I always enjoy education forums, but even I was surprised by the creativity of some of the ideas that surfaced at a panel discussion on the state of Hawaii education Tuesday night.

And maybe it was because three of the four panelists weren’t the usual suspects:

• Jill Baldemor, executive director of Teach for America Hawaii
• Bill Reeves, co-founder of The Learning Coalition
• Maya Soetoro-Ng, of the East-West Center and founder of Our Public School. (She’s also Pres. Barack Obama’s sister.)
• Hawaii State Rep. Lyla Berg, a former teacher and principal

The theme of the evening might well have been “New Tools to Combat Apathy About Public Education.” Here are the two that stood out:

Our Public School

Our Public School, a non-profit initiative founded by Soetoro-Ng to document and disseminate successful education practices, and to get community members engaged in the success of their schools. (It’s never been done before.) One of the things I love about the initiative is its Kanu Hawaii-like commitments, which it calls “Actions for Education.” Members can submit and commit to actions that they feel passionate about and will make a difference in Hawaii’s schools.

“I want to encourage all of you to see what you can do to get the community into the schools and the schools into the community,” Soetoro-Ng told the small audience.

“One of the big issues with regards to the board of education is: had we done a better job of creating public forums, offering opportunities for real debate and engaging all of the candidates in hypotheticals and dialogue, would we have a board that more accurately reflected the needs, the wishes and the desires of the public? In any case, having forums like this is a valuable move,” she said.

The Learning Coalition

The Learning Coalition, which is a non-profit organization committed to helping Hawaii’s public school system. It aggregates resources and compiles a wealth of information on everything from teaching your child to read to understanding the Hawaii Department of Education budget and knowing what is in Race to the Top. These guys partnered with the department on the Race to the Top application.

The energetic dialogue swept well beyond the allotted time, and yet nobody went home. It was inspiring to see the level of interest many took in the education issues. Only about 60 people showed up, which Hawaii State Rep. Della Au Belatti said was fewer than she had hoped. But those who came were engaged, despite the heat in the cafeteria and the sirens that occasionally roared by outside.

Next to me sat Rachael Hudes, who teaches seventh and eighth grades at Assets School. She came, she said, because even though she teaches in a private school, she still cares about the keiki in public classrooms. Some of them end up at Assets for remedial training, but Rachael wants to see better early intervention in public schools so those students don’t fall behind in the first place. If more people were like Rachael — engaging with the public school system and public policy even though they don’t directly affect her — I suspect our schools would all be on a better footing.

“If there’s one message I want you to take away from here today, it’s that there is a way for the community to get involved,” said Au Belatti, who sponsored the free forum at Queen Kaahumanu Elementary School in Honolulu.

(Click the icon above to listen to the first 33 minutes of the forum)

(Click the icon to listen to the last hour of the forum)