Growing Up on Lānaʻi, Everyone Knows Everyone. This Spring, the Island's HSSC Rep Is Going to South Korea to See What the Rest of the World Looks Like.
One of 42 public high school students selected for the 2026 Hawaiʻi Sister-State Study Tours.
Student Snapshot
Name: Sofia Emilia Patricia Pimentel
Preferred Name: Sofia
School: Lānaʻi High and Elementary School
Grade: 11th
Home Community: Lānaʻi — she names it repeatedly and specifically; the smallness of the island, its quiet rhythm, its familiar faces, its isolation are all central to who she is and why this trip matters
Delegation: Jeju Island
Travel Dates: March 14–25/26, 2026
Focus Interests / Extracurriculars: Cross country; tennis; cheer; ASB Secretary; Hawaiʻi State Student Council school representative; retail store worker (part-time); weekly church attendance and volunteering at Sacred Hearts; school event volunteer (Lokahi Day, Unity Day); photography (personal); has visited 10+ countries across four continents with family; traveled to Japan (Kyoto, Tokyo, Nara, Osaka); heard about PAAC through HSSC and a friend
Career Aspirations: Becoming globally competitive and someone who bridges cultures — she frames this with her principal's challenge: "locally committed and globally competitive"; not a specific career field named, but leadership, international relations, or community development are suggested by her framing
Why They Were Selected
Sofia grew up on Lānaʻi, where everyone knows everyone, and where the smallness of the island shapes everything — including the limits of what's available to its students. She has traveled to 10+ countries with her family, speaks basic Japanese, is her school's HSSC representative, the ASB secretary, a three-sport athlete, a part-time retail worker, and a regular church volunteer. She applied wanting to go to Japan because it was familiar. She got Jeju instead. And her acceptance reflection is about what happened next: her mind opened.
What They're Excited About
The isolation she has felt on Lānaʻi; wanting to explore the world since her early teens; originally wanting Japan because it felt familiar; getting Jeju and having her perspective change; meeting new people and building global connections; being part of something not many students from Lānaʻi get to be part of; the prom logistics question
She Applied Wanting to Go to Japan Because It Was Familiar. She Got Jeju Instead. That's When Her Perspective Changed.
When Sofia Pimentel filled out her PAAC application, she put Japan as her first choice. She knew what to expect there. It felt familiar. She got Jeju Island instead — and when she found out, something shifted. She wrote about it honestly: getting Jeju opened her mind to new opportunities for travel and learning that Japan, the comfortable choice, might not have. For a student who has spent her whole life on Lānaʻi, where everyone knows everyone and the limits of a small island are real and daily, that kind of openness matters. The Lānaʻi High junior is going to South Korea this spring.
Sofia is one of the most engaged students on an island with one school and one of everything. She's the ASB Secretary and the Hawaiʻi State Student Council representative for Lānaʻi High and Elementary — the school's connection to the statewide student voice network. She runs cross country, plays tennis, cheers, works at a local retail store, volunteers at school events and at Sacred Hearts, and has traveled to more than ten countries across four continents with her family. She has been to Kyoto, Tokyo, Nara, and Osaka. She speaks basic Japanese. Jeju is the first time she'll go somewhere she didn't already half-know.
Sofia was selected because she already understands something particular about growing up somewhere small: the quiet rhythm of a place like Lānaʻi, where how you help your neighbors and care for your land defines the community, is a form of knowledge that doesn't travel badly. Her principal challenges every student to be locally committed and globally competitive. Sofia has been both for a long time. She's going to Jeju to deepen the second part of that, and she already knows what she'll do with what she finds.
"I remember when I first filled out the applications, I really wanted to travel to Japan... Getting the chance to travel to Jeju Island opened my mind to new opportunities for travel and learning." — Sofia Pimentel, Lānaʻi High and Elementary School, Class of 2027
When Sofia comes home to Lānaʻi from Jeju, she'll return as the island's ambassador to a place most of her community has never seen — with new perspectives on how small, rural communities around the world face the same challenges Lānaʻi does. For an island where not many students get this chance, that return will be felt.
