His Grandmother Talked About Okinawa His Whole Life. This March, He's Finally Going.
One of 42 public high school students selected for the 2026 Hawaiʻi Sister-State Study Tours.
Student Snapshot
Name: Nainoa Hooke
Preferred Name: Nainoa
School: Kohala High School
Grade: 11th
Home Community: Waikoloa Village, South Kohala, Hawaiʻi Island
Delegation: Okinawa
Travel Dates: March 14–25/26, 2026
Focus Interests / Extracurriculars: Jiujitsu, wrestling, baking; Naʻau Oiwi ALO (Alternative Learning Opportunities) program — community-based hands-on learning cohort; traveled to South Korea with ALO group to study agricultural techniques; presented learnings to local community and Starseed Ranch upon return
Career Aspirations: Agricultural sustainability and community self-sufficiency — his vision for Hawaiʻi centers on local farming, green energy, restored public transportation, and using local materials for building; not a named career but a clear civic and environmental direction
Why They Were Selected
Nainoa has already done exactly what this program asks students to do — he went to South Korea, learned advanced agricultural techniques, came home, and shared them with his community. He didn't file a report. He presented at a local ranch. He's also a student who found his way to learning through Naʻau Oiwi, a program built for students who thrive outside traditional classroom settings — and he's thriving. His grandmother is Okinawan. He has never been. This trip is personal in a way that few students in this cohort can claim.
What They're Excited About
Going to a place his family comes from; learning what his grandmother experienced there; understanding agricultural and cultural practices he can bring back to Waikoloa and Kohala; being speechless in the best way possible
His Grandmother Talked About Okinawa His Whole Life. This March, He's Finally Going.
Nainoa Hooke grew up in Waikoloa Village listening to his grandmother talk about Okinawa. She's sansei — third-generation Okinawan in Hawaiʻi — and the stories she told painted a picture of a place Nainoa had never seen but somehow already knew was part of him. When he opened his email and found out he'd been selected as a PAAC Sister-State Student Ambassador, he was speechless. Then he was excited. Then he started thinking about what he'd bring home.
Nainoa is a junior at Kohala High School on the Big Island, where he practices jiujitsu, wrestles, and bakes — making desserts he carefully studies and perfects. He's also part of Naʻau Oiwi, an Alternative Learning Opportunities program that takes students out of traditional classrooms and into the community for hands-on education. Last summer, that program took him to South Korea, where he learned about AI-assisted seed selection and advanced farming techniques. When he got back to Kohala, he didn't just write a report — he presented what he learned to his community, including a local ranch called Starseed.
Nainoa was selected because he already understands what this program is actually about. He went somewhere, paid attention, came home, and shared what he found. His analysis of the South Korea trip — that the farming techniques he learned were "more advanced than what Hawaiʻi is currently ready for" — shows the kind of honest, grounded thinking that turns travel into something useful. Now he's going to Okinawa, where his own family came from, with the same clear intention: learn something real, and bring it back.
"My grandma is full Okinawan and is sansei — a third generation Okinawan living in Hawaiʻi. She would sometimes talk about Okinawa, and I would love to see what Okinawa is like on this trip." — Nainoa Hooke, Kohala High School, Class of 2027
When Nainoa returns to Waikoloa from Okinawa, he'll have something his grandmother has spent a lifetime describing — firsthand. For a community built on farming, self-sufficiency, and deep roots in the land, the knowledge and stories he brings back will carry weight far beyond a classroom.
