Chancellor’s Remarks
End-of-the-Year Celebration & Recognition Ceremony
May 10, 2007
Ho‘oulu Terrace

Aloha!

Once again, we celebrate the end of the academic year. This is a special time to recognize our colleagues, and my special time to say thank you to all of you. Your dedication and commitment to work together result in many achievements, and we can all be proud. Thank you for your hard work to achieve the best teaching and learning environment for our students.

SERVICE AWARDS

Today we celebrate and honor our university colleagues for their exemplary service and dedication to our university.

Those who have served 10 years:
• Kathryn Daub, associate professor of nursing
• Robert “Tommy” Hamilton, resident life programmer
• Lydia Hart, clerk
• Kenneth Hon, associate professor of geology and volcanology
• John Ige, janitor
• Terrance Jalbert, professor of finance
• Yolanda Keehne, secretary
• William Mautz, professor of biology
• Jon-Pierre Michaud, associate professor of chemistry
• Donald Price, associate professor of biology
• Madeline Sehna, clerk-stenographer
• Un Suk Kim Sugiura, janitor III
• Becky Thurston, instructor of psychology
• Teresa Tsuda, clerk

Those who have served 20 years:
• Lo-li Chi, director of facilities planning
• Frederick Dela Cruz, building maintenance worker
• Suzanne Hara, secretary
• Dennis Imanaka, groundskeeper I
• Richard Kamali‘i, janitor III
• John Kusinski, professor of music
• Gordon Mitchell, janitor II
• Jo-Ann Nishioka, administrative officer
• John Scott, associate professor of biology

The “survivors” of 30 years of service:
• Daniel Brown, professor of anthropology
• Joseph Estrella, men’s baseball coach
• Sheldon Furutani, professor of plant science
• Gregory Nielsen, farm manager
• Lawrence Rogers, professor of Japanese
• Cynthia Yamamoto, clerk/typist III
• Albert Yoshitsugu, janitor III

And reaching the grand milestone of 40 years of service:
• David Miller, professor of English

Let’s give a round of applause to all the Service Award recipients!

RETIREMENT AWARDS

Today we also honor our retirees. Please note that this list covers the period from April 2006 to March 2007, and anyone who retired or retires after March 31st will be recognized at next year’s Recognition Ceremony.

This year we honor the following:

• Cornelia Anguay retired after providing leadership to UH Hilo’s Upward Bound Programs for many years. Cornelia built the nationally recognized Upward Bound Programs that served hundreds of East Hawai‘i students over her career.

• Professor of Economics Jon Cauley came to UH Hilo in 1975 from Arizona State University. He quickly became known as one of the most inspirational and brightest teachers on campus. He published research in the top journals in the field. Since the late 1980s, Professor Cauley has worked on explaining the emerging Chinese model of organizational structure. He was awarded successive Fulbrights 1992-1994, which he spent in China, and he has been an invited visiting foreign expert in China.

• Bill Higa, professor of psychology, was born in Hilo and raised in Honolulu. He earned his doctorate in clinical psychology in 1973 from UH M?noa and joined UH Hilo faculty that same year. His service at UHH spans 33 years and includes time as faculty senate chair, psychology department chair four times and Minority Biomedical Program director. He also played a major role in the creation of the master’s degree in Counseling Psychology, which is graduating its first class this year.

• Susan Maesato began her career at the Library in 1983 as an instructional librarian who provided services to both UHH and Hawai‘i Community College. She also has served as the reference coordinator and Hawaiian collection librarian. Her accomplishments include working on a Hawai‘i island newspaper indexing project and serving on a system-wide distance learning committee. After 23 years of public service, Susan will be enjoying her retirement by devoting time to her family and traveling.

• Ida Nealon was a janitor at UH Hilo and worked at the library, Edith Kanaka‘ole Hall, and the Hawai‘i Community College Manono campus. Ida came to UH Hilo in 2001 and retired due to her health. Even when she was experiencing discomfort, Ida was always upbeat and very encouraging to her co-workers. In retirement, Ida now spends a lot more time with her children and grandchildren.

• Theatre Manager Larry Pruitt-Joseph came on board first as lighting designer and then became manager 24 years ago. He was committed to bringing quality and varied programming to the Theatre. He not only served as manager, but also volunteered his talents as a set and lighting designer/builder and also directed many plays.

• Robert Stack, associate professor of marketing, joined UH Hilo in 1984, when he also served as director of the UH Hilo Small Business Institute. He was a superb classroom teacher as well as leader in small business education. He developed and taught courses that enabled students to link classroom management education with actual practice, and was the driving force behind the Small Business Consulting course and Internship Program as well as laying the foundation of the College of Business and Economics.

