Health

Asian Health Outreach Foundation Addresses Health Care Disparity
Minnie (Minerva) Morey

Minnie is the Executive Director for the Asian Health Outreach Foundation which helps underserved Asian Americans to gain access to health services in West Michigan. She is a federal retiree who had worked for the Social Security Administration as a Social Insurance Representative responsible for interviewing claimants and determining their eligibility for benefits. Her position involved working with the Social Security, Supplemental Security Income and Medicare laws. She had earned an Associates Degree in Liberal Arts from Diablo Valley College, Pleasant Hill, California before entering the federal workforce.

Business

Asian Americans - Model Minority?
Bing Goei

Bing Goei is President and CEO of Eastern Floral and Gift Shop with 7 locations in West Michigan. Eastern Floral is a Top 50 Teleflora florist in the U.S and Canada and has won numerous awards. Bing was born in Jakarta, Indonesia and has also lived in the Netherlands for a short period of time. Bing arrived in the U.S. in 1960 and has lived in Grand Rapids since 1960. Bing is married to Jean for 39 years and are blessed with 5 children and 6 grandchildren. Bing has been and continues to be involved in the Grand Rapids and west Michigan community. Bing serves on several community Boards and is the Past Board Chair for the Grand Rapids Chamber of Commerce. He also serves on the board of the Asian center and the Asian Professionals Organization. Bing continues to be a strong advocate for an inclusive and diverse community

Politics

The Asian American Vote - Our Voice Counts!
Stephanie Chang

Stephanie Chang is the current chair of Asian & Pacific Islander American Vote (APIA Vote-Michigan). APIA Vote-Michigan is a pan-Asian American coalition that is registering 2500 Asian Americans in Michigan to vote this year. Asian Americans are one of the fastest growing communities in Michigan, yet we currently lack a strong unified voice. By registering to vote and by voting, we fulfill a responsibility to impact the issues in our community that we care so much about. Stephanie is a Taiwanese American who grew up in Canton, Michigan and graduated in 2005 from the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor with a degree in Psychology and a minor in Asian Pacific Islander American Studies. Mentorship and community empowerment work with the Detroit Asian Youth Project is a favorite way to spend her time, along with other projects to build bridges between communities. She works for the Campaign for Justice, fighting for a fair and effective public defense representation system.

Culture

Race, Ethnicity, and the Perception of Culture: Where Are You Really From? Professor Jennifer Stewart

Jennifer Stewart is an Associate Professor of Sociology specializing in the Sociology of Race and Ethnicity. In addition to her teaching responsibilities, Dr. Stewart is also the creator and faculty mentor for "Act on Racism", an anti-racism theater group grounded in the tradition of the theater of the oppressed.

Personal Reflections on Cultural Assimilation
Professor Curtis Smith

Curtis Dean Smith teaches all levels of Chinese language, literature, and culture. His research focuses mainly on the eleventh century literatus Su Shih, but his interests range from the literature and philosophies of the Chinese Warring States period (5th Century BC) to the Northern Song dynasty (12th century AD). Professor Smith received his Ph.D. degree in Chinese language and literature from National Taiwan Normal University, becoming the first Westerner to do so. During his time in Taiwan, he developed a deep interest in Chinese tea. Professor Smith is the coordinator of East Asian Studies.

Race and Adoption
Sarah Zuidema

Sarah Zuidema is a graduate from Calvin College with a Bachelor?s degree in Social work. She continued her education at Grand Valley State University where she received her Master?s in social work in 2001. She has worked with adoption, specifically international adoption, for 9 years. She currently works at Bethany Christian Services where she recently transferred from the National Office located in Grand Rapids to Bethany?s office in Holland. Mrs. Zuidema has been married over 10 years and has two daughters. Mrs. Zuidema will be speaking on race and adoption.

Education

Appreciation of Heritage and Profession
Albert Vincent Y. Yu Chang

Albert Vincent Y. Yu Chang is a Chinese-Filipino and an attorney with Warner Norcross & Judd LLP -- the largest of law firms headquartered in West Michigan. He is a member of Warner's international business practice group. He earned law degrees from Northwestern University in Chicago and Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. Albert was recently named among 40 Under 40 Business Leaders by the Grand Rapids Business Journal. He is a director of the Chinese Association of West Michigan and a manager of the Detroit Chinese Business Association. Prior to coming to the U.S., Albert was as an attorney with SyCip Salazar Hernandez & Gatmaitan -- the largest law firm in the Philippines.

Topic TBA
Greg Mahoney

An Assistant Professor of Liberal Studies and East Asian Studies, Greg Mahoney spent summer 2007 as a visiting scholar with the School of Ethnology and Sociology at the Central University of Nationalities in Beijing. At CUN he taught a graduate seminar, "Critical Theory and Ethnography," and directed GVSU LIB major Vanessa Crowley's S3 research project, "Queer Beijing: An Ethnography." His paper, "On the Way to Harmony: Marxism, Confucianism, and Hu Jintao's Hexie Concept" was nominated for the "best of conference award" at the 20th Annual Meeting Association of Chinese Political Studies (July 2007, results pending), and is a forthcoming chapter in a Rowman and Littlefield volume edited by noted China scholar Sujian Guo. During the 2008 winter term at Grand Valley he is teaching a course on Maoism (EAS 380). He can be reached at mahoneyg@gvsu.edu.

Behind the Mystery of Almond Eyes
Student Panel: Bryan Alonzo, Hong Dinh, Arvin Hernaez, Alicia Ung

The image of an Asian American today is portrayed by the media as gifted in the ways of education (males) or very promiscuous (females)... We all know that most of the time, the media blows things way out of proportion and distorts the reputation of Asian Americans as a whole. So how do we correct the misinterpretations of the media? We tell the truth, through life experiences, and let the public know we really aren't different from anyone else.