Employee Spotlight -
Carol Tamashiro

Each May, our country celebrates Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. Longtime CASA employee Carol Tamashiro proudly exclaimed, “I am all of those things!”  For over 15 years, Carol has served as Volunteer Specialist in the Camden County office of CASA.  She has seen the office’s physical location move four times, including the most recent move to the Sentry Plaza building in Westmont.   

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Carol was born near Kona on the Big Island of Hawaii to a Japanese father and Chinese-American mother.  As a child, Carol spoke fluent Japanese at home, and later the family moved to the island of Oahu, where she would attend school. As a teenager during the summers, Carol worked the overnight shift at the pineapple factory, packing pineapples, which she and her friends found quite enjoyable. She recalls how they would leave each morning after a hard night’s work, covered in the sweet scent of the fruit.  She fondly remembers all the girls wearing their swimsuits under their clothes when they went to school so they could head straight to the beach after school for an afternoon of surfing! Upon graduating from high school, she would receive a gift from her parents that would ultimately change her life’s path.  The gift was a trip to Europe.   

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Traveling with a few other friends, they explored several countries before the other girls ran out of money and had to return home…but Carol stayed!  She walked into a military hospital in Germany and applied for a job. She took a civil service test and began what was a five-year career in Frankfurt. She worked for the Department of the U.S. Army at the hospital in the admissions and discharge unit. During her years there, she continued to travel all over, exploring not only many European countries but Thailand, Korea, Malaysia, and more.  

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Eventually, her time in Europe came to a close and she returned to Hawaii.  Carol found work at the local telephone company, where she was employed for the following decade.  She shared how over those years she accumulated stock in the telephone company, which she sold to finance her next adventure, this time back to the mainland, settling here in New Jersey where her son was born.  Now in his thirties, with a nine year old son of his own, Carol is a proud and involved "Tūtū wahine" (Grandmother), spending time with her grandson taking him to all of his favorite places such as amusement parks, museums, and their annual summer vacations to Wildwood.  

 

When I asked Carol how she first became aware of CASA, she recalls watching TV and seeing a segment on the Dr. Phil Show!  She was inspired by what she heard and soon after came to work at CASA in Camden County.  Carol’s presence has been a mainstay for our organization for quite some time.  If you have a question about anything in the past history of CASA in Camden County, you know where to go – Carol Tamashiro!  

Thank you, Carol for your continued dedication to the children we serve. We truly appreciate you!