Koyo High School Visit

Koyo Senior High School students visited in August. The students were with their specified Kalani host for one week. The Koyo students and the Kalani students got to interact with each other and shared laughter and smiles. The Kalani students took their host/guest to all types of places around the island such as Diamond Head, Magic Island, and the Kalani football game. The Kalani students took them to school to teach them of their student lifestyle. Although that each of the students had fun during the week, the hard part was saying “goodbye” to the Koyo Senior High School students. Some Koyo Senior High School students enjoyed their visit to Kalani and shared their experience. The Koyo students enjoyed interactions with the Kalani students in class, at the football game, and at the beach. They also enjoyed how welcoming everybody was. The Koyo students and the Kalani students will later meet up again in November. The special bond of the students that was made in Hawaii will be created again when they both meet each other again in Japan.

In November, the Kalani students will have to adapt the lifestyle of Japan for one week. Instead of the Kalani students going to a Hawaii high school with less stricter guidelines, they will be going to a much stricter school in Japan. The teachers who visited from Koyo High School, Mr. Masahiro Kohata and Mr. Yoshinori Sotome shared their observations on the differences they saw. For example, you are not allowed to eat or drink in class in the high schools in Japan. you are not allowed to eat or drink in class. The difference between the two schools were shared out by the two teachers who visited from Koyo High School. They shared out some of the differences between Kalani and Koyo.

The Koyo High School students have to wear uniforms, with no ear piercings or hair dye allowed.  Students are in charge of cleaning classrooms, the outside walls, and even the bathrooms after school. They also take recycling seriously. The trash is divided by sections such as paper, plastic, and aluminum bottles, and you are responsible to take home your own trash you bring onto campus.

Unlike the schools in Hawaii, the students generally stay in the same classroom while the teachers move between classes with a “homeroom” teacher that follows one classroom of students throughout all four years of high school.  This “homeroom” teacher acts as an advisor, counselor, etc. to these students. The teachers say this is beneficial because they get to know the students well since you interact with them over the course of four years. The rules in Japan are quite the opposite from  the rules at Kalani. However, the teachers mentioned that there will be exceptions to the rules when the Kalani students visit.