Aloha and welcome to a special edition of HIKI NŌ.

I'm Taylor McCann, a proud HIKI NŌ student from Hilo's Waiākea High School.

I'm standing in front of the doors to the Tapa Ballroom in the Hilton Hawaiian Village in Waikiki, site of the first ever Hawai‘i hub of the STN annual conference and competition.

STN stands for Student Television Network, and its annual conference has been called the Super Bowl of student digital media competitions.

Over its long history, the STN conference has been held in large cities on the mainland, with Hawai‘i students and their teachers traveling to those cities to compete.

And since virtually all Hawai‘i students that compete at STN are HIKI NŌ trained, the Hawai‘i contingent has been a force to be reckoned with, traditionally taking home a stunningly high number of awards for a state our size.

But for the February 2022 conference, we did something different.

We brought STN to Hawai‘i.

Playing off the national STN theme of Limitless, we called it Limitless Aloha.

I was here for that event, and believe me, it was amazing.

Here's the story of how Limitless Aloha STN in Hawai‘i came to be.

[music fades] [cheers] STN, the Student Television Network is an annual, um, competition where students from across the U.S., um, compete, uh, from middle school to high school, um, in different categories in different video, uh, competitions, whether it'd be like, short stories, or what they call Crazy 8s, or different kinds of competitions like that.

They kind of come together as teams or individuals or as pairs and, and create video projects.

And when you talk about problem solving and critical thinking, that engagement for our students was huge.

Uh, and something they're excited about, what better opportunity than, than to have them participate in STN.

The only STN competition that I participated in and was able to take students was the 2020 STN competition that took place in Washington, D.C.

Unfortunately, that was the start of the pandemic, so the convention was canceled the very day that it was supposed to start.

And then the year after that it was virtual, and then we're in, this year where, that, there was going to be held in Long Beach, California.

Traveling in the pandemic was definitely was a problem for students.

The predicament we were in was that at that time, there was really no travel that was being allowed by the state to go to the mainland for any type of, uh, competition or a convention.

And so, we were trying to figure out, you know, what's the best way that we can attend the convention without traveling all the way to California.

And a few of the media teachers from across the state, we were all talking.

And, you know, we said, "Oh, wouldn't be great, instead of working on our, uh, projects for the conference, you know, in isolation at our schools, we could just get together at somebody's school, and have our kids work together in one place and still, you know, maintain social distancing and all the COVID protocols.” Um, from there, it kind of snowballed into inviting other schools from O‘ahu, and at some point, we said, you know, what, if we're gonna do this, we might as well make it a statewide thing.

And from there, it just kind of picked up momentum and became, you know, a, a hub for STN.

STN was very supportive in the fact that okay, if you do it virtually, you can have it as a, kind of like a mini hub kind of section of their, of their event, um, and Hawai‘i was really the only one that really did that.

I want to give credit to our Hawai‘i Creative Media team of teachers, with Kevin Matsunaga, Luane Higuchi, um, Donn Yamamoto.

All those guys, uh, John Allen, Austin Zavala.

Because they actually were the workhorses behind the scenes that made this all happen for us.

So, just following emails from Hawai‘i Creative Media, you know, it sparked, there was a little bit of hope that something was gonna happen in Hawai‘i.

And I jumped on it as soon as it wasn't even official yet, but as soon as the idea came up, I was, I was in, I want to bring my students.

We just felt that we could probably pull something off if we could just get all of the teachers that normally go to STN to instead, you know, go to a location, you know, stay in Waikiki or at another spot, you know, someplace where we could gather everyone together.

And for us, you know, one of the hardest things is having a venue for our students.

We could do it on the school campus, but you know, another opportunity was to go to a ballroom and that kind of thing.

So, we went to the Hilton Hawaiian Village.

When we were asked, ‘Can we do it?’ We have the space, it's a natural fit for us to extend those types of opportunities.

And so, things like this, that we can offer a controlled environment where students can be as creative as humanly possible, but in the means of being around 23 acres, as opposed to saying go film across O‘ahu and you don't know where anyone is around the island, it provides them a good cultivating environment.

And so, the superintendent was very supportive and, and pretty much the cost of being able to use the Hilton Hawaiian Village and provide meals and the location and support for them.

And so, without his support, you know, it would have been hard to put this together in such a short timeframe to raise money.

There was a substantial financing that was involved to make this happen, to ensure that it would happen.

Again, I think, you know, looking at what the outcome and the benefit for students and student learning, as well as, uh, being able to showcase the student, the school that they represent, the community that they represent, and the state of Hawai‘i; it was an easy decision.

