excited that we can share this with you. But, we always start our episode with some Go-To’s.
LS: We do.
AD: And this time, we have like a different type – you know, we’ve done a range of Go-To’s. Like music, mostly, but other things. But, this week, or this episode, the Go-To is: what is your Go-To food when you’re home and you’re trying to work? Or, if you’re like working. What’s your Go-To food that you need to do work?
LS: So, I like to have snacks. So Imma eat, Imma have like my meals, but I need snacks.
AD: Like any snack? Salty or savory – salty or sweet?
LS: Can I get both?
AD: Oh!
LS: Yes.
AD: Ok. You’re like, well rounded.
LS: I like chips and salsa, I might make some guacamole, some like, fruit, like grapes, ones that you can like pick at.
AD: Yeah. Slow munchies.
LS: Slow munchies. All day.
[1:25]
AD: I agree. Yes.
LS: Might make some cookies.
AD: Ooh.
LS: Some chocolate bars.
AD: Oh my god, you’re making me hungry now.
LS: What’s yours? Ha ha ha.
AD: Ha ha ha ha.
LS: …Sound effects.
AD: I agree. I like snacks. I love chips and salsa, especially in groups. Like, I feel like that’s an easy snack and then you can all share. Sometimes though, if I’m deep into hard writing or reading or whatever, I like ice cream.
LS: Mmm yeah, ice cream’s good.
AD: It’s not necessarily the snack food, but it is a comfort, like..
LS: Yeah. I got ice cream today. I left work and went to get some ice cream. Cause – what is today? Today is what?
AD: It’s Monday..
LS: March..
AD: Oh. March, yes. 9th.
LS: It was like 70 degrees, what was the weather? AD: It was 70!
LS: It was 70 degrees today, it was hot! So I went for a walk, get some sun, but then I was like, you know what I’m gonna do, get some ice cream.
AD: Nice!
LS: So, I got some ice cream.
AD: It was like the day for it, for sure.
LS: Mhmm.
[2:26]
AD: Yeah, so that’s my Go-To food.
LS: Do you have a favorite ice cream flavor? Do you have a Go-To ice cream flavor?
AD: Ha ha, ice cream flavor. I could do anything with some brownie, some nuts – what is that, what is that called? It’s not Rocky Road, but it’s like? LS: Funky monkey? Or something like that?
AD: Not with bananas. Blegh. Ha ha.
LS: Woah woah woah. Ha ha. Disrespectful! You don’t like bananas?! AD: Ha ha. I love bananas but not in my ice cream.
LS: No, so not even like vanilla ice cream with bananas? You don’t fuck with?
AD: No, that’s fine. It’s the chocolate and fruit situation that I feel like – they’re separate things for me. I like fruit.
LS: Always?
AD: Yes. Pretty much. I mean I love food. So, like if it’s in front of me, I’ll most likely eat it. But I won’t enjoy it as much. If it’s a chocolate covered strawberry, sure ok, fine.
LS: But you don’t love it?
AD: No. But chocolate covered like, oranges…no! Thank you!
LS: Ok, now that, to me, no offense to anyone who loves it – that to me, I can’t, sounds weird.
AD: Chocolate covered bananas? I don’t know, not really. That’s unnecessary. I like bananas. I’ll have the banana. I want the chocolate. I’ll have that.
LS: I feel like bananas are a versatile fruit though. I think, you could – bananas and chocolate, bananas and peanut butter, bananas and chocolate and peanut butter. No, you’re not? Throw some nuts in there, you like the nuts? No.
AD: No, I’ll eat it. Like I said, I’ll eat most everything. But I won’t love it.
LS: Oh. Hmm.
AD: But you’re an equal opportunity, all fruits and chocolate?
LS: No, because not oranges.
AD: Oh. Not oranges.
LS: I just think of flesh of the orange and like the hardness of the chocolate. I don’t like it. Like, I can already like feel the texture in my mouth and I don’t like it.
AD: So, not your Go-To.
LS: No.
AD: That would be not your Go-To.
LS: Not my Go-To.
AD: Maybe our next series should be Not Go-To’s.
(Both laughing)
[4:08]
LS: I like it.
(Both continue laughing)
LS: Oh my god.
AD: What is your definite Not Go-To food? (Cough) Chocolate covered oranges. Ok. So, remember when we talked to Dr. Kari Kokka? About her stuff. Ha ha ha. Her amazing work.
LS: Yes.
AD: And she brought up that upcoming conference in Hawaii?
