{"id":9953,"date":"2023-05-10T07:44:00","date_gmt":"2023-05-10T17:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/?p=9953"},"modified":"2025-03-24T10:08:21","modified_gmt":"2025-03-24T20:08:21","slug":"2023-kahuku-high-student-named-2023-u-s-presidential-scholar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/2023-kahuku-high-student-named-2023-u-s-presidential-scholar\/","title":{"rendered":"Kahuku High student named 2023 U.S. Presidential Scholar"},"content":{"rendered":"

U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona\u00a0announced\u00a0Kahuku High & Intermediate School senior Vaeanui Peck as one of three Hawai\u2018i scholars in the 59th class of\u00a0U.S. Presidential Scholars<\/a>. (The other two scholars are enrolled in Hawai\u2018i private schools.) This year\u2019s class recognized a total of 161 high school seniors nationwide for their accomplishments in academics, the arts, and career and technical education fields.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vaeanui was selected as a U.S. Presidential Scholar in Career and Technical Education \u2014 a category that only honors up to 20 students. A total of nine Hawai\u2018i students, which included five Hawai\u2018i public school seniors, were selected as\u00a0semifinalists<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are so proud to have Vaeanui representing the state of Hawai\u2018i for the prestigious U.S. Presidential Scholars Program \u2014 one of the nation\u2019s highest honors for high school students,\u201d Hawai\u2018i State Department of Education Superintendent Keith Hayashi said. \u201cIt’s always validating to see our Hawai\u2018i public school students recognized for their outstanding achievements and for our schools to be elevated on a national scale. The entire HIDOE celebrates Vaeanui, her family and Kahuku High & Intermediate on this well-deserved and prestigious achievement.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We are very proud of Vaeanui,\u201d added Kahuku High & Intermediate School Principal Donna Lindsey. \u201cThis is a tremendous honor for Kahuku High & Intermediate School and the Castle-Kahuku Complex Area. Vaeanui has already accomplished so much and we look forward to seeing all that she will accomplish in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Vaeanui is ranked first in her class with a 4.145 GPA and will be graduating as a valedictorian with academic, STEM Capstone, National Honor Society and CTE honors. She is a participant of the Windward Community College Early College Program and has accumulated 26 college credits toward an associate\u2019s degree. Vaeanui is also involved in her school\u2019s CTE club, hydroponics program, and has participated in track and field and cross country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A strong advocate of sustainability, Vaeanui has been serving as an agricultural engineering intern at Kualoa Ranch this past school year where she\u2019s built a vertical saltwater hydroponic system for sea asparagus \u2014 the first of its kind. After graduating, Vaeanui will be attending Yale University where she will be pursuing a degree in mechanical engineering and a certificate in Renewable Energy Systems. She hopes to become an engineer focusing on promoting renewable energy to help developing nations move toward sustainable energy sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\u202fWhite House Commission on Presidential Scholars<\/a>\u00a0selects scholars annually based on their academic success, artistic and technical excellence, essays, school evaluations and transcripts, as well as a demonstrated commitment to community service and leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of the 3.7 million students expected to graduate from high school this year, more than 5,000 candidates qualified for the 2023 awards determined by outstanding performance on the College Board SAT or ACT exams or through nominations made by\u202fchief state school officers, other partner recognition organizations\u202fand\u00a0YoungArts<\/a>, the National Foundation for the Advancement of Artists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As directed by Presidential Executive Order, the 2023 U.S. Presidential Scholars are comprised of one young man and one young woman from each state, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, and U.S. families living abroad, as well as 15 chosen at-large, 20 scholars in the arts and 20 scholars in career and technical education.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Created in 1964, the U.S. Presidential Scholars Program has honored over 8,000 of the nation\u2019s top-performing students. The program was expanded in 1979 to recognize students who demonstrate exceptional talent in the visual, literary and performing arts. In 2015, the program was again extended to recognize students who demonstrate ability and accomplishment in career and technical education fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Presidential Scholars Class of 2023 will be recognized for their outstanding achievement this summer with an online recognition program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A complete list of 2023 U.S. Presidential Scholars is available at\u00a0http:\/\/www.ed.gov\/psp<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona\u00a0announced\u00a0Kahuku High & Intermediate School senior Vaeanui Peck as one of three Hawai\u2018i scholars in the 59th class of\u00a0U.S. Presidential Scholars. (The other two scholars are enrolled in Hawai\u2018i private schools.) This year\u2019s class recognized a total of 161 high school seniors nationwide for their accomplishments in academics, the arts, […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","wp_popup_display_lightbox":0,"wp_popup_suppress":"","wp_popup_trigger":"","wp_popup_trigger_amount":0,"wp_popup_disable_on_mobile":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":21,"label":"News"}]},"featured_image_src_large":false,"author_info":{"display_name":"Chanel Honda","author_link":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/author\/chanel-hondak12-hi-us\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":21,"name":"News","slug":"news","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":21,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":306,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":21,"category_count":306,"category_description":"","cat_name":"News","category_nicename":"news","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-14 20:18:17","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"post_status","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9953\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hawaiipublicschools.org\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}