Off the Grid: Kua o ka Lā’s Solar-Powered Sustainability

Off the Grid: Kua o ka Lā’s Solar-Powered Sustainability

Pū‘ala‘a’s hot. It’s isolated. It’s mere miles from an active volcano. It faced three natural disasters in the last three years. It’s a tough place. But the people are tougher. Kua o ka Lā Public Charter School in Pū‘ala‘a is using its natural environment to teach its students about perseverance and pono.

Their curriculum is based on Ke Ala Pono, the righteous path, and that path has led them to run their school completely on sun power, create a solar village to produce salt and dried fruit, and establish an award-winning culinary program that uses only local and organic produce. Ke Ala Pono is a powerful example of what happens when we use Hawaiian culture and understandings of the world to inform how our keiki are taught. They use ancestral wisdom to inform and find new solutions for the problems of today. See the students shine as they follow Ke Ala Pono and seek righteousness.