• Wini Tatsuda retired after spending her entire professional career at UH Hilo’s Office of the Registrar. She is known throughout the campus for her wisdom and knowledge of the academic requirements at the university. Her standards of excellence and strong work ethic have preserved the integrity of our records and admissions over decades.

Thank you to all the retirees for your many years of service. We are envious but wish you the very, very best. Take care and good luck!

SPECIAL TRIBUTES

Our university is very fortunate to have volunteers to take care of our landscaping, provide beautiful floral arrangement and volunteer other services to us. Thank you so much:

• Ramon Abong
• Jean Funai
• Harue Kaneshiro
• Robert Koga
• Caroline Madrid
• George Matsubara
• Philomena Rabago
• Sueno Saruwatari
• Chiyono Kobayashi
• Junko Nowaki
• Lynne Shimazu

A round of applause for our RSVP and other volunteers!

Will all members of the University Congress please stand and be recognized?

Will all members of our faculty senates stand and be recognized?

Will all faculty and staff stand and be recognized?

UH HILO AWARDS

Jonathon Koch, a Chancellor’s Scholar since 2003 who will graduate this fall, is the recipient of the Student Employee of the Year Award. Jon earned accolades for taking a leadership role in turning the Chancellor’s Scholar Program into a student run program with upper classmen mentoring and guiding new scholars. He is majoring in environmental science while working at Admissions, where he has proven himself invaluable with his sincerity and spirit of aloha, especially in his peer counseling of newly accepted students to the university.

Tom Pinhey, professor of sociology, is this year’s recipient of the Excellence in Research and Scholarly Activities Award. Tom is an internationally known medical sociologist whose research interests reach broadly beyond that field. He has published twelve articles in major journals since he came to UH Hilo, including the American Journal of Public Health, Social Biology, Women and Health, Social Science Quarterly, and Pacific Studies. His studies of at-risk youth are of critical significance, and he has devoted much effort to the understanding of drug use and violence in adolescents. More recently, he has become interested in other health issues, from menopause to diabetes risk, and has applied his research in particular to Pacific populations. He also has served as a mentor for both students and faculty colleagues in research activities, and has coauthored papers with colleagues.

Yolanda Belog, social sciences division secretary, is the recipient of the UH Hilo Outstanding University Support Employee. Yolanda has served at social sciences since 1995, having previously served as clerk/typist at the humanities division offices. Yolanda is known for her exemplary work, and recently served as secretary to the dean at the new College of Pharmacy during its start up phase. Without her help, the college would have had a much more difficult time getting started. While everyone is appreciative of her efforts for the College of Pharmacy, the social sciences division is very happy she decided to return to their offices.

Let’s give another round of applause and congratulations to Jon, Tom and Yolanda! To be nominated and selected by your colleagues is a distinct honor.

We could not honor the recipients without the hard work of the selection committees. Thank you, Norm Stahl, for chairing the Student Employee of the Year Award; and thank you, Jim Juvik, who chaired the UH Hilo Awards Committee together with Ron Amundson, Wayne Miyamoto, Jeff Scofield and Debbie Scott.

UPDATES

Vice chancellor searches

Our vice chancellor searches are proceeding in a timely fashion. Running three top-level searches has required a lot of coordination and hard work. Special thanks to the chairs, Randy Hirokawa, Keith Miser, and Bill Chen and the committee members for working industriously to find quality leaders for UH Hilo.

Legislative session

Every legislative session is tough, but this year’s was extra-tough, especially with newcomers in leadership positions at the Legislature. I am very fortunate that we have a strong and seasoned administrative team. Special thanks to Gerald DeMello, Steve Hora, Keith Miser, Bill Chen and Audrey Furukawa for working very, very hard.

We did not get everything, but we came out pretty good. We have $26 million for the renovation and addition of the Student Services Building, $6 million for the College of Pharmacy Building, and almost $3 million for Phase II of the North Hawai‘i Education and Research Center. Very soon, we will have more details for you on the operating budget.

Commencement

Our next event is Commencement this Saturday, May 12, when we celebrate our graduates. We are honored to have Jack Gifford, one of the founders of the analog chip industry, as our keynote speaker.

MAHALO AND ALOHA!

In concluding this celebration, I wish to once again thank you very much for working together to move UH Hilo forward.

See you at Commencement and have a safe and wonderful summer.

Mahalo.