LS: Yes. The “Creating Balance in an Unjust World” Conference.
AD: Yeah. We went.
LS: We went. And maybe you could have gone too if we put up – aired the episode sooner!
AD: Told you all beforehand! Sorry listeners.
LS: Sorry. It was so dope!
[4:43]
AD: Yeah. Hawaii was beautiful. It was beautiful.
LS: Mhmm. It was in Oahu.
AD: It was on the campus of the University of Hawaii, Manoa. And we did a lot. I feel like – we were only there for like five days.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: Which I mean, is. It was a good amount of time.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: But we did a lot! Are there things that kind of, were interesting that you wanna share with everyone?
[5:09]
LS: One. Ok, so the weather, I was like, ok, Hawaii. I’m starting to recognize your clouds. Cause it rained. Maybe it was just the time or the season, but it would just rain on and off. It would just like rain, and then stop, and then rain. And then, I don’t know what y’all hair is looking like, but my hair is a fro, and maybe like, I could take it one day but like…
AD: Everyday?
LS: Everyday?! Multiple times a day.
AD: Ha ha ha ha.
LS: Strugglin! The beach was beautiful.
AD: It was really unreal. Yeah.
LS: Yeah. Oh, my favorite thing that we did. We drove –
AD: Yes!
LS: …cause, we’re in New York City and there’s like, three stars. Ha ha. In the sky.
AD: That we can see. Right.
LS: And so, Atasi suggested like, let’s drive somewhere as dark as it can get and let’s look at the sky.
AD: That was so cool.
LS: It was so cool. It was so beautiful.
AD: I think we ended up finding like a park, that was by the ocean. So we could, you could hear the water.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: But, it was like, you could see the Milky Way. It was so unreal.
LS: We saw the Milky Way?
AD: I think so! I mean, I feel like the swath of, it’s like, the – you’re like, no, we didn’t see no Milky Way.
LS: Ha, we did not, however, I would love to. I love the stars.
AD: Noo. And, also, everybody except for me saw a shooting star. Ha ha ha.
LS: We did! Aww. Poor Atasi.
AD: But it was beautiful.
LS: Mhmm.
[6:27]
AD: I really liked that, and I also, I think we went up to the North Shore. To the Northern part of the island of Oahu. And we like, put our feet in the water and it was such a beautiful sunset and you could see like in the distance.
LS: Oh yeah, it was.
AD: Yeah, the waves crashing and then just kinda like, the sky was beautiful. It was just a really beautiful. I can’t even describe it. It was just so, like a picture.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: And it reminded me of a tarot card that…
LS: Oh yeah.
AD: We, that I saw, played? What do you call it, saw? Pulled?
LS: Pulled. Drew.
AD: Yeah. Drew. Mhmm.
LS: Uh, the people were dope. Hawaiians are really nice.
AD: Yeah, we met some amazing educators.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: That were so open and just, sharing all, like stories and things that they’re working on. And, we saw this march that was commemorating the illegal overthrow of the queen in 1893.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: Which is a pretty powerful ceremony. And since recently, there’s been all this organizing against the – 30 –
LS: Mauna Kea.
AD: On Mauna Kea, against the telemeter, 30 meter telescope, TMT.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: So like, it’s sacred land, Mauna Kea. There’s already a telescope to look at stars. To look at the universe.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: And there’s a proposed expansion of that on that land and so, the struggle over how to – who can use that land and for what purpose is, become central?
LS: Yeah.
AD: And so there’s this march that happens every year, um, commemorating the illegal overthrow of the Queen in 1893. But, because of this organizing, it was like, so many kids, so many families.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: Like, were coming out and kind of like, talking about sovereignty and land and like, Hawaii as Hawaiian’s land. You know. It was powerful.
LS: Yeah.
[8:36]
AD: But this was also powerful for the conference too. I mean, I feel like, we were, that was one aspect of what was happening.
LS: So the theme of the conference is, was, “Akeakamai: Critical Re-envisioning of STEM Education Through the Lens of Culture and Place.” And so, we’re gonna read this?
AD: We could take turns reading it, maybe.
LS: Ok, so this is their – in their call for proposals, they like asked folks to like, make sure that your proposal like, spoke to the specific theme of the conference and we’re gonna read you that theme cause it’s pretty dope and speaks to sort of like, the colonial nature of STEM education and STEM education reform. So, it says: “STEM has a rich history in education with multiple iterations and the addition or subtraction of letters from the acronym. So, STEM being science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Each letter represents a particular way of empowering or disempowering systems of knowledge, peoples, and places. At the United States federal level, STEM education is driven primarily by industry and military needs. And content is framed in an exclusively Western lens.”
