Honolulu Community College
Committee On Social Equity
Annual Report for the 2014-2015 Academic Year
Membership
Monir Hodges, Carol Kagimoto, ShidongKan, Brenda Kwon, Janina Martin (Co-Chair), Guy Shibayama (Co-Chair), David Wong
The Co-Chairs commend the membership on their hard work and dedication to providing the Honolulu Community College campus with important resources and information over the course of the 2014-2015 school year.
Committee Meeting Dates
Sept. 22, Oct. 13, Nov. 24, Dec. 15, Feb. 4, Feb. 23, April 13, May 18
“Awareness Doesn’t End”: November 5, 2014
An event was planned to provide students, faculty and staff with information on domestic abuse and sexual assault. Brenda Kwon secured speakers Brooke Conway from the Sex Abuse Treatment Center and MandideSouza from the Domestic Violence Action Center. They came to take part in an informational session held in the Loui room from 12pm-1pm. Attendees were presented with information on on-campus resources as well as community resources.
The “No More” campaign against violence was introduced and utilized as a heading for an interactive board inviting participants to finish the sentence “I say No More because…” The responses from individuals included sentiments such as “I say no more because everyone has a right to feel safe!” to “No means No.”
A total of 50 attendees participated in this event comprised of 3 staff, 11 faculty and 36 students.
Movie “Tough Guise” showing and facilitated discussion: April 29, 2015
As a follow up event to the “Awareness Doesn’t End” event and in support of the recent nationwide focus on college campus policies and awareness around Title IX and the Cleary Act, COSE provided a showing of the movie “Tough Guise” with guest facilitator Brian Bilsky from the UH Women’s Studies department [faculty]. Brian no longer teaches there, but he is from the department. Brian led a discussion post-viewing of this movie based on the research of Dr. Jackson Katz. “Tough Guise” proposes that masculinity and the idea of what makes a “man” in the American cultural sense is detrimental and directly related to high levels of violence being played out in schools and neighborhoods around the country. Attendees reflected upon the prevalence of bullying behaviors they have seen and experienced, questioned what they could do as individuals, and spoke about the need for future resources and dialogue around the topic on campus.
Evaluations collected post showing and discussion showed an overwhelming sense that this topic was timely and thought provoking. Many comments back to the committee were that people felt there needed to be more events where the campus community could share thoughts and ideas. There were a total of 57 attendees: 31 were students, 19 faculty, 3 staff, 3 administrative personnel, and 1 was a representative from the State Sheriffs Training Division.
Submitted by Janina Martin and Guy Shibayama, Co-Chairs COSE 2014-2015