Kamuela Yong
Name Kamuela Yong
Age 36
Town/Moku Waimanalo
Island Oʻahu
Social Media Handle @KamuelaYong
Nominated by Anita Mae K. Naone
Leadership Category Education
Share with us a little about yourself and what you do.
I have always loved math but didn’t know what I could do with it so I went to college as an engineer. Along the way, I met a math professor who saw something in me that I hadn’t realized and inspired me to pursue a career in mathematics and to get my doctorate. Through this encouragement I became the first Native Hawaiian to earn a Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics. My journey to achieving this was not easy and I struggled along the way. I was fortunate to have support from others and as such, I recognize the power a mentor has on our youth. I strive to encourage more students to realize their potential and also be there when they need help. To this end, I am developing a curriculum and textbook to teach precalculus through Polynesian navigation and I plan to make this book free for all students and schools.
To the best of my knowledge, there are 40 Indigenous people from Canada to Australia with a doctorate degree in mathematics and 19 graduate students. Some of these people have gone 10 years after getting their degree before meeting another Indigenous person. To address this, I co-founded Indigenous Mathematicians (indigenousmathematicians.org) to show the Indigenous students around the world that they can be represented in the field of mathematics and to provide them with resources. I have been the de facto president of this group, starting the website with my own money before I was able to secure a grant to redesign the website which acts as a virtual hale to bring us together. I have also found most of the members in our community either through searching math departments or through writing campaigns to get the word out. Currently, I am working on trying to create a conference where we can physically come together. Before starting this community, most members could list on one hand all the Indigenous mathematicians they knew.
Why is the work that you do important to you? The community?
I would never have imagined that I would be in this career had I not had the mentors who believed in me and showed me that math can be fun. I know there are many students out there who may not have been as fortunate as me to have these mentors and opportunities. I want to redesign the mathematics curriculum to include ʻike Hawaiʻi so students can connect to the curriculum. A large barrier to students achieving college degrees in all fields is often their math class. All too often students will fail their math class and end up switching majors or dropping out of college. If I can get students to not give up on math, then they can complete their class and go on and realize their dream careers. Frequently I hear students say that they hate math and they don’t like numbers and society has accepted such statements, yet no one says they don’t like words. My goal is to give students an appreciation of the subject. I do not want them to be math majors, but instead I want to give them confidence that they can tackle a math problem both in the classroom or in the real world. This can be done through several ways including how you talk to your students as well as getting them hooked by tying ancestral knowledge into mathematics. For students who are already interested in math, the Indigenous Mathematicians community will give students the support they need to navigate the world of higher education in mathematics. Masters and doctoral students often have to leave Hawaii for their education and the journey can be difficult. Creating a community to give support to Indigenous students as well as professionals will enrich both the mathematical and Indigenous communities.
Share with us the qualities of leadership you admire and how you express those in your life.
A leader recognizes the potential of those around them and will find a way to create an environment and opportunities for everyone to thrive. In my classroom, I have found potential in all my students. In a calculus class, I had a student who got 43% on the first exam but after encouraging and working with him, his second exam improved to 55%, then to 85.5% for exam 3, and he finished the class with a perfect score of 100% on his final exam. Another student of mine took college algebra, the lowest level math offered on my campus thinking that they would be done with math forever, however after taking my class, they wanted to learn more and ended up taking every math class taught on campus and is now a statistician with the US Census Bureau. When I started mentoring Native Hawaiian students who were pursuing a PhD in mathematics, I realized that we were the only ones and I needed to bring us together so we could support each other. We soon realized that there are other Pacific Islanders and Indigenous people like us so we decided to create Indigenous Mathematicians to support each other.
Who has inspired you to do the work that you are doing?
Everything that I have accomplished is because of the support and care of my mentors and those before me. My high school teachers inspired me to go to college, my college professors inspired me to go into math and grad school, and my family and wife inspire me every day. While in college on the continent, there were programs in mathematics that were designed to help and encourage students in the black and Hispanic communities. The leaders in these communities have inspired me and eventually have helped and supported me as I developed a community for my own people. Seeing how important this community means to its members keeps me motivated. In the classroom, my students are always inspiring me. They have overcome so many obstacles to get to where they are and it makes me want to keep challenging them and seeing what they are capable of.
What is one word that describes something you are excited about for the lāhui?
Future
What is one word that describes a pressing issue that is facing our lāhui?
Sustainability