AD: So, “However, as states and local communities seek ever increasing needs to address issues of climate change, poverty, housing, and other issues of equity and access, the question of whose knowledge matters has been brought to question and spun the inclusion of A in STEM. Where A represents art, or ʻāina, ancestral, or perhaps, agriculture. So, then otherwise called STEAM, S-T-E-A-M.”
LS: Yes, and it should be noted that the A is, you know, art is sort of the standard, Western way. And then the conference organizers have added ʻaina, ancestral, agriculture.
[10:29]
AD: Yeah. And an extra M has been added for making. So, S-T-E-A-M-M. So, the second M, making, and S2, too has been added for social sciences of sense of place. So, STEMS2. The mathematics of STEM has been replaced with ethnomathematics. And so, all of these variations challenge the normative STEM narrative and provide grounds for the exploration of the roles of place, culture, and indigeneity, play in real world problem solving.
LS: Yeah.
AD: So, it’s a pretty like, amazing call, and there was, I mean, really awesome thinkers, and folks who are working in STEM and academia. Some folks, there were teachers there.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: Uh, K-12 teachers there. And we – there was a really amazing keynote that talked about ʻaina. So, ʻaina is, from what I remember, in the Hawaiian language, talks about some people take it forward as like, food, or that which nourishes. And I think in this, what you’ll hear in our interview, in just our group conversation, you’ll hear more about what ‘aina means. It was a really great conference and we got to talk with the organizers.
LS: Yeah, we did get to talk with the organizers. So they, I mean a big shout out and thank you to them. If you’ve ever planned a conference, you know it’s exhausting. So this was at the end of the conference when, you know, they’re also cleaning up and trying to break things down. And so they sat down with us to have this conversation, so thank you to them for organizing the conference and for speaking with us.
AD: Mhmm.
LS: And also thank you to our friends at Anecessarie Film.
AD: Yes.
LS: So, we were able to record this because they let us borrow their equipment.
AD: Thank you very much. And so there are a lot of people that you’ll be hearing.
LS: Mhmm.
AD: It’s not a one on one, our usual conversation. There was a group of folks.
LS: Uh huh.
AD: And they’ll introduce themselves.
LS: Yes.
AD: So, we’re excited for you to listen.
[12:32]
[Switches to pre-pre-recorded audio.]
AD: So, we’re here in front of a lot of amazing, dope, organizers, educators, mathematicians, scientists, and so, if you could just introduce yourselves to listeners.
Taica Hsu [TH]: Hey y’all, my name’s Taica Hsu, he/they pronouns, and I’ve been a math and computer science teacher in San Francisco at Mission High for 13 years. I’m also a drag queen and a lover of peacocks.
(Heyy!)
LS: Oh, last - sorry, one thing I forgot to add, your connection to the conference since, folks are organizing through different places.
TH: Yes. I was a participant in the Creating Balance Conference in 2008, and then I became an organizer in 2010.
[13:10]
Eōmailani Kukahiko [EK]: That’s amazing. Aloha, I am Eōmailani Kukahiko. I am, I guess a local kind of, hoa, a friend, to this group. I started attending the conference, I believe in 2008, uh, when it was first held in Brooklyn. Maybe that wasn’t even the first year, but that was the first time it kinda caught my attention. So, I just kinda fell in love with the same things you’re talking about, these creative ways of looking at mathematics. I think it was at that time, and now that it’s more expansive, looking at different areas of STEM, culture. I just felt excited to be in that space. And, because I work here at the University of Hawaii, at Manoa, I wanted to understand how I could work with these ideas, these new ideas, progressive things, that was more similar to my background of Hawaiian studies here at the University. That it just felt, it was so divorced from just the mainstream education that I was seeing, so yeah, I really appreciate all the hard work that went on way before us, way before the conference even came to Hawaii.
[14:14]
Carolee Hurtado [CH]: Hi everyone, my name is Carolee Hurtado. I was a high school math teacher in LA Unified, and now work at Cal State University, Channel Islands. I think I was at the first social justice conference and haven’t missed one since. And joined the organizing team in 2013, when we were able to bring it to Los Angeles.
