The ARCS of a career bend toward science

Cheryl Ernst, a retired UH Mānoa public information officer, is co-president of the Honolulu chapter of ARCS: Achievement Rewards for College Scientists, which celebrates its 50th anniversary on February 10 with the We Are Stardust fundraiser luncheon (registration here) at the Outrigger Canoe Club.

I was always interested in why things are and how they work, so I sat in on friends’ science courses during free periods at the University of Washington and volunteered for the science beat once I became a newspaper reporter in Spokane.

Marriage brought me to O‘ahu, where my ability to write quickly and for a lay audience secured me a job as a UH public information officer. Once again I requested the science beat. Covering topics like the sex lives of corals, medicinal benefits of bitter melon extracts, and development of carbon nanotube materials was my favorite part of 31 years in this career.

I had a front-row seat to major news stories of local and international import. Physicist John Learned patiently explained high energy physics so I could publicize the discovery that neutrinos have mass. “As you remember from physics class —” he would intone. I never admitted I hadn’t taken any physics classes!

I helped promote astronomer Karen Meech’s role in NASA’s Deep Impact comet collision and marine geologist Margo Edwards’ pioneering sonar explorations of the seafloor under the Arctic ice. I saw research life behind the scenes, like world-renowned biologist Ryuzo Yanagimachi brushing dust bunnies from his trouser knees after scooping up the frisky male mouse clone that had leapt to the floor and scuttled under a table during a photo shoot.

Along the way, I became involved in ARCS: Achievement Rewards for College Scientists. The Honolulu Chapter, one of 15 across the country, supports doctoral students in STEM fields at UH Mānoa. It was launched by local women socialites at a 1974 meeting on Moku o Loʻe, known as Coconut Island, before the Pauley-Pagen family donated the interior portion of the island to the university, another story I covered.

United by the powers of curiosity and science

Membership in the local ARCS chapter has increasingly shifted to working women. We come from varied backgrounds, but we remain united by our curiosity and our belief in the power of science to advance knowledge, address challenges and solve problems.

We mark our 50th anniversary in 2025, celebrating more than $2.8 million in grants for 670 of the brightest and most promising graduate students at UH. ARCS Scholars are free to spend their award funds in any way that advances their academic careers — typically that’s research equipment and supplies, professional travel and publishing, academic and living expenses. Our annual fundraising efforts augment endowments established by members, seeking to offset scholars’ increased costs of living.

In 2021 I joined the likes of kama‘aina banker’s daughter Helen Jones Farrar, gracious benefactress Hazel van Allen and adventurous educator Mona Elmore, using proceeds from my parents’ estate to endow two H. Keith and Sue Ernst funds. Dad’s carpentry skills and Mom’s bookkeeping acumen — both acquired in community college programs — built a succesful, respected, custom home contracting business in Seattle, so one endowment supports the carpentry program at Honolulu Community College. The other honors their intellectual curiosity and belief in higher education by creating an ongoing source of funding for ARCS Scholars.

Advancing U.S. leadership in STEM fields

Honolulu ARCS scholar alumni include:

• Heidi Hammel, vice president of the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, a national ARCS Alumni Hall of Fame inductee, who served as senior scientist in development of the James Webb Space Telescope.
• Eric Vanderwert and Lindsay Young, who founded Honolulu-based non-profit Pacific Rim Conservation to restore habitat and protect endangered species.
• Heʻeia National Estuarine Research Reserve research coordinator Yoshimi Rii.
• UH Mānoa’s geriatric medicine pioneer Patricia Blanchette, Space Flight director Luke Flynn, Microbial Lab founder Anthony Amend and College of Engineering Dean Brennon Morioka.
• Science magazine blogger Christie Wilcox, Sierra Club national climate policy director Patrick Drupp and Philomene Verlaan, a leading international voice on seabed mining.

And so many more making contributions as educators, researchers, entrepreneurs and community leaders.

Each spring, I am awed anew by the energy, passion and talent that UH ARCS Scholars exude in describing their work to us. That, along with the fellowship of a fun group of like-minded women, is what keeps me involved in ARCS Foundation and supporting UH students.

Are you an ARCS Scholar? Please share your experiences since graduating from UH. Email [email protected]. Your success stories encourage contributions for future scholars.