New University of Hawai’i President Wendy Hensel says she is making an effort to be transparent about what is going on behind the scenes.
“The last thing any of us wants to be, some performative encounter, right?” Hensel said. “And again, in order for me to represent you—in order for me to champion this community, I have to understand this community, and that requires regular and ongoing engagement. It’s not a one and done.”
Hensel is visiting all 10 University of Hawai’i campuses in her first few weeks. Hensel visited the Mānoa campus on Wednesday to answer questions from staff and students and discuss her plans to make the campuses more connected.
“We have really significant opportunities to work together as a system, to reach places that we cannot reach as individual campuses,” Hensel said. “So it’s not that you’re a student of the Maui campus or Kapiolani or Mānoa, you are a University of Hawai’i student.”
Hensel said in her short time here the issues she’s been focused on the most have been athletics and Hawai’i’s state legislature. She said UH Mānoa’s cost of attendance has been lowered in part to the school’s work with the legislature.
“I’ve been appreciative of the message I have received, which is that they want to see us succeed,” Hensel said. “They want to see me as the new president succeed, recognizing that the future of the state is affected by this university and so we really are partners in that conversation.”
Hensel also made it clear that she sees AI more as an opportunity rather than a concern. She said cheating with AI is “somewhat controversially, the least of my concerns.”
“This is the area as educators we need to lead,” Hensel said. “That’s what we do. We educate, and we have to begin with ourselves. So I’ve already started that conversation identifying who already here is doing this work.”
Hensel spent the hour listening to every concern from the staff and students. Throughout her conversation, she emphasized that she plans on having regular opportunities to speak with her on any issues regarding UH Mānoa.
“It’s important that we establish regular opportunities to speak with students, with faculty, with staff, so that we can build a relationship,” she said.
