Listening Campaign

A Youth-Led Participatory Action Research team of 5 College Fellows, 7 High School Students, and staff conducted a 3-month listening campaign in Fall 2017 with 30 Listening Circles and 55 interviews with hundreds of API students, families, staff and community-based organizations to better understand student needs and shape the initiative’s activities and strategic focus areas.

Some of the key issues and needs that came up include:

Overcoming Historic Inequities & Social Challenges

• Academic Challenges for Samoan, Tongan, Filipino, Lao, Cambodian, Mien, Yemeni, Afghan, ELL Students
• Mental Health, Emotional Support, Community Healing, Belongingness

Immigrant & Newcomer Barriers

• Need for Language Access & Multilingual Learning
• Supporting Refugees, Asylum-Seekers & Newcomer Transition
• Creating Safe Learning Environments for Arab, Southwest Asian & Muslim Students

Lift Up Visibility, Data & Stories

• Absence in the Classroom: Visibilizing Our Stories, Disconnection of Student Goals & Curriculum
• Data: Clear Assessments to Enable Equity Analysis & Action, Disaggregated Data
• Need for More API Staff, Role Models, and Understanding of the Diversity of API Communities

In November 2017, we held a Listening Campaign Reportback and Community Celebration to share the results of the Listening Campaign with the participants and community and released preliminary findings and recommendations.

You can view documents shared at the Report back:

• Preliminary Findings and Recommendations
• APISA Team Presentation
• API Student Data Charts

This research will inform the development of the APISA Initiative in its first year.