Scaling New Heights

Peter Giles brings an impressive resume to the Mauna Kea Astronomy Education Center

Peter Giles Director Mauna kea astronomy education center Age: 61 Education: B.A., history, Brigham Young University, 1969; Masters of Public Administration, urban management, University of Pittsburgh, 1972 Work Experience: Santa Clara County Manufacturing Group, San Jose, Calif., president and chief executive officer ( '78-87); The Technical Museum of Innovation, San Jose, Calif., president and chief executive officer ( '87-05); Mauna Kea Astronomy Education Center, director, present hobbies: Learning languages, singing, yoga and aerobic exercise family: Wife, Leanne; 7 children; 10 grandchildren

Peter Giles compares his previous and challenging job to climbing a very high mountain. "One that you're not sure what the route is," he says, "because nobody's actually been up there before in that particular community."

The community was San Jose, Calif., where he led The Technology Museum of Innovation – a 130,000-square-foot facility with a $12 million annual operating budget – from mere concept to successful venture attracting more than 3 million people in its first 15 years.

Now Giles is again scaling unprecedented peaks, this time as director of Hilo's newly constructed Mauna Kea Astronomy Education Center (MKAEC), which opens in early 2006. The ambitious, $28-million NASA-funded museum includes an interactive planetarium using data from the mountain's observatories, exhibits such as one in the Kumulipo (the Hawaiian creation chant) and a "4D2U Theater," a one-of-a-kind exhibit using real astronomical data in its six-minute simulation of the universe's evolution.

Giles says the key to The Tech's success was the support of a broad base of community and industry, as well as a few significant major donors, for its mission, which was to inspire the innovator in everyone. He says that the MKAEC will similarly need to be "adopted" and supported by the community. "At some level by many," he says, "and at a significant level by a few visionary, generous donors, around the relevant mission of life-long learning, economic benefit through increased tourism activity, and inspiring our youth."

University of Hawaii at Hilo chancellor Rose Tseng, who sat on The Technology Museum's board of directors, asked Giles to consider directing the Mauna Kea center when former director Marlene Hapai resigned for personal reasons. Giles and his wife visited Hilo and liked what they saw.

"The town is one of the things that made us want to come here," he says. "It's small, but it has sort of a cultural heartbeat and a natural beauty and almost a rural simplicity and feel."

He says the museum will link Mauna Kea's astronomy with the Island's resurgence in Hawaiian language and culture.

His top priorities? First, to place the 40,000-square-foot MKAEC, with its projected 250,000 annual visitors and $3 million annual operating budget, on a solid financial basis. His goal is for the center to earn half its revenues from admissions, program fees and rentals of the space. About 25 percent will come from state and federal grants, and the remaining quarter from private gifts.

Secondly, he aims to build the image and reality of the MKAEC as a world-class, "must-see" destination in the Pacific. He'll do this, he says, by tying together two things that fascinate people: the universe and Hawaii.

"I describe our brand promise as a personal Hawaiian journey through time and space," he says. "There's the whole idea of both an astronomer and a Hawaiian navigator as explorers."

The grandfather of 10 says his third priority is to inspire Hawaii's youth to set their sights on careers in science and technology. Says Giles, "We've got to rekindle whatever it was that enabled the ancient Hawaiians to navigate the seas and to try new things. It's out there someplace. I think it's a cultural matter. You've got to make solving problems and doing interesting things cool and interesting, and then provide the ways of doing it."

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