It was well worth the investment.

So, then we enlisted the help of PBS Hawai‘i and got them on board.

Um, we also then were able to speak to the people at ‘Ōlelo, and ‘Ōlelo TV jumped in and said they would be happy to help us with the live streaming of the events that were happening that weekend.

We also wanted to get some people that were also involved in the film side, so we reached out to some local filmmakers and got them, uh, on board.

We also reached out to the Academy of Creative Media at the UH West Oahu campus and got them to come out and do a session to explain what they're doing on their campus.

So, um, it was grassroots, led by just a group of people that were, you know, committed to making something happen here in Hawai‘i for our students who could not travel at that time to the mainland.

You know, it takes really committed educators and people to put an event like this together, all in the name of providing students with authentic opportunities to engage, not just on a local stage, but nationally, you know, and competing with peers, student peers, from across the country.

I am inside the Tapa Ballroom at the Hilton Hawaiian Village.

As you can tell, it's very quiet in here.

As the saying goes, you can hear a pin drop.

But from February 18, 2022, the opening day of Limitless Aloha, to the closing ceremonies on February 21, the sounds of excitement echoed through this ballroom and the energy was palpable.

Check it out.

[cheering] I still remember walking through the door and seeing this ballroom setup.

Uh, real chicken skin moment, um, really felt good that we were able to pull this off for students.

They were quite overwhelmed.

You know, they really felt like celebrities.

Um, they weren't expecting something of this grand scale to be put on for them.

You can just see it on their faces.

Um, you know, not just my students, but all the other students that were participating.

Uh, they really felt like they were at a, uh, national convention, a national conference.

Being back in person and having the opportunity to be with people and just like, have the magic of STN was really, really special.

So, we got to the ballroom, and there was so many other different schools.

I was really, just surprised to see everyone there, especially because of COVID, I haven't seen that much people in one place for like, years.

I think it kind of regrouped to us as a state of media schools, and, um, and it just made us all realize, um, how strong the bonds are within our own media network.

And, um, it was just incredible to be, you know, part of that weekend to see our students in person again, out in the, in the community and, and, um, competing, and helping out each other.

We still had schools that were helping out one another, and it was just a special experience.

Being surrounded by such intelligent filmmakers, um, throughout the competition was just something so crazy to me, knowing that everybody's here for the same reason because they all want to learn and get better at what they do, um, is, is really, it's really cool to know that I'm learning from them, and they're learning from me, and we'll be all in the same boat.

Only when you're there, do you get a sense of the energy, do you get a sense of the, the, the buzz among students, the excitement, uh, with teachers.

You know, and I think we had our legislative leaders there, uh, governor, Governor Ige was there, um, some of the Department of Education leaders were there.

It was exciting.

Uh, and it's, it's not something that you, you can understand until you're actually there talking with the students, and just feeling that energy in the room.

[chanting] Hawai‘i, Hawai‘i, Hawai‘i.

Oh, you made my day.

Thank you very much.

Have a great morning.

So, I entered the commercial category with Faith and Julio.

And that morning we were sitting at the ballroom, we like had our breakfast, and then we got our prompt, and we just went straight into it.

Um, it was really stressful; we only had five hours, and we realized that we had to record a lot more than what we thought we needed.

And especially since it was only 30 seconds, I thought we wouldn't, but I learned that we did.

And it was nice working with them.

I feel like we got closer and we communicated better through this experience.

Some challenges that we faced were definitely time management.

We tend to spend a lot of time focusing on one thing that sometimes we don't necessarily use.

Like, I know certain shots, we spent a lot of time setting up and taking and then we don't use them in our video.

So, we definitely have to work on that, and also like, coming up to people and asking them to interview.

It definitely pushed us out of our comfort zone, when we were going around, uh, a place that we don't really spend much time at, and we're filming people that just want to have fun and they're like, in their like vacation.

So, it was like, we don't want to intrude you, but can we take video?

A property like this that has 10,000 plus people on property every day, going through the hustle and bustle of enjoying their vacations or enjoying their business; it, it provides opportunities for people to exchange, and have interactions or witness life in its happenings.

When we were under the time pressure, I couldn't think of anything else other than making the video.

So, I had to forget that we were the underdogs and just get the video done, even though other schools had, maybe they had better equipment, larger groups, we just had to get it done.

Once we submitted our video, it was like, all of the weight was lifted off our shoulders.

We were like yes, it's, it's in, we're ready.

