Junior Zilpher Faitalia danced slowly and gracefully in the sun, her palms opening to the rays, while the mirrors affixed on her tuiga glinted. The tall and heavy traditional Samoan headpiece steadied her in a shower of whirling dollar bills tossed by family, friends and onlookers in signs of appreciation and respect.

She was the eye of a storm of jubilation at the closing of a two-hour long celebration of Polynesian culture in Red Square Friday.

The song ended, and soon almost everyone — performers, friends, family and onlookers alike — rushed to the stage, lined with banana leaves and straw mats, and danced the electric slide.

This was the 10th annual Poly Day, an event organized by the Polynesian Student Alliance (PSA). It was a fusion of Polynesian and Husky pride, of age groups, friends, family and onlookers, and a sharing of cultures and talent, including banana-peeling, ukelele-playing techniques, song and dance.

“I was happy to be able to share who I am and where I come from,” said Benjamin Lealofi, PSA’s vice president of external affairs. PSA is part of ASUW’s Pacific Islander Student Commission and does outreach to the campus community and local high schools.

A large part of Poly Day was spent engaging youth in workshops at the Ethnic Cultural Center, playing games and hosting a question-and-answer panel of UW students. About 60 students showed up for the workshops, and about 100 came with their families to see the performances in Red Square, wrote PSA president Nestor Enguerra in an e-mail.

“We invite schools from the Seattle area,” Lealofi said. “We tell them about statistics here at the UW and higher education and secondary education.”

After Poly Day, Lealofi said, “They went ‘Ooh, I want to go here.’ They really want to change the statistic around here.”

According to statistics from the UW’s Undergraduate Admissions office, in fall 2008, only 0.6 percent of the undergraduate student body identified themselves as Pacific Islander.

Lealofi ticked off a list of things that frequently prevent Pacific Islanders from pursuing higher education. There’s a lack of resources within the high schools, he said, and a lack of finances.

“A lot of our backgrounds are disadvantaged,” he said. “But that shouldn’t be an excuse.”

Family is also a factor, he said.

“Kids down there would do anything for their families,” he said, including taking care of them by getting a job after high school to help provide.

Lealofi pushed himself to excel in high school so he could attend the UW.

“My mom told me after high school, ‘If you don’t have any scholarships to get to UW, then get a job to help out the family,’” he said. “I had to boost myself and motivate myself in high school to get scholarships to get to UW. I not only represent myself, I represent my family.”

Lealofi was able to get the scholarships he needed and is now a junior studying sociology and drama.

One of the common things many Pacific Islanders feel is that the only way to become successful in an academic environment is to abandon your roots, wrote Enguerra in an e-mail. PSA and other Pacific Islander clubs, like Micronesian Islands Club and Filipino American Student Association, “try to educate our communities and our school that our culture can coexist with our education,” he wrote. Enguerra is a junior in American ethnic studies with a minor in diversity.

“The misconception [of] culture only being in the way of education is always a problem,” he wrote. “But culture is what keeps PIs and underrepresented communities strong and … motivates them to support their families.”

Getting to school may be difficult, but staying there is also a challenge.

“In addition [to being underrepresented], we also hold one of the lowest retention rates, creating a double-sided issue of both attracting Pacific Islanders to the UW, but also finding ways to keep them enrolled into graduation,” wrote Kiana Fuega, a Pacific Islander recruitment counselor for the Office of Minority Affairs and Diversity (OMAD), in an e-mail.

As a senior in high school, she participated in one of the outreach programs sponsored by OMAD and run by students involved in PSA. Fuega joined PSA once she started attending the UW, and even though she has graduated, she still participates, performing and acting as part of security for Poly Day.

As part of such a small group on campus, PSA fills the need for community, support and representation among Pacific Islanders facing a large and sometimes alienating campus.

“It feels intimidating at times,” Lealofi said. “There are not as many faces that look like me, but in a good way it brings diversity to campus, to share our perspective.”

Within that perspective, there are many more.

“Sadly, many people think that islanders all know hula and live somewhere near Hawaii,” wrote Vaeomatoka Valu, a senior and PSA’s vice president of internal affairs, in an e-mail. “The Pacific is made up of Polynesia, Micronesia and Melanesia … all very diverse in language and culture but share the same warmth and welcoming spirit that is so famously known in Hawaii as the aloha spirit.”

Poly Day shared that spirit. There was a song of welcome from New Zealand and two hulas from Hawaii. There were hip-popping dances from Tahiti, during which the men stalked across the stage and waggled their tongues at the audience, and a sitting dance from Tonga, traditionally performed to celebrate something very special, during which the performers sang a song written especially for Poly Day.

Before the ending number was a call-and-response rally song in Samoan.

“In our culture, when villages would travel to visit other villages, the hosting village would come together to perform song and dance for their visitors,” Fuega wrote. “Oftentimes, the visiting villages would do the same.”

So, Fuega asked, “O ai outou?” or “Who are you?” The response was resounding: “UW!”

“E tagi mai a le husky?” or “And what sound does a husky make?”

“Woof!”

Last, but not least, Fuega asked what sound a cougar makes: “Ae tagi mai a le cougar?”

“Meow.”

Reach managing editor Erinn Unger at features@dailyuw.com.