Nurturing Faculty Excellence
Endowed chairs and professorships greatly enhance the prestige of academic institutions. They are powerful vehicles used to celebrate distinction and are given to scholars or teachers who are widely recognized as leaders in their field. These endowments help our university attract and retain the best faculty and students.
An endowed chair or professorship is more than an honorific for the academic chosen to hold it. It offers a private source of funding that enables the chair holder to take advantage of opportunities, finance important research, fund necessary instrumentation, attract post-doctoral fellows and graduate students, and support collaborations with other colleagues.
Creating endowed chairs and professorships is a priority at the University of Hawaiʻi Foundation because of the powerful and direct impact these academics have on our students, our faculty and our future.
Faculty awards recognize outstanding contributions in education and nurture faculty excellence. Awards are a meaningful way to thank and acknowledge the stellar work faculty do, in their important role as mentors to the next generation and forward-thinking researchers.
Distinguished lecture series enhance our campuses’ ability to stimulate intellectual vitality in our community. Through public lectures given by distinguished leaders and renowned scholars, our community is introduced to new ideas and engages in the exchange of knowledge.
On August 8, 2021, 100 people gathered under a big white tent in the UH Mānoa quad – bordered by Hawaiʻi, Crawford and Dean halls – to celebrate the life of the late Chung H. Lee.
Kamanamaikalani Brenton Beamer named inaugural Dana Naone Hall Endowed Chair in Hawaiian Studies, Literature and the Environment.
When Russia hurled its Sputnik satellite into orbit October 1957, it initiated the USA-USSR Space Race, but it also launched Jacquie Maly to UH Mānoa.
The poet, Hawaiian rights advocate and environmental activist worked for decades to honor and protect Hawaiian burial sites and culturally-important locations when planned development threatened access for Native Hawaiians and the public.
Mitzi Nakata Fuke was born and grew up in McGerrow Camp, Pu'unene, Maui. She was a smart woman who made the most of the limited schooling she had. She genuinely loved people and extended her own gracious hospitality to offer food to guests, even in hard times.
McCorriston died in 2001, after an outstanding career as professor and physician, influencing generations of Hawai‘i doctors who learned from him, and delivering more than 10,000 babies into the world.
The “plug and play” tool will allow educators to customize OER textbooks by adding interactive assessments to enhance student retention, engagement, and accountability.
