Hawai’i Electric Light, Hawaiian Electric and Maui Electric have contributed $25,000 to the Hawaii Island United Way. In addition, contributions from employees of the three utilities will be matched by the Hawaiian Electric Industries Charitable Foundation, up to a total of $10,000. All funds will be used to support Hawaii island residents impacted by Tropical Storm Iselle.
"Since the storm swept across our island, we’ve all seen how our community has come together to face the challenges," said Jay Ignacio, Hawai’i Electric Light president, in a news release. "As our company ohana remains focused on restoring power to all of our customers, we’re thankful that Hawaii island United Way is also directly providing relief to those most impacted by the storm."
In other awards and donations:
>> McKinley High School Foundation has received donations totaling $25,000 from Matson Foundation and Alexander & Baldwin Inc. for its McKinley Million Campaign.
"Matson Foundation and Alexander & Baldwin, Inc. have been very supportive of our organization and our mission, and we are so grateful for their generous contribution to our campaign," said MHS Foundation President Carl Takamura in a news release. "Receiving this additional support from both Matson and A&B is very special to us because of the link between our organizations."
The campaign was launched last year to achieve a total asset base of $1 million to enable the McKinley foundation to continue to provide scholarships for school graduates.
"A&B is proud to continue to support McKinley’s brightest college-bound students while, at the same time, honoring the legacy of our former CEO, community leader and McKinley alumnus — Bobby Pfeiffer — through this scholarship that we established in his name," said A&B Senior Vice President, Government & Community Relations Meredith Ching.
>> PBS Hawaii’s student news program and statewide digital media learning initiative, HIKIN, has received a three-year, $2.1 million grant from the Stupski Family Fund of the Hawai’i Community Foundation. The grant is intended to be a game changer, leading to the development of HIKI N standards-aligned curriculum and the establishment of an elective course in Hawaii’s middle and high schools.
According to a news release, since the program was launched in 2011, participating students have been working on video stories about their communities as an extracurricular activity. HIKI N teachers have been using vacation and weekend time to receive training in the new literacy of digital media.
"Our participating public schools have already seen very encouraging learning outcomes from this groundbreaking digital media initiative," Hawaii State Department of Education Superintendent Kathryn Matayoshi said.
Associated Press contributed to this report.