Um, we spent a lot of time on this and we were like, I think we just put all of our effort and our skills that we have learned back from our teachers and everything.

It was all put into this one video, and it was really good, and we’re very proud of it.

[slow music] Yeah, is that you?

One of the many conveniences of having the conference at the Hilton Hawaiian Village is that the breakout rooms for educational sessions were right next to competition headquarters in the Tapa Ballroom.

So, when students had a break in their competition, all they had to do was walk a few steps to the workshop of their choice led by HIKI NŌ staff, mentors, and other industry professionals.

We stress this when I'm, uh, mentoring in schools is scouting, preparing, doing test shooting.

The breakout sessions at the national conference are, you know, they're done by industry professionals.

And by having the conference here in Hawai‘i, we didn't want to, you know, skip that part of the conference.

We thought that was super important to do.

So, we reached out to the team at HIKI NŌ, and, and of course they said yes.

And they stepped up to the plate and they were able to support us, and, and, and they ran almost all of our sessions.

The breakout sessions were amazing.

There is a variety of topics covered, uh, for students, no matter if they're working in front of or behind the camera.

Um, some of the topics that we had were, um, things like how to get quality sound with your DSLR camera, uh, finding your story in the topic, the three-act story structure, uh, the montage, the essential element of filmmaking, uh, career pathways in journalism, script writing from voiceover to sound bite, how to shoot a sequence.

It was really beneficial because I attended one on how to find a story within a hook, and it really showed me like, how you can shape the way that your story turns out.

You want to figure out how are you going to get from that starting point, and then go in.

It might not always be going - I learned more ways to record B-roll and all the angles you need to put in.

My experience, and my talent just went up from that because I learned so many things that I could put in to my videos.

I had a projected screen that, that showed what my camera was seeing.

And even though all of their cameras may be different, uh, they could see me changing the aperture, or they could see me changing the shutter, or they could see me setting white balance and things such as this.

I think the value of the session in relation to the competition is the immediacy, and that is that they go through the process of hearing all of this, seeing it, learning about it, and then go right into having to use it.

My students could take advantage of the workshop sessions and attend and learn, and, you know, perhaps even bring some of what more they had learned from those sessions into the following day, when they were in contest.

You know, the, the focus of it all was, you know, how to support our students and teachers in actually taking productions to the next level.

The breakout sessions for me solidified some of the things that I was teaching in class.

It's different when you hear something from a teacher versus somebody that's in the industry.

Learn to use manual – Sessions and breakouts that we had were streamed back to California, and the STN group in California got to experience the same workshops that we were hosting.

So, it was a great opportunity to see, kind of bridge the gap, you could say, um, to come together and be one, one solid event.

And so, you know, we're so grateful to PBS Hawai‘i and HIKI NŌ, uh, in helping to provide that professional development for students in the workshops, and those experts that bring that rigor and the quality to a whole nother level.

After three full days of high intensity, sometimes heartbreaking competition, the moment of truth arrived on Monday, February 21, with the closing ceremonies and awards show.

Because of the time difference between Hawai‘i and the West Coast, we started at an excruciatingly early 6 a.m.

But once the presenters started announcing winners, the adrenaline kicked in, and we were all wide awake.

[cheering] The, uh, awards ceremony is, you know, is the highlight of the whole trip.

Uh, the excitement, the anticipation just builds.

What's really nice is whether they win or not, uh, they're cheering, you know, for each other.

All the Hawai‘i schools cheer for each other.

[cheering] It didn't matter if it was your school or not, as long as it was a Hawai‘i school, you cheered, and it was really loud in the room that day.

Uh, and the energy was really high, and you're just glad to be there and glad that other Hawai‘i schools could win.

We were sitting in the ballroom during the award ceremony, and I honestly thought, “Wow, that'd be very impressive if we placed because this is, this is the whole country.” I didn't really expect much out of like, us from a little town.

Honorable Mention: Lahaina Intermediate School.

[cheering] When we saw that we placed, it just, I could see it in Ms. Koyama’s eyes, my teacher.

She was very proud of us, and I was happy that she was proud of us because we worked really hard.

As we were watching the award ceremony and just seeing our name up on the screen, it was…I was in shock and just so proud, so proud of my students.

So, for the award ceremony, we were all actually at home, um, virtually listening in.

Vienna was the one who actually spread the message onto all of us, because we have like, our team group chat, and she sent it out and we were like, “Oh my gosh, this is crazy.” So yeah, she sent out the video of them announcing it, and it was like, just watching it.