Kari Kokka [KK]: Hi, I’m Kari Kokka. And, I am a former New York City math teacher, former NYCoRE member friend, and one of the co-founders of the Creating Balance in an Unjust World conference, that started, you know, like many of those organizations, Jonathan and I were leaving a NYCoRE event, and we were walking to the train and he said, I have this idea. Would you be down to organize this conference with me? And, we had Bob Moses as our first year keynote speaker and we asked Taeko Onishi to also organize with us, and so, we’re just thrilled to be able to bring it here to Hawaii.
[15:20]
Tol Lau [TL]: Hi, I’m Tol Lau. I am from San Francisco and I teach math at Mission High School there, and I attended the conference in 2010, and after that conference on the Sunday, I talked to Kari about joining the organizing team and have been part of the organizing team ever since. I went to the conference because it aligned with why I got into education in the first place, and it was, and math education in particular because I wanted it to be different from the type of education that I had growing up. And, to think about math education with a purpose.
[15:59]
Michael Britt [MB]: Hi, I’m Michael Britt. I began attending the conference in 2012. It’s been different situation because most of the organizers you talked to, I knew as mentors or my master teachers, or ran the departments of the schools I first began teaching at, and I’ve been with the conference now ever since, on the organizing side, since 2014. I was an educator for five years and worked on the conference and it’s interesting now, I’m now an educational advisor, which is really financial advising for public school districts in California. And everywhere on how to fund and operate schools, where money and budgeting should go, educating board members on how to sustain and support different school operations, um, collective bargain agreements, pensions, making sure teaches have access to programs. So, I think I’ve still remained in because, the focus still at the end of the day here, and the appreciation of this conference specifically is not just STEM in education, but equity. And it’s important that not just educators and teachers, but those throughout the community are listening in and involved in the conversation and knowing and informed on how can we actually support these things happening. So.
[17:06]
AD: Great, thank you. So much richness and experience at this table. So, we’d like to just maybe start off um, talking maybe with folks who have a longer history of how this gathering emerged, what made, I mean, you talked a little bit about it, but if there are more things you wanna fill in about, where does this come from, how did you find each other, yeah?
[17:30]
TH: This is Taica the drag queen. (Laughter in the background) Um, so, I was a first year teacher in San Francisco and I literally googled ‘social justice math conference’, cause I needed it, I wanted it. And the first thing that popped up was Creating Balance. So, I flew to New York – the school did not pay for it – but I flew to New York. And I observed Dr. Kokka, in all of her glory and amazingness. And I actually took notes. I was like, what is she doing? How do I bring this back to my classroom? And then we became quick friends after that conference. And we were actually roommates, side-story Kari found my notes from my observation of her teaching while she was my roommate. She was like, what are these (laughter in background) and I was like, don’t look at those! (Laughter) No, they were all positive, they were all great, it brought us closer as roommates and friends. And I just realized that you know, flying to New York as a first year teacher was cost prohibitive for a lot of people, it was not accessible, and I was like, what if we brought it to the West Coast so it could be accessible by more teachers. And so that was the impetus to actually host it at Mission High School, which we did for the first time in 2011, yeah. I think it was 2011, yes. And so, we took on that call because the Teachers for Social Justice Conference, which was also held at Mission at that time, had very few math and science workshops. And so, folks that would attend would be like, well, I’m a STEM teacher, but none of these workshops really appeal to me or are relevant to what I’m doing. And so, we were like we need another conference to fill that void, to fill that space. And so, it’s just been a great way to connect with other social justice minded folks in education. For me, it’s really rejuvenating. Like, it’s not a conference where you go and you’re drained, you’re actually filled and you’re actually ready to re-enter the classroom and both mentor and teach in a new way that furthers the work of equity and social justice. And so, I love coming every year because I’m ready to go back with a new spirit and new energy around this work.
[19:19]
LS: Clarifying question – is the conference every year or every other year? Yeah, say it.
KK: So, originally, did it every year. And, because we are super grassroots, so like I said at the intro, on Saturday morning, it’s literally a group of organizers who are friends. And so, it just became too difficult for us to do it every single year. So, similar to Free Minds, Free People, I believe TODOS is also every other year, we decided to, for the sustainability of the conference, to do it every two years. I also forgot to say, I am at the University of Pittsburgh, as an Assistant Professor of Math Education. I forgot to say that in my intro. But yeah, we really wanted to create a space where we felt rejuvenated and felt re-inspired to enter the sometimes hostile spaces that all of us were teaching in. And making these connections in order to sustain ourselves in this work. And so, it’s really encouraging to hear your perspective about this being the anti-AERA. (Laughter) Or, you know, it’s – like Taica said, it’s filling you up versus extracting your energy and your soul.
