PUHI — The Mokihana Club launched its year by presenting a total of $30,000 to 20 students in the Kaua‘i Community College (KCC) Nursing Program on Monday.
In addition to the $30,000 in awards to current nursing program students, the Mokihana Club announced an additional $10,000 in scholarships awarded to two students, Deva Siblerud, and Mary Hall — both graduates of the KCC Nursing program — who are pursuing Bachelor of Science in Nursing degrees.
“It is the Mokhana Club’s intention to continue to do all we can to support the nursing program, successfully,” said Mokihana Club President Terri Gately.
The Mokihana Club was founded in 1905 by Miss Mabel Wilcox, herself a graduate from the Registered Nurse Program at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, to create funding for nursing scholarships and other causes, states a Mokihana Club announcement of the scholarships for 2023.
In the two decades the Mokihana Club has been presenting awards to nursing students, nearly $350,000 has been distributed by the club that boasts 70 members. During that time frame, many of the scholarship recipients have completed the program successfully and are currently employees as nurses in the state of Hawai‘i, the announcement states.
In a press release covering the 2022 scholarships presentation, the Mokihana Club offered its first $1,000 scholarship to Sandra Hanna in October 2003, after receiving funding via the Mokihana Golf Scramble. This tradition continued until 2019, when the scholarship funding was generated by concerts featuring Hawaiian artists.
During the pandemic, the concerts were suspended and the nursing scholarship funding was supplemented by donations from the club’s members and friends, resulting in $29,000 in scholarship awards to 18 KCC Nursing Program students in 2022.
The Mokihana Club recently discovered a comment from its first chair of the Nursing Scholarship Committee, Marie Ryan Pietro, which appears relevant 20 years after the club’s first scholarship presentation.
“We look forward to an ever-increasing program directly connected to one of the Mokihana Club founders, Miss Mabel Wilcox who graduated from the R.N. program at John Hopkins University, and was responsible for many of the local health decisions made those many years ago,” Pietro said.
The nursing students continue to remember and honor Miss Mabel Wilcox by hosting their traditional Pinning Ceremony following graduation on the grounds of the Grove Farm Museum, which was Wilcox’s residence.
