May is AANHPI Heritage Month

This message is being sent to all UW Tacoma students, faculty and staff.

May is Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, a time when we celebrate the contributions of people having origins in Asia, Polynesia, Micronesia and Melanesia to the history, culture, and distinctiveness of the United States.

Here in the Northwest, and in South Puget Sound, we have much to celebrate, and also much to reflect on. It is a fact that some of the most tragic acts of exclusion and discrimination have been carried out against AANHPI communities right here in Tacoma. It is also the case that we here at UW Tacoma are engaged in meaningful work to reconcile past harms and secure a bright future for those we serve.

During this month, there are lots of ways you can learn more about both aspects of our AANHPI heritage.

You could visit the Tacoma Chinese Reconciliation Park on the Commencement Bay waterfront to learn about how our community is healing from the 19th century organized expulsion of Tacoma’s Chinese people.

You could visit the Tacoma Japantown Project website, which documents the existence of a thriving pre-WWII Japanese community in and around the UW Tacoma campus neighborhood. Dr. Tamiko Nimura will describe the project at an event called “You Are Here” on May 15 at 12:25 p.m. in Philip Hall. Across Pacific Ave., the Washington State History Museum tells the story of the incarceration of 120,000 West coast Japanese Americans, which brought about the end of Tacoma’s Japantown, in an exhibit entitled “Remembrance,” and will host Dr. Nimura at a Scholarly Selections talk on on May 16.

Your spirits will really be lifted if you watch “Horizon Identities,” a 30-minute celebration of the AANHPI community at UW Tacoma made by alumni (and brothers) Nuk, ’17, and Nut, ’18, Suwanchote, and produced by the Chinese Reconciliation Project Foundation as part of its “Our Communities, Our Neighbors” series of films. The film will be screened as part of UW Tacoma’s Alumni Speaker Series on May 28.

The student experiences they document are what our own Project AAPI Thrive aims to strengthen and replicate for our AANHPI community and beyond. AAPI Thrive is funded by a $2 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education as a result of our designation as a Minority Serving Institution. They are creating programs such as AAPI Thrive Scholars and Teaching to Transform, bringing together first-year students and faculty respectively to foster positive learning and teaching experiences.

In May and throughout the year, let us continue to celebrate the rich cultures and heritages that make up our community. Our university and our world are strengthened by our diversity. It is by working together that we will achieve our goals of equity and justice for all.