[20:49]
CH (?): I think a lot of math teaching and professional development has traditionally focused on, let me show you what you need to do. And just, or maybe a make and take kind of workshop. What I love about this conference is, it’s not that. It’s really a space for people to commune together, to think about what issues and interests our community has and being able to connect math and science and STEM with that. So, you might be in a session that’s facilitated by a teacher and their students. And we have student, young people who come to this conference and there’s nothing that prohibits anyone who’s interested in social justice and equity and STEM education from being a part of it.
[21:33]
TL: I haven’t been to that many conferences, and I generally kinda avoid conferences, and it’s not that I don’t wanna learn but I do like, I know I teach math, and I have a certain perception of what going to a math conference is like. And it doesn’t seem to be filled with the ideas that I wanna be bringing back to my classroom. In the Bay Area, we have the Asilomar Conference. Um, every year, and I went I think twice, and it just didn’t speak to the type of teaching that I wanted to be teaching. It was really seen, like this math that was devoid of the social context that we live in and the schools that we work in, so for me, it meant that, Creating Balance was really in line with how I wanted to teach. And how I wanted to learn about my teaching and to think about the context and the students I was teaching. And so, I think one thing that I’m always looking for when we’re organizing and we’re looking at workshop proposals, I’m really looking for like, is this something that I can bring back to my classroom the next day? Like, I really want to have things that relate to my students, and also things that I can actually implement as opposed to just lofty ideas that don’t really connect back to the classroom. And I think, so I always kinda push that, but that’s not how it should all be. So, there’s a balance, but I think that’s what rejuvenates me, is this idea like, I have things to bring back. Um, things that I can use right away the next day. And that’s, always what, got me excited about this conference.
[22:59]
MB: The only thing I’ll add, is that, what I can always appreciate, even still to this day about the goal of taking things back to the classroom, is that this conference has always had, I won’t say an added layer, but a dual focus of forcing all attendees, not just educators, to think in a different way. And even if you are very set in a lot of the theories, and schemes, and how you view things, to really push your mind to think, you know, the conversations just from today and yesterday, like. How does identity shape how I view and create math? Even though I think I’ve been reflecting on that constantly since I started. Or, how am I actually centering – conversations we had about centering the contributions of our students’ identities, into informing the math that’s taking place in the classroom. I mean, I thought I’d done a lot of thinking, but as a part of this conference, I really started finally realizing, I haven’t done enough reflection on how I support women, particularly women of color in my classroom. And it moved from that to being a center focus of the graduate work I was doing on empowerment of women of color. So that kinda pushing the conversations, I feel like, each time I arrive, there’s things I haven’t thought or reflected on. And even criticized and evaluated myself, so, that part I think is sadly missing from so many math conferences I did have the chance and have the chance to attend.
(Ha ha ha)
[24:20]
A: I know, I wanna say that was amazing contribution. And I felt, I feel that way, so much learning that I’m taking with people and, I mean taking part with people, and yes. I echo what you’re saying, yeah.
[24:34]
LS: So, we’re in Hawaii at University of Hawaii, at Manoa. So how did the partnership emerge for the conference this year?
[24:42]
EK: Well, when we had the chance, I think the last conference we went to was in San Francisco. And we took a small group of the Hawaii, um, University, College of Education professors, and we had been to it before. And I think it was actually Tara who just loves to take more and more responsibilities on, and she has these big ideas. But then she agrees and then we kind of help her articulate that dream. So, I think she put it out there and then we kind of put that on the backburner. And then, I think it was Taica that actually came and was like, remember that time where you said this? (Laughter in background) We wanna do that, we wanna come to Hawaii. We wanna share this conference there, so we’ve been working, I don’t know, maybe almost a year to try and put things in place. We’ve been meeting consistently – both the Hawaii team in collaboration with, call them the international team. As you talked about settler-colonialism, and ongoing occupation here in Hawaii. It’s definitely some of the complicated issues that we face here.
