Only a few rare educational studies have focused on the indigenous population of Hawaii; making Native Hawaiians one of the most understudied populations in the educational literature. Usually when Hawaiians are included in a study they are bundled under the heading of “Asian Americans”. This study uses data from a unique project that focuses on alumni and a set of students who received a special financial aid from a private school dedicated to the education of Native Hawaiians. The study proceeds to identify the factors leading to the acquisition of a bachelor’s degree of Native Hawaiians from the high school graduating classes of 1993, 1994, and 1995. Major findings include: financial aid is an important contributor to college completion; students attending college on the mainland tend to complete their degree in higher proportion than those who remain in Hawaii; and students who begin their postsecondary experiences at a community college are much less likely to attain a bachelor’s degree
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/linda_hagedorn/13/