Working with a 7-year-old girl from Tonga with cerebral palsy named Maikale, along with her family members who are living in TVA, students in this semester’s SPED 370 class have gone above and beyond what they were assigned to do, said Dr. Barbara Hong, who teaches Special Education classes.

The Student Events team transformed the Little Circle into a roller disco on Jan. 8 from 8-10 p.m., complete with competitive games, prizes, and music provided by local deejay Viliami Toilolo.

President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Russell M. Nelson, and his wife, Wendy, offered new perspectives to the terms “millennial” and “desperation” in this year’s first worldwide devotional for young adults broadcast from the BYU-Hawaii campus. The couple spoke on topics relating to identity and potential – words that resonated with BYUH students.

With the New Year, Hawaii became the first state to accommodate the hearing and visually impaired in movie theaters, reports Hawaii News Now.

Jane-Lyn Scotty is the first and so far only student attending BYU-Hawaii from an island country in Micronesia called Nauru, and recently hoisted her home country’s flag to join the circle that marks the university’s entrance. Scotty, a political science major, said she has a passion for people and plans to return home to help her country and fellow Nauruans. “Not a lot of people know where Nauru is, so I’m happy my flag is up there to recognize that I am proud to be Nauruan,” said Scotty. Scotty joined the LDS Church while attending high school in Kiribati, where she lived with relatives. “In high school, I wasn’t that serious about the church until the end,” said Scotty. “I saw different families happily living the gospel and realized I wanted that for my family. It made me really want to be a part of it.” Currently, Nauru has placed restrictions on the church’s presence in its country. Scotty, who served her mission in the Utah Salt Lake City East Mission, hopes to one day bring the church to Nauru. Through her membership, Scotty was able to come here to BYUH and receive an education, the best part of which, she said, is the people. “I love getting to interact with all sorts of different people and getting to know more about their different cultures,” said Scotty. “I love to just talk to people, meet different people and get to know them. I just talk to anyone.” Originally, Scotty said she had planned to major in information technology but switched to political science, which so far she loves. “I love it because it helps me understand how things work, and what’s going on around the world,” said Scotty, “and how a government should run.” Elder Sam McCollum and Sister Jeannine McCollum, senior missionaries in the Career and Academic Success Center, met Scotty at the PCC during their scheduled time for distributing tickets. “We encouraged her to come in and see us,” said Sister McCollum. “We have a map on our wall where we try to put a pin for all the different countries students are from. We currently have about 35-36 different countries,” Sister McCollum added. “We found out she was from a country we hadn't heard about before.” Elder McCollum checked into the statistical information of the country of Nauru, which, according to him, is the world’s third smallest country. McCollum then informed BYUH President John Tanner about his findings. “I thought it would be really nice if we could have a flag for her, and he agreed,” he said. “When I first came home from my mission it was hard because there was a specific way I wanted things to work out,” said Scotty, “but it didn’t happen the way that I wanted. Later I realized I didn’t actually want it that way, and I was able to be happy with Heavenly Father’s plan. Everything is going to work out the way Heavenly Father wants it, even though we may not want it at first.” Elder McCollum said of Scotty, “She has a very positive attitude. She knows where she's going and she sees that she can help her small country so that's what she wants to do.” After returning from her mission, Scotty came to BYUH. She said not seeing her family for so long is hard. But if there’s anything she has learned, it is “everything is going to work out.” Uploaded Jan. 14, 2015

Several students shared although they had an enjoyable time back home during the two-week Christmas break, they missed some aspects of their home here in Hawaii.

Beau Mills has lived on the Big Island of Hawaii for 16 years with his family, he said. Recently, he took a group of 30 scouts on a trip to Hookena Beach, located on the Big Island. He led scouts and some families to the beach towards the end of October.

The two week Winter break saw some students leaving for home or new lands, while others stayed and worked.

Going to school in what USA Today says is the most expensive state to live in can make finding affordable activities challenging. Through Residence Life and the Student Events team in Student Leadership, Activities and Service, BYU-Hawaii provides fresh movies each month for students living in the hales and TVA that can be viewed at the campus Little Theatre, online, and on television.The Residence Life offerings extend to the Little Theatre and sometimes the Aloha Center, where a selection of 12 different movies per month play for the residents, with a showing every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Online, movies have three months before they are taken down. A sophomore from Nevada studying social work, Emma Baggett, said she has been taking advantage of being able to watch them online. “It’s a lot easier to watch them online whenever you can,” Baggett said, “because of time constraints and homework.” While others may come to enjoy the movies, they are specifically arranged as a benefit for those residents staying in on campus housing as an extension of their lounge space, according to Alison Whiting, director of Student Leadership, Activities and Service (SLAS).Shirley Tovey is the Coordinator of Student Development for SLAS. She helps to coordinate the movie showings and said the way to for on campus residents to access the movies online is simple. “To get the movies on demand, you just type in the link https://movies.byuh.edu/site/SDC/content/browse.aspx.” Tovey said it can also be accessed through the BYUH home page by searching ‘movies on demand’ and clicking ‘Free on Demand Movies/BYU-Hawaii Calendar,’ then clicking the link https://watchnow.reslife.com/byu. Along with the online movies, all the movies that month are also available on television.“They've been around for longer than I've been in school,” Tovey said. Tovey said she has fond memories of watching the movies via television when she lived in the hales. “If on my day off if it was raining–and back then I didn’t have a laptop–I would go in the lounge.” There she would turn to the BYUH channel. “That’s where I was able to see the movies and spend my day watching movies.” She noted the absence of commercials was also a plus. “They just showed one movie after the next,” she said. The committee in charge of choosing movies, which Tovey is a part of, makes sure each movie follows BYUH’s Movie and Entertainment Policy, and is in standards with the school and church. The company that the school rents the movies from, Swank Motion Pictures, edits out vulgar language in order to maintain the standards, said Tovey. Because of the atmosphere this creates, Tovey said, “We have a lot of families [living in Temple View Apartments that] come on the weekends with their children.” Freshman Ammon Autele, a business management major from American Samoa, came with his family when he was between the ages of 3 and 6. “I still remember watching Mulan. I loved it… We used to go with a bunch of other TVA family friends.” Uploaded Jan. 14, 2016