Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in California: How Higher Education Diversity Benefits Our Communities

Lisa Yee
ASA 002
Blog #3
4 October 2015

In “Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in California: How Higher Education Diversity Benefits Our Communities,” it discusses the benefits affirmative actions can bring to the AAPIs in the educational system. The author of the article mentioned how the amount of AAPIs have risen up to be one of the largest ethnic groups in America. However, the groups in the AAPI community still face low representation, especially in the educational institutions. Filipinos, Pacific Islanders, and Southeast Asians seem to especially deal with this conflict. The article mentioned Pacific Islanders having one of the lowest rates when it comes to college degree completion. Also, their admission rates are lower than the admission rates for underrepresented minorities according to the school data. With having diversity among students with different ethnic backgrounds, studies have found multiple advantages to these situations such as developing better cognitive skills and having a more positive attitude about different cultures. It is important that we build more opportunities to help represent the AAPI community since it could help the foundation towards a better educational system where every ethnic group can thrive.

Question: What are some opportunities the educational system can offer to help decrease misinterpretations among AAPI groups?