Reflecting on the APIASF Higher Education Summit

Linda Huynh

Trapped inside a building in the sweltering D.C. summer air amidst hundreds of other fully-suited people was far from how I would typically spend a vacation day. Yet, I would trade a hundred of my Southern Californian days just to be back in D.C. at the APIASF Higher Education Summit.

Being a biochemistry major, pre-med student, education seems distant from my interests. However, I was also an Asian American who was deeply involved with her Vietnamese heritage and culture. Thus, I told myself that I would try to participate as fully as I could with the knowledge that I have.

Initially, the Summit intimidated me, as I was the youngest person there amongst respectable figures from the Department of Education, presidents/chancellors of universities, congressmen, and of course the APIASF staff. However, winning a travel grant to be at the Summit meant an obligation to bring in whatever I knew from experience to the discussion.

Choosing to participate in the Underserved Students working group was the right decision for me because I felt it was most introductory. It was helpful that a representative from each Asian and Pacific Islander (API) subgroup – Pacific Islander, Southeast Asian, and South Asian – explained why they were so underrepresented when compared to the few high-achieving ethnicities in each group. Sitting through all the data and statistics not only opened up my eyes to reality but also aggravated me. Prior to attending this summit, I had also been questioning its purposes, as I shared responses with those who thought this summit must have been ridiculous, for Asian Americans were seemingly dominating the universities. Being a Vietnamese American from the Little Saigon area, I had always thought that our students attending college was in proportion to those of the Chinese, Korean, and Japanese. Thus, it shocked me to discover that there was only one Vietnamese teacher for approximately every 450 Vietnamese students.

Dividing the working group into smaller groups made up of fellow scholars and interns of various organizations helped generate an engaging dialogue. It not only brought together many areas in agreement but also raised multiple perspectives as to how the problem of underserved students could be resolved. While others brought up ideas from work, I had to use my single strength of background to bring forth what I had personally seen. In the end, we came up with many possibilities, some of which include targeting areas less populated by APIs, using the media to display successful APIs in underrepresented fields, and establishing a college-going culture for all APIs.

At the end of the day, I felt so caught up in the issues of higher education with regards to APIs that I was disappointed the Summit was coming to an end. As only a rising sophomore in her undergraduate studies though, the Summit opened a new door for me; instead of just being pre-med, I am now considering public health, where I will be able to work with policy affecting a population rather than just the individual.