Farrington High School’s Matthew “Matt” Legg, a 17-year-old junior, didn’t know how to swim growing up in Kalihi but finally learned when he joined Farrington’s surf team, where his teammates and coach enthusiastically support two legislative bills that would provide funding for high school surf teams across the islands where the sport was born.
House Bill 133 and its companion, Senate Bill 178, would provide as-yet unspecified funding to the state Department of Education to create high school surf teams and leagues across the islands.
HB 133 has been scheduled for a hearing by the House Finance Committee at 10 a.m. today.
Prior bills have died after resistance from the state Department of Education over financial, safety and liability concerns.
But support for surf teams and leagues has taken off this legislative session after the first Hawaii Water Safety report by the Water Safety Coalition showed that drowning was “the foremost cause of death” for Hawaii children ages 1 to 15.
The coalition supports HB 133 and SB 178 along with bills it introduced this session that emphasize the need to get children and adults better trained to prevent them from drowning.
The lack of an organized network of school surf teams across the islands is keenly felt by the many passionate surfers who are too young for high school, in high school, or are adults who wish they could have surfed on their school teams.
Several spoke to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser at Kaisers, a surf spot near Ala Moana and Waikiki, and universally supported formal high school teams.
And they said they don’t understand the lack of state funding for teams and leagues in the birthplace of surfing.
Hawaii is also the home of legendary waterman Duke Kahanamoku, an five-time Olympic swimming medalist widely considered Hawaii’s original ambassador of aloha, who helped spread surfing around the world.
Kahanamoku graduated from McKinley High School, which honors his legacy with a photo portrait of him in its “Hall of Honor” in the school’s administration hall.
But McKinley doesn’t have a surf team.
Malia Manuel, 17-year-old McKinley senior, will graduate this year and would have liked to be a part of a school surf team, along with other McKinley surfers.
Manuel, who grew up surfing at Kaisers, called surfing “a really common, fun local activity, I think that students would actually be interested in learning!,” in a text to the Star-Advertiser.
Sarah Fairchild, executive director at the Outrigger Duke Kahanamoku Foundation, has been a longtime advocate for student access to surf teams and disagrees with safety concerns.
The DOE surfing regulation written in 2014 mandates that “all of the coaches must go through water safety training and all of the players must participate in junior lifeguard classes,” she said by phone to the Star-Advertiser.
“The existing surf league on Maui and the club leagues on Oahu have a great safety record,” Fairchild said, “It’s probably got more safety regulations than any of the other sports that the DOE participates in.”
Kim Ball, the original organizer and co-coordinator for the Maui Interscholastic League surfing, said safety hasn’t been an issue since the league unofficially began in 1995.
“We’ve never had a fracture, dislocation or concussion at any of our MIL contests,” he said via phone to the Star-Advertiser.
“No major injuries.”
He thinks that liability concerns don’t pose a strong argument against state funding for school surf teams.
“We’ve proved to be one of the safest Interscholastic sports,” Ball wrote in a follow-up text.
For some students at Farrington, the surf team was the first place they learned to swim and gained confidence in the water.
Although Farrington had no state funding to start a surf team, it was Brady Giusta’s passion and commitment that made the team a reality in 2008 and led them to a state championship that same year.
Students need to keep a 2.0 grade-point average to stay on the surf team, as with any other high school sport, but Giusta gives team members a goal to encourage working for even higher grades.
“If they keep a 3.0 all year, they get a board they get to keep at the end of the year — any incentive to keep our kids in school,” Giusta said.
“For us it’s not about the competitions and winning, No. 1 is that I help our students with their dreams and goals for the future.”
Giusta wants more students to have the opportunity to try surfing on a team, especially for those who haven’t been able to participate for financial reasons.
The Farrington team holds fundraisers and welcomes donations, however thousands of dollars a year for things like competition fees come out of Giusta’s own pocket.
“We’re the only school in the state that provides all the equipment for the kids,” he said.
Giusta also drives students to and from the beach in his 2011 Ford Passenger van for team practice to make sure that everyone gets to surf.
He called their Kalihi home “a community that doesn’t have a lot of water access. Most of our students live in government housing.”
“I wanted to start a surf team to get kids who are disconnected from the ocean connected to the ocean.”
Because many Farrington students come from low-income families without access to swim lessons, Giusta runs free swim lessons for the first few months each school year at Kalihi Valley pool.
Legg joined the surf team in August and learned to swim this school year through Giusta.
After taking swim lessons and going through junior lifeguard training, Legg’s confidence grew and he now loves surfing so much he refers to it as his “craft.”
For Legg, surfing has been therapeutic and even strengthened his friendships beyond the surf team.
“My friends have opened up to me since I started surfing,” he said.
“It’s made me more calm.”
Another passionate team member, Ezekiel “Zeke” Palabay — a 16-year-old junior who joined as a freshman — said the team reintroduced him to surfing after he “got lazy during COVID” and said he especially appreciates the sense of community he gained from being on the team.
“My favorite part about this year on the surf team was definitely having new members and being able to be in fellowship with each other,” he said.
Eva Iaea, a 14-year-old freshman at Kalani High School from Kaimuki, has surfed her “whole life.”
Iaea would join an official school surf team because “it’s fun to get active” and she’s made good friends through surfing.
Miranda Algeri, 10, was surfing at Kaisers and told the Star-Advertiser that she’s been surfing since she was 3 or 4, when she said “my dad just threw me in the water.”
She giggled and pointed at her best friend and fellow surfer Chappell Bernier, 11, who she met when they were kindergartners.
“I saw her at the beach so we were like ‘yuhh’ and had a sleepover and ever since we’re surfing,” Algeri said.
The pair are excited by the possibility of being on an official high school surf team together in a few years, when they both attend Kalani.
Palabay, from Farrington’s surf team, also wants HB 133 and SB 178 to pass because he knows they would give more students access to surfing through state funding.
“It would be good for students to be out surfing,” Palabay said. “It might be a passion, or it could be a good therapy being out in the water.”
“I’m in full support.”