Yeah, because I really felt like, you know, we can learn how to do regular math better, but it’s almost like the why. Like, why are we doing these things, who’s getting represented? Um, women of color. The first conference I went to as a teacher educator, it was an anomaly because I had these three women of color that were math teachers. And it was almost like, that never happens. These – so I traveled with this group of unicorns to Brooklyn, and they got to experience this amazing thing that felt and lifted them up as educators. And so, I felt like, that’s what I want to feel every time. And ironically, you know, AERA is one of the conferences that we engage in, for us it’s like, oh you gotta go to AERA, you gotta do this, but, it never feels like that. You get lost in this huge mass of things. You do your presentation and you’re out. You don’t necessarily feel connected to that community. Except for maybe the people that you’re traveling with. So, I felt like, this kind of conference, these kind of creative ideas, these ideas that are sparking more ideas for me, was a thing that I wanted to be connected to in perpetuity. So, even if we’re maybe not hosting the conference again here, this is definitely a group of people that I want to be connected with long term.
[26:51]
AD: I have a follow up question to kinda help me understand more of the work that has been happening at the University here but maybe even outside the university around engaging, there was an amazing keynote speaker yesterday, who just kind of blew my mind of, I feel like, every single term that she was talking about was embedded in Hawaiian culture and also the way of complicating notions of science and mathematics. And so, I don’t know if you can represent all of this, but just your reflections on what has been cultivated and cultivating here that align with some of the stuff that came in the conference?
[27:32]
EO: Well, some of the stuff that resonated with me yesterday was just the representation. You know, even as a Hawaiian woman working at the university there. Oh, are you in Hawaiian Studies? These are the spaces that we’re allowed to be in. Just around Hawaiian knowledge. And even, maybe the College of Education has the next amount of um, Hawaiians across the college. But if you look into these other departments where we have not had representation, I think Rosie talked a lot about that, like, they are the first ones in those spaces. And especially areas where Western knowledge has really dominated the field, um, male, white privilege has definitely been pervasive at this university. It’s not really representative of the communities that we serve here. So, I think the strength of her conversations and if we can, kinda ground this, all in the complicated nature of the TMT conversation, that we, she talked a little bit about it yesterday. Really, like, don’t even put those words STEM together. Don’t talk about that in our Hawaiian communities, because basically, what they saying is like, our rights or our knowledge systems here in Hawaii as indigenous people are not as important as economics, STEM initiatives, and they want those things no matter what costs. And so that those have literally been clashes on the mountains, arrests, ongoing encampment up there for 100+ days already. And that’s something that still goes on.
And so, I think that you saw perhaps on the news that not only that, but that they chose to arrest our kūpuna, our elders on the mountain. That just went too far, so you see, I mean I guess the happy byproduct of that is you really see this rallying call across the islands, that you just went too far. You just went too far in disrespecting land, people, culture, and so, the folks that are leading, or co-leading – yes, the Hawaiian scientists have a place, science has a place, but we’re also taking the cue from our elders. The ones that have been here really engaging in spaces in a pono way. And I think that’s the word that Rosie used a lot yesterday, was just the idea of pono. It’s like the perfect word to use in any situation because it’s not just about doing what is right, or social justice, it’s about this idea of balance, yeah. But not only that, but who gets to decide what and where that balance occurs. Right, one of our scholars, Kaleikoa Ka’eo, he always talks about scientists saying that: oh you know, Mauna Kea belongs to the world. You know, that we should have every country across the world engaging in this space. But this idea that, we have this concept, maha’oi, it’s almost like, who are you to decide our sacred places and who gets those access around the world as a settler yourself. So, it’s a really interesting time to be here, it feels like it’s charged and I feel like, you know, we’re coming to these spaces where we need to engage in all of those critical conversations that start in maybe not the university. And that kind of understanding that we don’t hold all the knowledge here at the university is critical to that. Like, our communities hold the knowledge, our elders hold the knowledge, the ‘āina holds the knowledge, just like Rosie talked about. That that’s our first teacher. Sorry.
[30:52]
AD: Yeah no. Don’t apologize.
(A few chuckles)
LS: I guess, clarifying question, the Ethnomathematics Program is nested in the Hawaiian Studies program? Or is that, is it separate?
EK: So, actually Linda Furuto is in the Curriculum Studies department with me here in the College of Education. And she has actually started that a few years before she came to the University of Hawaii at Manoa, when she was working at the University of Hawaii at West Oahu.
LS: Mhmm.
