MISC team enlightens Seabury Hall students

Recently, a group of students from Seabury Hall had the great fortune to work with the Maui Invasive Species Committee in Hana, led by Imi Nelson

and Aja Akuna, both Hana locals who have worked for MISC for many years and who both possess prodigious knowledge of Hana’s ecology.

In the two days Seabury’s tenderfoots worked with and learned from MISC team, students pulled miconia in “the core” and in the process, cultivated a deep respect for the men and women of this organization and similar conservation groups on island.

Students can put opportunities like these to two uses: the first is the tangible purpose of assimilating the technical and scientific aspects of the ecology and the disproportionate effects seemingly harmless plants and other species have on the environment; the second is to develop an appreciation and respect for the folks who have devoted their lives, sometimes generationally, to protecting Maui’s ecology and to be inspired by them so that the students see themselves in a larger societal framework, obligated to a purpose greater than themselves.

The first is know-how; the second is cultural, sacred.

The experience that Seabury’s students had with MISC was highly scientific and profoundly cultural, and Imi and Aja were teachers par excellence. Along with Imi and Aja, Josiah Malaikini infused the science with a comprehensive and thorough history of the Hawaiians’ harmony with the environment, and students came away with a deeper understanding about the sanctity of the land, thanks to his efforts. Carson Strohecker

Makawao