Kulana Ike Kupuna. Program to increase capacity and economic development for Native Hawaiian cultural practitioners. - Hikaʻalani proposes the Kūlana ʻIke Kūpuna project to strengthen the economic resilience and visibility of practitioners with expertise in Native Hawaiian practices in Koʻolaupoko, Oʻahu. This three-year initiative will build economic capacity for practitioners through training in income generation, business development, and marketing strategies—paired with immediate paid work opportunities via workshops, school contracts, and fee-for-service cultural experiences rooted in kapa (bark cloth), hula (dance), ulana lauhala (pandanus weaving), mele (song, poetry), hulu (featherwork), and other ʻike kūpuna (ancestral knowledge) traditions. Despite their vital role in maintaining Hawaiʻi’s cultural heritage, many practitioners with expertise in Native Hawaiian practices earn less than $20,000 annually from their craft and face high housing costs in areas like Kailua, where the median household income exceeds $146,000 and the median rent is over $2,300/month (U.S. Census Bureau, 2020–2023). This project will primarily serve cultural experts—who carry ancestral knowledge relevant to the population being served but face economic precarity due to persistent underestimation of the value of their work and lack of structural support. Hikaʻalani will address these needs by launching a practitioner-driven cultural education and enterprise model. In Year 1, the organization will build internal capacity through key staff hires and program infrastructure, and launch practitioner-targeted economic development training. In Years 2 and 3, Hikaʻalani will offer ongoing economic development training, cultural programming in partnership with local schools, the visitor industry, and community organizations while building a diversified revenue stream to fortify practitioner employment. In tandem with curriculum development, Hikaʻalani will initiate an economic strategy track to explore long-term income models for cultural programming. This includes analyzing workshop delivery costs, setting pricing benchmarks, and testing participant fee models to achieve partial or full cost recovery. The goal is a financially self-sustaining framework that supports both organizational growth and practitioner economic development—advancing SEDS goals of economic development and self-sufficiency. Specific activities will include: Economic development curriculum, cultural curriculum and workshop development, DOE and charter school partnerships, digital learning resources, cultivation of native plants necessary for executing cultural practice. Hikaʻalani will serve as a school for practitioners—offering structured programming to support their growth as cultural entrepreneurs. The long-term goal is to restore ʻike kūpuna (ancestral knowledge) as a viable economic pathway while creating a scalable model of cultural and community development that reflects the values of the population and community being served.
