Yesterday’s Star-Advertiser headline was College Education Grows More Crucial.

Roughly two out of three jobs in Hawai‘i will require some college education by 2018, according to a new study by the Georgetown University Center on Education. It’s one of the highest projected rates – the 10th highest in the nation – and it applies to kids who are now in the fourth grade.

Right this moment, we on the Big Island have a golden opportunity. We have Hawaii Community College, which has open enrollment. All you have to do is show up willing to study and you can get a good education building, making, growing and sustaining things. These are important skills that will be especially important in a world of a declining oil supply.

And we have the Thirty Meter Telescope, which has committed to providing an annual keiki education fund of $1 million – from the construction period through the life of the telescope, which adds up to approximately $58 million in all. The indirect benefits of locating the best telescope in the world here on the Big Island will have a positive impact on our young people. Fewer will have to leave home to find good jobs.

And if we maximize cheap geothermal usage in the face of rising oil prices, we will be able to raise the standard of living for all of us.

This is especially important for Native Hawaiian kids. Hawaiians occupy the lowest rungs of the socioeconomic ladder, and we know that education is the great equalizer. Let’s do the right thing for all of us.

Let’s not look down on the ground at the mud; let’s look forward, toward the horizon. There, the future is very bright indeed.