Written by: Alex Harris

For example, approximately 70% of jobs in the technology sector are found through networking rather than traditional job advertisements. While our culture in Hawaiʻi is highly relational, students who are the first in their family to attend college or who come from low-income backgrounds tell us they often feel uncomfortable when asked to promote themselves. We know humility is part of our culture and children are taught from an early age not to brag.

So, we set out to better understand how to help local students grow their professional networks in a way that feels more respectful and authentic. Through Hawaiʻi P-20, we provided funds to four outstanding youth-serving nonprofit organizations: KUPU, Adult Friends for Youth, Hawaiʻi Workforce Pipeline and the Center for Tomorrow’s Leaders.

These four organizations spent a year testing and integrating new strategies into their work with young people. Some led mapping exercises that helped youth understand their professional networks are more extensive than they might suspect. Others led role-playing scenarios so students can practice how to introduce themselves to authority figures and respectfully keep in touch.

We are now ready to migrate these insights into the public high school curriculum. This summer, we worked with teachers and counselors to develop a set of simple lesson plans that can be taught in advisory periods and other classroom settings. In the fall, we will test this with several public high school partners.

Pursuing equity means we must interrupt deeply held behaviors that perpetuate the status quo. Teaching young people how to advocate for themselves and their future in a way that is empowering and authentic is one way to work towards this goal.