Opele Revisited: How Oceanic Blackness Impacts Student Belonging and Success

Abstract

The Opele Report of 1992 provided a window into the concerns surrounding educational opportunities and quality of education for underrepresented Black students at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa (UHM) (Takara, 1992, p. 4). By providing a comprehensive analysis, the “Opele Report” suggested multiple ways to improve Black student and faculty retention, recruitment, and well-being. Thirty years later, what has changed? How has Black student life and well-being improved, and how supported do they feel? How do they envision their belonging in an oceanic educational space where they are traditionally underrepresented? How might their experiences provide a space to rethink Blackness in oceanic settings? This article revisits the “Opele Report” by providing a window into the contemporary experiences of the 1.8% Black student population on campus by highlighting how they cultivate belonging while navigating their intersectional identities on the University of Hawaʻi at Mānoa campus. I focus on six former and current students affiliated with the Black Student Association as they engage in storytelling surrounding Blackness and belonging on campus and in Hawaiʻi as an expansion of a previous photo voice project and current documentary project. Each student’s response to a series of prompts reveals how Black hypervisibility and invisibility impact their on-campus experiences with belonging while gesturing to how it helps them expand conceptions of Blackness in an oceanic setting. Their dialogue highlights the need to honestly address diversity, inclusion, equity, and justice work on university campuses, including those beyond the continental United States. From experiencing tokenism from colleagues and throughout campus to racism from peers, these students’ experiences highlight the intricacies of finding belonging in the face of anti-Blackness that remains pervasive on campus and statewide.