An innovative nutrition program’s successful launch received an important endorsement and boost thanks to a new federal grant awarded to Chaminade University.
Chaminade’s College of Nursing & Health Professions has been awarded a $500,000 competitive grant from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to promote healthy nutrition among youth from grade school through college. The award is being distributed by USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. USDA-NIFA is issuing the prize under the federal Alaska Native-Serving and Native Hawaiian-Serving Institutions Education Competitive Grants Program.
Chaminade’s nutrition program will use the funds to operate a program titled “Nourishing the Keiki: K-12 to Higher Education Pipeline.” The grant will be distributed by USDA on an annual basis beginning in Fall 2026 through September 2029.
“It’s a project I’m genuinely excited about,” said Melissa Cline, DrPH, Assistant Professor of Nutrition and Chaminade’s Nutrition Program Director.
Cline said Nourishing the Keiki will focus on introducing students to healthier diets using ingredients common to Native Hawaiian cuisine and readily available in Hawaiʻi. Students will be taught how to build recipes with these healthier, more traditional foods using common kitchen appliances that young people can easily operate.
The program qualified for the USDA-NIFA grant because it’s designed “with a strong focus on recruiting and supporting Native Hawaiian students,” Cline said.
Nourishing the Keiki is further designed to benefit all involved. Chaminade nutrition students will lead the project and provide lessons to youth and peers on preparing nutritious and balanced meals using local and Native Hawaiian traditional ingredients. Students at K-12 institutions will, in turn, learn more about nutrition and Chaminade’s nutrition and dietetics programs, health fields struggling with shortages of qualified practitioners in Hawaiʻi and nationally.
An initial pilot project launches in January 2027 at St. Louis School, but Cline said other Catholic grade schools are already signing on.
The college’s Nourishing the Keiki program is ambitious, but Cline said the USDA award represents an important first step toward establishing what will hopefully become a permanent project.
“While $500,000 is not enough to cover every school, it definitely provides initial equipment,” she said. “And then our goal from there is to try to get it supported with other grants to keep it going and then expand it throughout the community.”
The equipment to be integrated as part of the nutrition education initiative includes rice cookers, slow cookers, air fryers, portable ovens, microwaves, and other such small kitchen appliances that students are likely to have at home and can operate by themselves. These appliances will be used for a comprehensive and “age-appropriate, culturally relevant nutrition curriculum units for middle and high school students that emphasize Hawaiʻi’s food systems and food security,” Cline explained.
The specialized nutrition curriculum under the program, Cline added, will be tailored toward local and Native Hawaiian contexts, in keeping with Chaminade’s strategic vision of anchoring students with a stronger sense of place and purpose while advancing relevant academic instruction.
“These aren’t generic materials,” she said. “They’re grounded in local context and designed to resonate with students’ lived experiences.”
A portion of the grant will also be used to fund scholarships for nine Native Hawaiian-focused students each grant year. These scholars will be paired with students from K-12 institutions participating in Nourishing the Keiki, providing Chaminade University nutrition students with real-world and hands-on experience while they get to serve as role models for younger students and as ambassadors for the nutrition program and paths for careers in nutrition and dietetics.
Cline said she’s hopeful that the program makes an impact well beyond education and curriculum.
Large numbers of people in the state suffer from nutrition-related health issues and chronic diseases. By imparting to Chaminade and K-12 students healthy nutrition lessons and skills, it is hoped young participants will carry these lessons with them throughout their adult lives.
The USDA-NIFA grant and its funding of Nourishing the Keiki will prove a win-win for all involved, Cline said.
“We’re building a diverse, culturally competent nutrition workforce,” she said. “We’re providing K-12 students with foundational nutrition knowledge and real career awareness.”
“We’re creating authentic learning partnerships between schools and higher education, and critically, we’re grounding all of this work in cultural respect, food justice, and health equity.”
Grant number: 2026-38470-46946