Lilia Iokepa-Guerrero

Name Lilia Iokepa-Guerrero

Age 15

Town/Moku Kahaluʻu, Koʻolaupoko

Island Oʻahu

Social Media Handle @liliaig_official (Instagram)

Nominated by Leināʻala Medeiros, Niuli'i Heine

Leadership Category Mālama ʻĀina - Environmental Sustainability

Share with us a little about yourself and what you do.

Aloha! As you know my name is Lilia Iokepa-Guerrero. I live with my parents and my older brother in Kahaluʻu Koʻolaupoko, Oʻahu (fun fact: my brother is 2 days, 2 months, and 2 years older than me) :0. My platform is "E Aloha ʻĀina - Care for our land, our ocean, and most of all the people." Me and my family strive to create a healthy striving environment and community (warning: you will see me write about this a lot). We often do community service, which include beach cleanups, working in the loʻi/māla, Cop on top, helping to pass out food for families, volunteer my time for the non-profit, and many many more. Although in my free time I do like to "kick-back" and relax with my family. No matter what we do, I just love spending time with my ʻohana. I have to say my favorite times are the small things, like, simply eating together while watching tv, or going diving/swimming, even cooking, and especially learning together. Although I love to relax and spend time with my family, I do also like to hangout with my friends. :)

Why is the work that you do important to you? The community?

First of all, we not only create youth leaders in our communities, but we teach others about Aloha ʻĀina and how our lāhui can and have to change the way we use, work with and take care of our environment. We teach others how bad the environment has gotten because of our ways, and how it CAN be in the future. Not only a striving environment, but a striving lāhui as well.

The work that we do is really important. It is important because of the outcome that it has. Of a striving community and environment. The things we (all people) do (bad and good) now will affect our keiki and the generations to come. Our actions has a huge role in the outcome of how our environment and community will turn out to be. Of course you would want your keiki and their keiki to grow-up and live in a healthy environment and community with no pollution in the air, no rubbish on the sidewalk or plastic in our ocean. It is important to me and others to see just how much our actions can affect the generations to come.

Share with us the qualities of leadership you admire and how you express those in your life.

Leadership- to me leadership is someone who takes charge, who is skillful in both mentally (and sometimes physically). A leader is someone who is not afraid to stand alone, it is someone who leads others on the "right" pathway. Someone who encourages others, and is respectful. Although they might seem perfect, they do have flaws. I do consider myself as a youth Aloha ʻĀina leader. Although, I do know that I have lots to work on. I do encourage others to aloha ʻāina, I get out into the community, do community service, share these "worries" other people, and many more. But with everything that I am doing, I know that I still have many things to learn.

Who has inspired you to do the work that you are doing?

For me its not just one person, place, or thing that inspires me to do what I do. To me, what inspires me is seeing how our lāhui our community and our environment is nowadays and comparing it to how it was or looked like back then (with our kūpuna, our ancestors.) Having the urge and want to change our environment for a better environment and community

What is one word that describes something you are excited about for the lāhui?

leaders - I am excited for leaders in our community, more specifically, youth leaders growing in our community that want to and are encouraged to change our environment in a better way.

What is one word that describes a pressing issue that is facing our lāhui?

pollution - pollution has a huge role in "bringing down" our environment. Pollution is also an outcome of how we treat our environment. Really pollution teaches us how our actions can affect our environment, which affects us the community.