BIOLOGY
Program Chair: Dr. Michael Weichhaus
Biology Major Faculty Advisors: Dr. Jonathan Baker, Dr. Jolene Cogbill, Dr. Michael Dohm, Dr. Genevieve Griffiths, Dr. Frederique Kandel, Dr. Mindy McDermott, Dr. Chrystie Naeole, Dr. Henry Trapido-Rosenthal, Dr. Helen Turner, Dr. Michael Weichhaus
Biology Minor Faculty Advisor: Dr. Michael Dohm
Pre-Health Advisor: Dr. Amber Noguchi
Research Internship Coordinator: Dr. Jolene Cogbill
Mission
Biology at Chaminade University prepares students to think like scientists, work like scientists, and contribute as scientists. The program delivers a contemporary, integrated education in the biological sciences that combines rigorous content knowledge with sustained research experience, hands-on field and laboratory work, and individual mentorship throughout the four-year curriculum. Students graduate as practiced scientific thinkers, communicators, and investigators; ready to enter graduate study, professional school, the health professions, conservation and environmental careers, science education, and the biotechnology and life-sciences sectors.
Vision
Drawing on the University's federal designation as a Native Hawaiian-serving institution, the Marianist commitment to integral education, and Hawaiʻi's unparalleled ecological and cultural setting, the Biology program aspires to become the preeminent baccalaureate biology program for Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander students; distinguished by the quality of its research mentorship, the depth of its engagement with place, and the success of its graduates in advanced study and professional careers.
Educational Foundations
Marianist Educational Values
The Biology curriculum is grounded in the Marianist Characteristics of Education: formation in faith, integral and quality education, family spirit, education for service and justice, and education for adaptation and change. Students engage these values directly through bioethics and policy coursework, peer-mentored research collaborations that build family spirit within the laboratory, conservation and public-health coursework that orients science toward service, and a curriculum that explicitly equips students to adapt to a rapidly evolving scientific and environmental landscape.
Native Hawaiian Educational Values
The program is shaped by Mana, Naʻauao, ʻOhana, Aloha, and ʻĀina, values that resonate with and deepen the Marianist tradition. Coursework grounded in Native Hawaiian knowledge — including the Kumulipo, traditional protocol, and Hawaiian conservation practice — sits alongside Western scientific frameworks, treating both as authoritative sources of insight into the living world. Field-based ecology, marine science, botany, and wildlife courses turn Hawaiʻi's distinctive landscapes and seascapes into the program's primary classroom, while research training and stewardship coursework prepare students to serve the communities and ecosystems of which they are part.
Alignment with the University Strategic Plan
The Biology program advances each of the University's strategic priorities. It serves the Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander community as an academic home for the life sciences; provides the integral, place-based education that distinguishes a Chaminade degree; embeds undergraduate research, internships, and mentored scholarship throughout the four-year curriculum; and prepares graduates for the health, environmental, and scientific careers most needed in Hawaiʻi and across the Pacific.
Distinguishing Features
Mentorship at every stage
Every biology major works directly with faculty mentors throughout the degree. Class sizes are intentionally small, faculty are accessible, and students transition naturally from foundational coursework into supervised research, internships, and field experiences. A three-semester mentored Research sequence anchors this relationship in a coherent scholarly project that begins with proposal development and culminates in original data analysis and public dissemination.
Place-based learning
Hawaiʻi is one of the most biologically diverse and ecologically distinctive places on Earth, and the program treats this as a fundamental educational asset. Field courses in marine environmental science, Hawaiian wildlife, conservation biology, and ecology give students direct experience in native forests, coral reefs, and endemic ecosystems found nowhere else, while internships connect students with the agencies and organizations working across the Hawaiian Islands.
Integration of indigenous and scientific knowledge
The program treats Native Hawaiian ways of knowing and Western scientific methodology as complementary frameworks, especially in conservation, organismal biology, and the ethical dimensions of biological research and practice. Graduates leave the program able to draw on both traditions to address contemporary biological and environmental questions.
Tracks within the Biology Major
The Bachelor of Science in Biology is offered in two tracks. Students select a track based on the kind of scientific work they wish to pursue and the post-graduate destinations they have in mind.
Biomedical Sciences Track
The Biomedical Sciences Track prepares students for medical school, the health professions, biomedical research, and graduate study in the molecular life sciences. The curriculum is aligned with the prerequisites required by U.S. medical, dental, veterinary, pharmacy, and physician-assistant programs and with the content domains assessed by the MCAT; including general and organic chemistry, biochemistry, physics, mathematics, psychology, and sociology. Students engage with cellular and molecular biology, genetics, genomics and bioinformatics, biostatistics, epidemiology, immunology, biochemistry, and microbiology, and complete a three-semester mentored research sequence that allows each student to develop, execute, and disseminate an individually designed scholarly project. Students intending to apply to professional schools are supported through a dedicated Pre-Health Advisor and are eligible for the Chaminade Early Admissions Program with select partner institutions.
Ecology and Biodiversity Track
The Ecology and Biodiversity Track prepares students for careers in conservation, environmental management, biodiversity preservation, environmental and human health, and graduate study in ecology, evolution, marine science, and environmental science. The curriculum integrates rigorous training in cellular and molecular biology with extensive field-based and organismal coursework, including botany, invertebrate biology, Hawaiian wildlife, evolutionary biology, ecology, marine environmental science, conservation biology, and Earth systems science. The track is distinguished by its grounding in Hawaiian place and tradition (including the Kumulipo: Origins and Organization of Life and Hawaiian Wildlife, Threats and Preservation) and culminates in a senior-year Environmental Capstone Experience and a required field internship that connect students with the conservation organizations, state and federal agencies, and Indigenous-led stewardship efforts working across the Hawaiian Islands.
After Chaminade
Graduates of the Biology program enter medical, dental, veterinary, pharmacy, and physician-assistant schools; pursue Ph.D. and master's degrees in the biological, biomedical, ecological, and marine sciences; work in clinical care and public health; lead conservation and biodiversity efforts within state and federal agencies, non-profit organizations, and Indigenous-led stewardship programs; staff environmental consulting firms and the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries; and serve as science educators in Hawaiʻi and beyond. The combination of mentored research, place-based education, and the values that ground the curriculum produces graduates who are not only well-prepared scientifically, but ready to contribute meaningfully to the health of their communities, the stewardship of their environments, and the advancement of biological knowledge.