EK: And, she is one of these fortunate people that has this math kind of welo, we call it, like it comes down from her father I think, even her brother. So they have this kind of love for math, and if you meet Linda, it’s like her love of math and growing up on the countryside of this island. Like, she was always looking for ways to integrate, you know, cultural knowledge with these higher levels of mathematics. You know, building those relationships with mathematics. So, the ethnomathematics formally, I think the program started about 2 years ago, even though she had been doing that prior to that. And, one of the things that’s amazing is like – she’s working with students that would have never considered, even stepping into those math courses, you know but. Like, she’s hooking them in by doing these amazing activities. She has um, a very connected relationship with the Hawaiian canoe, Hōkūleʻa, that’ probably, maybe folks are familiar with, because it just came back from around the globe tour. And so, you know, she really used the canoe to connect these ideas of celestial navigation, um, peace, and how do we take care of our Earth. So, I feel like what transcends is, you know, we’re using these STEM ideas to really find what it means to be a pono citizen on this island, island Earth, yeah –
Mālama Honua .
So yeah, that ethnomathematics certificate, in collaboration with Tara’s Program, the STEMS2, I think we’re all just trying to figure out how to connect all these knowledge systems. And I think that ethnomathematics is one of the amazing ways that that’s happening here.
[32:59]
LS: Got it, thank you. Can we talk about the conference theme and how y’all came to the conference theme, what that process was like, and, how you were hoping it like, played out in the workshops that got accepted?
[33:14]
EK: Because my background is in Hawaiian language, and that’s honestly the road that I traveled in to get to mathematics. Because I always felt like, they were basically saying – and I say they, royal they I guess, that we didn’t really have mathematics in our culture because every time we would go to use curriculum in our Hawaiian immersion classrooms, it would be translated, we would bring in these full on textbooks from the continental US, and then we would translate it without kindof our own input, and then that’s what we’d be teaching our students. So, all of these random animals, ideas, squirrels – like, we don’t even have that stuff here. (Chuckles in background). So it seemed a little bit awkward and it’s even more awkward when you translate it into Hawaiian and they don’t know that word either. Honestly, it was out of necessity that I started to engage in that math process.
But, if you look at like, the wealth of resources that we have in our Hawaiian culture, or even just cultures around the world, the way that they engage in their quantitative universe, or their numerical understandings – I’m sorry but, that’s not a Western only kind of knowledge system. We were surviving. We wasn’t – and that’s Rosie, she was so articulate in talking about those things – the food production, that we’re ready to farm our oceans, like, we had that handled. So, long story long – no, this idea around akeakamai, as a word, like, it’s literally this idea of akea, which means, to be, or to yearn for, almost like, to crave, and this idea that, we need to seek out and really engage in this knowledge. Now whether that means, you know, we’ve used that word to mean science in the past, but really it’s just this broader idea of knowledge and the way that different cultures format or separate out their knowledge systems is really up to them. But that’s why I think I gave that theme, the akeakamai, as the idea that, we don’t want it to be so boxed up but we want all of the different knowledges that come together for the benefit of students to be utilized in creating their own love learning.
[35:12]
AD: So, I just kinda wanna ask maybe one question for everybody to maybe reflect upon. As we’re wrapping up, it’s the end of amazing day and a half, two days, this entire process. And so, I’d like you to think about and maybe reflect upon a poignant moment or memory, or something, of this time that we’ve had in organizing and having folks here, and what’s something that you would like to takeaway? To take that moment into create and build movement. So, what’s something poignant that’s happened, that you would like to take away to make, continue movement? [35:54]
MB: I think, building off of what Eō was just saying, I say it wrong all the time, aena, something that, with this year’s theme but what Dr. Rosie Alegado, um, was sharing just at the opening, that we sometimes, always keep arguing about, when she was talking about ‘aina kinship. And that place really matters. And that there’s a reciprocal relationship between science communities. There’s a problem just constantly dealing with, especially outside of this whole circle and this, great support system, you know we have of teacher of color, that place does not matter when it comes to your math and science classrooms. That, oh, I’m just here to teach about the math. Oh, I just care about the chemistry. And, really pushing – what this conference has done, especially with this year and this theme, of really pushing, and especially the Hawaii team. Pushing everyone here to think about. There is a reciprocal relationship between everything you do and math you’re teaching. Between science in our communities, between how you view your lessons and what you’re – the knowledge you’re sharing, and the impact it has on our actual students, the children, because if there was not, there wouldn’t be any need for this conversation around equity. If there is nothing there to think about and there is no relationship there, we wouldn’t have to think about these impacts and why there are disparities and these outcomes that we’re still having the conversation about around, oppressed groups and minorities and women in our classrooms, that I mean, how long have we been talking about education? And so, yeah, just taking away the value of that place really does matter. And constantly thinking about that, and what goes into every single thing that you teach and share as an educator.
