While many students may feel the pressure to choose one career path as their job, class of 1987 graduate Tiffany Chitwood is living proof of the exact opposite. Chitwood who is now manager of the Honolulu Certificate Management Office for the Federal Aviation Administration, also works with her husband on their keiki comic publication, Mana Comics. Through her work with community and government, Chitwood shared advice for Kalāheo students on the power of passion and creativity.
Despite balancing responsibilities in different career paths, Chitwoodʻs original plan was to become a lawyer. “When I left Kalaheo my dream was to be an attorney. I left Hawaii and went to school in Boston, going to school to eventually head to law school.” But after being homesick, a part time job with an airline in Hawaii, led her to the Federal Aviation Administration”, she said.
“We have oversight for all of the big airlines that you see here. I have a staff of aviation safety inspectors that go out and do surveillance and oversee and try to keep our skies safe and everybody happy out there.”
In working in the FAA for the past 24 years, Chitwood explained the intense demands of the job. “It's extremely fast paced and stressful. But my career has taken me all over the place and I have been very blessed with what I do. When there are incidents on the planes and those passengers come off of the airplane, we write the cases, investigate them and take those to court. We also do surveillance so I have inspectors that will go out onto the planes and they will watch and make sure everything is right,” she explained.
During a work day, she stated that her job can even come with high security individuals such as politicians. “The Department of Transportation's U.S. Secretary is actually in town and he's going to be on a flight here. And so I would monitor to make sure everything is going okay,” she said.
When it comes to managing Mana Comics, Chitwood gave credit to her husband, Chris Caravalho, for starting the creative endeavor in 2014. A comic book that represents iconic Hawaiian cultural icons and heroes, she explained how the project came into fruition. “He was the quiet kid in the back of the classroom that would doodle and that was kind of his thing. He would make friends by drawing his friends. And he always wanted to do it and thought Marvel's not going to do this.
Since creating one book in 2014, Mana Comics has expanded far and wide. From Pele to the Anuenue Warriors, Chitwood gave a breakdown of their collections. “In our Aumakua series,we've done six issues. He's also spun off a Mana Double Feature series. We have Anuenue Warriors. That's our latest comic book coming out. He has Sister Shark, who's got three or four in her series, Baby Sister Shark. Our latest comic book is about Pele, which is our own story about the fire goddess in modern times”.
Also diving into the life of King Kamehameha, working alongside Kamehameha Schools, Mana Comics released a true to life comic on the events of the conqueror of the Hawaiian Islands. A book that is in both English and O'lelo Hawaiian, it is a book that broke many barriers in the field of culture and comics.
“In the past couple of years, we did Kamehameha, which was the first kind of true to life events of Kamehameha from the time he was born to the time he became a young warrior. And that was really a special project because we teamed up with Kamehameha Schools and we took on some interns. And that book we actually did in Olelo as well. So it's the first of a kind comic book where you see it in English and Olelo. We did it as true to fact as we could so readers will get a sense of cultural education, learn a little bit of history, learn language, and it was just fun to do. And we've got three more books for this year that are scheduled to come out and even more.”
Fitting both a federal job and comic book business in her life, Chitwood explained the drive that keeps her going. It's hard sometimes because a lot of times my job has very strange hours. Normally, I work from six in the morning till two thirty. But because of the government, my contacts are in Washington, sometimes I'm up at three o'clock in the morning and sometimes I'm on late at night and you never know. But the fun piece is the Mana Comics piece and I love that.
“And so you do what you need to do to make that work because that piece is really kind of the legacy where you make an impact with the community, with the kids. You have a responsibility to kind of tell those stories to make a difference. When I'm with Chris and we're out and I see him interact and I see the kids and I see the adults even reading the stories and the impacts that he makes and the difference, I know we're doing the right thing.”
“When you finally see a kid holding your book or somebody holding your book who runs up to your table at one of these events and says, this is my favorite comic book of all time, or you get the email from somebody that says, I absolutely love this story, it's made me miss home and I'm dying to come home, that's where it all holds true. So I make sure that there is time for that,” she explained.
We all have dreams and goals that we would like to fulfill in this lifetime. While making the decision may be challenging at times, Chitwood gave advice for students who are unsure about what career path to take. She explained that it can be one part time job to change your entire plan of action. “Its okay to be unsure. You have your whole life ahead of you. It's great if you have a plan. But just like me, I thought I had a plan. You know, here I was ready and prepared. I thought I knew exactly where I was going to go and what I was going to do.”
“And then one instance of getting a part time job that I thought was just going to be fun completely changed my outlook. So you never know. You know, you end up being in the right place at the right time and having a change in your outlook. So go with what you love.”
“You never know what it's going to change in the end.”