A Ninth Grader From Kīhei Is Headed to Ilocos Norte — And She's Been Preparing for Years Without Knowing It
One of 42 public high school students selected for the 2026 Hawaiʻi Sister-State Study Tours.
Student Snapshot
Name: Agnes Margaret Watt
School: Kulanihākoʻi High School
Grade: 9th
Home Community: Kīhei/South Maui
Delegation: Ilocos Norte/Sur
Travel Dates: March 14–26, 2026
Focus Interests / Extracurriculars: Girl Scouts (including World Thinking Day), baking, sewing, crafting, piano, aerial silks, dance, martial arts; leadership group (presented on homeroom Kuleana on O'ahu); STEM conference attendee; straight-A student
Career Aspirations: Becoming a responsible traveler, cultural learner, and community contributor
Why They Were Selected
Aggie is a ninth grader who applied knowing the odds were against her — and got in anyway. What makes her stand out isn't a packed résumé but a genuine, unhurried curiosity about the world: she researches cultures for fun through Girl Scouts, bakes dishes from places she's never been, and has been quietly building a global perspective since childhood. Her honesty about not yet having made a lasting community impact — and her determination to change that — shows a self-awareness rare at any age.
What They're Excited About
Immersing herself in Ilocano culture, food, and fashion; connecting with family friends from the region and learning how things have changed over decades; paying attention to how communities are structured and bringing those lessons back to Maui
She Opened the Email Expecting a Rejection. Then She Squealed.
Aggie Watt assumed she didn't have a chance. There's a preference for sophomores and juniors in the PAAC Sister-State program, and she was applying as a ninth grader from Kīhei. So when the email landed in her inbox, she braced herself — and then she opened it, saw the word accepted, and squealed and jumped up and down. This March, she'll travel to Ilocos Norte as one of the youngest ambassadors in the program.
Aggie is a student at Kulanihākoʻi High School on Maui's south shore, where she's carrying straight A's while staying active in Girl Scouts, pursuing aerial silks and dance, and spending her free time baking, sewing, and researching cultures she hasn't visited yet. That last habit is the one that matters most here. Through Girl Scouts' World Thinking Day, she's been making dishes and building presentations about far-flung places for years — not because she had to, but because she wanted to.
She was selected because her curiosity is the real kind — patient, specific, and grounded. She has family friends from Ilocos Sur and Norte, and she's already thinking about the conversations she'll have with them when she gets home, comparing what she saw with what they remember. Growing up surrounded by people from all walks of life — her father's construction crews, her mother's special education students — gave her an early education in difference that most students don't get until much later.
"I can't think of anything I've done that would have left an impact in a way that would last — this is why I want to take any opportunities I can to learn and improve myself so I can in turn improve the community that has surrounded me as I've grown." — Agnes Margaret Watt, Kulanihākoʻi High School, Class of 2029
Aggie is going to Ilocos Norte to pay attention — to how communities are built, how institutions are shaped, and what Maui might learn from what she finds. She's fourteen years old and already asking those questions. Whatever she brings home to Kīhei, it will be the beginning of something, not the end.
Aggie is a constituent of House District [#] and Senate District [#], represented by [Legislator Name] in the Hawaiʻi State Legislature. ([VERIFY WITH DISTRICT LOOKUP])