[37:39]
KK: For me, during this conference, the most powerful moment for me was when, Ikaika Mendez was invited to sing at the Friday opening event. I think you two were there at that point. And, he is a freshman at UH Manoa, yes. I think part of it for me highlights, when we know each other so deeply, that we know each other’s strengths to be able to invite each other to do certain things. Um, whether that be, I see a leadership role for you in this organization. I think that you should pursue this. I think that you should start an organization. And also, the power of young people. I’m very inspired by the Black Panthers. And thinking about the Black Panthers were super young, doing all of this revolutionary work. And the fact that, really, our best teachers are always our students. And so, for me, it just highlighted that for me and inspired me to, you know, just continue to, in my own learning journey and then also trying to help others in their learning journey also.
[38:51]
CH: Something I always pay attention to is, how our community is engaging with the sessions and what happens after. And so, one of the things that really stood out to me is, all of the people coming to talk to us about the new ideas that they’re getting and the things that they wanna do when they leave here. So, I brought five aspiring teachers with me and at lunch today, at the end of the conference, like, their mind is just so open to so many new ideas and what they wanna do. Now they wanna come here for your masters program. (Chuckles in background) And you know, just this idea that this space opens up opportunities for creativity and generation of new ideas. That’s the exciting part that every time we have this conference, that there’s more sessions, that we get to add to the offerings and then the conversations that happen here and then what happens after is I think the reason why I like to continue being a part of this organization as well as, being able to be in community with friends.
[39:55]
TH: I think as a conference organizer, I was, you know, not able to go to any of the workshops. But I was able to do a school site visit, and I think that the visit to Kaneoha really exemplified what Michael was saying about the theme of place, and to really see how that is embodied at a school site. Cause I think as much as teachers come to workshops and learn, it’s not effective until it actually does something with students and community. And so at that particular school, we saw students who, less than a semester ago, did not believe in their math abilities, did not understand what the point of school was, were not going to school, and these were a group of students that other teachers did not want to teach. And most of them were Native Hawaiian students. And we sat in a circle and we saw that the evidence of that transformation in both how they engaged with each other, how they engaged with the community, how engaged, they engaged with their land and their learning. And it was so authentic and so real, and I think that’s what I want to take back to my own teaching and my own community, is that it’s not just about like, our classroom community, right, it’s not just about our school community. But it’s about the broader community, this planet, this humanism, that we take for granted. And how do we really bring what I learned at that school to all the work that we do in our mentoring and our teaching, our coaching in our own community. To really honor folks, the land, and where we come from. In a real way. Like, it was happening in a real way in Kaneoha. I was blown away and I think it really embodied the theme of this conference. And so I was so lucky to be a part of that, Bella, like explained her journey and her work to us in a way that I don’t know why that’s not the model everywhere. Because it was so evident that it’s working and transforming the lives of students who are most abandoned by our education system. And so that for me was the highlight of this conference. Thank you.
[41:34]
LS: Oh, I mean, I would love to sit here and ask you many, many, many more questions. But I wanna respect your time and just, the year of organizing that went into this 2.5 days. You’re probably exhausted, so thank you so much for giving us, like the time that you’ve given us today. And for even allowing the conference to happen in the first place.
[41:51]
[Switch to other recording]
AD: So, we hope that you enjoyed listening in on this conversation with some amazing organizers for the conference, but before we go, we’d like to leave you with a few sounds from a march that we attended.
LS: Yes. So the march we attended was ʻOnipaʻa Peace March, which commemorates the illegal overthrow of Queen Liliʻuokalani. And so, Hawaii, there’s several different islands of Hawaii that took, collectively, we call Hawaii because under her rule, she brought all of these different islands together under one Queendom.
AD: And it was overthrown. And so, that march was - in 1893, this march is about that. Is commemorating.
LS: Yes, and ʻOnipaʻa was her motto. And so, we encourage you to go and read up on history of Hawaii, I think. You know, we think about the US as a settler-state. You can really see it visibly there and, you know, we honor the resistance that has continued since 1893.
AD: Continued.
LS: So, throughout the march, we heard lots of different songs and chants and call and responses. And so, we want to leave you with the sounds.
AD: Yes.
LS: Of that.
[43:02]
[Recording of the march.]
[43:58]
[♫ Musical outro.]
AD: Check us out at Abolition Science [dot] org, where you can sign up for our newsletter.
LS: And follow us on Instagram @abolitionscience and also follow us on Twitter @abolition_sci
AD: See you soon!
