My point is that, despite all the media bashing, the American college system seems to be pretty popular with a sizeable number of foreigners who have to go to great lengths to get there.I don't think so. The University of Hawaii graduate programs have in the past had few students who grew up in Hawaii and many from Japan, Thailand, China, Korea, Singapore. I think we'd prefer our education system work well for our own, as well as attracting applications from elsewhere.
If the educational systems of those other countries were so much better than America's, then I'd expect to see hordes of American high-school students scrambling to get into colleges in Japan, Thailand, China, Korea, and Singapore.
There are other complicating factors. For example we encouraged our daughter to go to a Mainland school so that she'd (1) cut the parental umbilical faster and (2) gain a better appreciation for Hawaii. But if she was back in Hawaii for an MBA then she'd do fine at Shidler.