History of FECH

Family Education Center of Hawaii (FECH) was established in 1970 at the Hickam Air Force Base with the involvement of Dr. James Deutch, a lecturer of the University of Hawaii at Manoa and licensed clinical social worker. FECH’s charter expired in 2003. 

In 2004, Dr. Mary Martini who was a professor of the College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources at UH Manoa during this time along with Dr. James Deutch developed a new 501 (c) 3, nonprofit, Family Education Centers of Hawaii.

In 2008, the Family Education Training Center of Hawaii (FETCH) was established as an affiliate of its parent non-profit organization, FECH. To do this, Martini and Deutch reached out to their students with the idea of providing parent and youth programs to the community, which were to be provided at Miller Hall on the UH Manoa campus. Their students responded eagerly to the invitation and took responsibility for organizing these programs by establishing committees, recruiting families, preparing the Miller Hall classrooms for the program nights, and supervising the children in the youth programs. Dr. Martini created the curriculum for both the family and youth programs, and the programs were implemented by herself, Deutch and other qualified staff. These programs were held at Miller Hall until 2010, when the FECH office and programs were moved to the Energy House, also on UH Manoa campus.

In 2012, all of FECH’s programs were relocated to Hale Tuahine, located at UH Manoa’s Magoon Research Facility. It’s 10,000 square foot of land provided the high school program participants and the college mentors of FETCH’s Sustainable Sciences for Youth Internship the opportunity to start a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) Farm, which continues to be an integral part of the internship today. With the move to Hale Tuahine, families of the Sustainable Families Program were and continue to nurture their own family grow beds together as part of the program’s curriculum. Gardening, combined with the curriculum for both the teen and family programs written by Dr. Martini provides participants the opportunity to learn skills in both sustainable agriculture and to effectively “belong by contributing.”

Following Dr. Mary Martini’s retirement in 2018, Norman Tansey was initiated as FETCH’s Program Manager. Tansey was a previous volunteer for FETCH and earned his Masters in Business Administration at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. In 2023, Tansey was initiated as FECH’s President.

FECH Team

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