During the pandemic, there has been an increase in the already elevated rates of anti-Asian discrimination. This has impacted the mental health of Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, who report increased distress, anxiety and depression related to racism. In NJ alone, reported bias incidents against AAPI individuals rose 82% from 2019 to 2020. Almost 25 percent of all reported bias incidents occurred in K-12 schools, more than in any other type of location. Given that bias incidents often go unreported, these numbers likely represent only a small fraction of the incidents involving NJ’s young people.
We believe that it is vital to focus on prevention and education by emphasizing what an integral part of this country Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders have been, and continue to be. Changing our public school curricula is an important place to start that work. We must correct the absence of Asian American and Pacific Islanders in our narrated history in schools. Our exclusion does not reflect the full breadth of American history, leaving all students inadequately prepared for a society of deep-rooted diversity.
As NJ Attorney General Gurbir Grewal said, “In school, students take note of whose stories and histories are taught and valued in the curriculum and whose are not. That's why it's so critical that we educate all kids about AAPI stories and history alongside the stories and history of other communities that have all too often been overlooked, marginalized or even worse been subjected to mistreatment and injustice during the course of our collective history as a nation.”
When our children grow up seeing themselves represented in their class lessons, they are more confident, more creative, and more curious. This inclusion builds awareness to fight racism, violence, and disparities in our communities. In this way, teaching Asian American and Pacific Islander studies can be part of a strategy to address the wave of pandemic-related racism and anti-Asian violence.
According to the National Education Association, a diverse and representative education produces stronger learning outcomes, improves test scores, and better addresses the social and emotional needs of the whole student, of every student. Including AAPI studies in our K-12 curriculum will build stronger, more creative, and more empathic students who are better equipped to meet our country’s present and future struggles.
As Rutgers professor and educator Tanja Carmel Sargent said, “Our school curricula need to be windows into Asian American lives and cultures for our students to gain respect and understanding of Asian American contributions. Our curricula also need to be mirrors in which our students can see themselves appropriately reflected. There is much work to be done to make our school curricula adequately global and truly multicultural in perspective and content.”
Make Us Visible NJ would not exist if not for the efforts of three Princeton University graduate students, Sonya Chen, Darren Yau and Alexander Jin, who formed the Central New Jersey Asian American Reading Group during the summer of 2020. This group contributed so much to my understanding of what it is to be an Asian American, our history and literature.
When reports of hate crimes against Asian Americans were escalating in March 2021, I wrote to the group and shared a video by Rise CEO Amanda Nguyen about how education and prevention are key to addressing these hate crimes. I asked if anyone wanted to work together on this in NJ and five people responded, Sonya Chen, Dr. Annah Kuriakose, Nathalie Levine, Emily Sun, and Dr. Jasmine Ueng-McHale, each of whom brought their wonderful talents and connections to our group. Nathalie mentioned the work of Make Us Visible CT. We met Prof. Jason Chang and Mike Keo, whose work, inspiration and support have been so important to us. Prof. Ying Lu, Dr. Christina J, Nancy Lin, Rajneet Pimmi Kaur Goomer, Amman Seehra, Swaraj Randhava, Ameya Ilangovan-Arya, Sasha Chawla, Gabriel Chao and Christina Huang also joined us and bring their incredible talents to our group.
After meeting with Prof. Jason Chang, we met with Princeton and Rutgers professors Beth Lew-Williams, Anne Cheng, Andy Urban, Dake Zhang, Rick Lee, Allan Isaac, Kathy Lopez and Kayo Denda. We also met with local teachers to understand their needs and gain insights into the barriers to teaching AAPI studies. Dr. Rosetta Treece from Hopewell Valley Regional School District invited us to present at the Mercer County Curriculum Consortium. We also met with other school districts (Princeton, West Windsor-Plainsboro and Robbinsville) in Mercer County, as well as the Cumberland County Curriculum Consortium. Dr. Treece also invited us to speak at her school district. Our event made the case for why AAPI studies are important and featured Att. General Grewal, Senator Gopal, Princeton Prof Beth Lew Williams, Rutgers Prof Dake Zhang, Fairleigh Dickinson Prof Khyati Joshi, Mike Keo, and Amman Seehra, Esq.
We learned about the amazing programs and professional development opportunities offered by Immigrant History Initiative, Wing Luke, Yuri Education Project, the Amistad Commission, the Center for Pedagogy, CHOOSE, the Institute for Teaching Diversity and Social Justice and SAADA (South Asian American Digital Archive). Dr. Khyati Joshi and Jun Choi of Jersey Promise arranged a group meeting with the Department of Education’s Dr. Lisa Gleason, Diana Pasculli, and Tonya Breland. We also teamed up again with Jersey Promise to promote Dr. Joshi and Jun Choi’s excellent presentation on how to advocate for AAPI curriculum in your local schools. We met with Gabriel Tanglao at the NJEA and are collaborating to create a five part AAPI studies webinar series for teachers in partnership with the Immigrant History Initiative.
We wrote an open letter that received 1500 signatures, 1223 were from NJ residents. We did legislative research of educational bills that passed in NJ prior to our conversations with Sen. Gopal and Sen. Ruiz's office. We reached out to our contacts from the open letter for a legislative advocacy campaign for NJ Bill S4021 and are forming a network of AAPI organizers in each NJ legislative district to advocate for the bill and to help with implementation at a local school district level by sharing curriculum and professional development resources.
We are so grateful for the alliances we have with amazing AAPI and social justice organizers across the state, local teachers, local schools, Rutgers University, Princeton University, Fairleigh Dickinson University, the NJEA, the DOE, and the NJ Department of Civil Rights.
We are very grateful to Senator Gopal and Assemblyman Mukherji and their cosponsors Senators Ruiz, Corrado, Gill and Turner and Assembly Members Jasey, Timberlake, Giblin and Stanley for NJ Bill S4021 regarding the inclusion of AAPI Curriculum in NJ public schools, grades K-12.
This education will not only address racism and empower AAPI children to stand up to discrimination and hate. Including AAPI history and culture in the curricula will tangibly benefit the entire community. We believe that by learning about the history of each member of our community - how we helped to build this nation and state together - we will be able to serve all students better.
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