Chaminade University is a unique, Federally-designated Native Hawaiian-serving institution that is positioned to lead in education and community development in the Pacific region. We educate students for careers in biomedical and behavioral sciences. With the rigorous training and engagement opportunities that derive from a research-directed undergraduate curriculum, our students will emerge as highly prepared young scientists and health practitioners. They will contribute to research and practice that will improve health, and reduce health disparities, in Pacific Island communities. The Chaminade BRIC will position our University to address the following goals: (1) educate and empower the next generation of students, primarily from Hawaii and the Pacific, to be researchers and practitioners who seek to address disease and healthcare access disparities in their home communities;(2) support a cadre of faculty researchers, from Chaminade and partner institutions, whose programs are thematically aligned around the underlying disease mechanisms and the epidemiology of pathologies that disproportionately affect minority populations in Hawaii and the Pacific;and (3) become a culturally aware center where Native Hawaiian/Pacific Island communities are engaged with faculty and students to promote community participation in research, promote informed advocacy and ensure the seamless integration of community priorities and cultural considerations with research agendas. Chaminade faces significant institutional challenges that this RIMI application will enable us to address. We are a tuition-dependent University with a small endowment, and we seek to serve students who are highly vulnerable to attrition from higher education, due to academic under-preparedness and over-whelming socioeconomic barriers.
Our Specific Aims are to establish Cores of activity in the areas of Administrative and Capacity Building, Research Faculty Development, Academic Enrichment Programs for Students, Shared Research Resources and Alterations and Renovations. The concerted efforts of these Cores will enable Chaminade to realize its full potential in education and research.
As a Native-Hawaiian and Pacific Islander-serving institution, Chaminade is uniquely positioned to train students who have first-hand experinces with the health disparities in their communities to be the next generatio of researchers and practitioners in this area.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 29 publications