It was like, “Oh my gosh, I know that they're gonna say my name.” At first place, Aliamanu Middle School.

[cheering] It’s like wow, you know, and it's kind of, uh, surreal, where you see your, your school's name up there and, you know, the students and, um, you feel really like, you know, proud that, all that time they put in and that effort, uh, it really paid off.

Everybody was screaming, um, and then they announced first place, Kaua‘i High School, and the screaming just, everybody just roared.

And I was astonished.

Um, I was shaking.

I was very, very, very surprised that I won.

Um, everybody was just screaming.

Kaua‘i High School.

[cheering] So, I got up on the stage, and all I can describe is just this feeling of holy cow.

Winning first place really marked a big turning point for me because at first, I've always been involved in journalism and media, and it was just something that I really loved to do and that I was passionate about, but I never really thought about it seriously.

But after that day, I decided that's what I'm going to do, and this is going to be my main focus, and this is going to be my life now.

Instances like that where students decide they want to continue into digital storytelling beyond high school, um, I, I think that's a wonderful thing.

You know it, it, um, helped to set them on a different course.

[cheering] So, all in all, Hawai‘i schools took home about 40 of these national awards at this convention, which was incredible.

But I, I will be, um, honest and say that I was surprised this year at how well we did, simply because of the fact that we haven't done this for two years.

To have 40 awards coming from Hawai‘i, it's not just for the individual student or team, or for that school, that's proud, but all of us in the state should be so proud of our students, and their efforts, and their passion and their motivation, as they represented all of, all of Hawai‘i.

Here are some highlights from Hawai‘i entries that took first place in their respective categories.

[upbeat drums and orchestral music] Good afternoon, Student Television Network.

My name is Maira Racoma.

And I'm Olivia Robinson, reporting in the beautiful North Shore Community of Haiku, Maui.

In this special edition of Crazy 8’s for Falcon Features, we include a feature story on Komodo bakery and how they give smiles to all.

A person on the street of how businesses keep their customers coming back to them.

A PSA on how we can pass on their smiles even with masks.

And a feature story on the beautiful Sacred Garden of Makawao, Maui.

All this and more this week on Falcon Features.

Hello, is my new roommate here?

What the, what is this stupid head doing here?

This is not a stupid head.

This is Patricia.

What is this place?

Where are we?

Jensen, what's going on?

Jensen, where's mom?

You're really scaring me right now.

We're gonna be okay guys, just, I need you two to listen.

Um, grab onto this.

Hold this.

Why?

Just trust me, okay?

Close your eyes.

Don't look back.

[snare drum music] [guitar plays] I'll take it as it comes.

What else can I do?

Yeah, I'm alright on my own.

I let it go.

A lot of business is word of mouth, and you see it on Instagram, or someone posts, like, specials.

Um, people post these, “Oh I saw that on Instagram,” and so they want to try it, and so it's just great.

For Student Television Network, this is Natalie Lett reporting.

Best friends for life.

[whoop] Good girl.

We're going to be best friends forever.

I'm gonna call you – Lani, I need you to sign these papers.

Are there any questions?

No, no, thank you.

[slow piano music] [slow violin music] [Coffee machine whirrs and piano plays] Caffeine makes me dizzy when I take it with no cream, but milk and sugar goes straight to your thighs.

So, I take mine black, and hot.

The warmth stings the fingernail indents coating the back of my throat.

But I don't mind.

After a while, I can't even feel it at all.

My outfit has been curated to show enough of my stomach to fit in with the pretty girls, but not enough for anyone to see how harshly I do not fit in with the pretty girls.

To watch all of the award-winning entries from STN 2022, go to PBSHawaii.org/LimitlessAloha.

As a visual storyteller, I like stories that have a moral.

I think the moral behind Limitless Aloha STN in Hawai‘i is that when it comes to providing life changing educational experiences for Hawai‘i students, different sectors of the community will come together and move mountains to make dreams come true.

Thank you for watching this special edition of HIKI NŌ.

Be sure to tune in next week for more proof that Hawai‘i's young people HIKI NŌ, can do.

And then when we got back to school, and we won first place, everybody was so proud of us.

And they looked at us like, “Wow, they won first place.

That’s so amazing.” And I remember all the teachers saying congratulations, and just, it was it was a really amazing experience and everything.

Every time I think of media, I think of STN and I feel like that's going to be something that I never forget.

When we placed I, I felt so like, proud and special, and especially because everyone in Hawai‘i was cheering for us, I felt like we, we belong.

[slow ukulele music]