Asian American Studies Programs Transform Lives and Build Leaders: Let’s Make Sure More Students Have Access

I’ve taught Asian American Studies (AAS) in places that could not be more different from each other—Harvard’s ivy-covered halls and Hunter College’s bustling urban campus; an elite New England women’s liberal arts college, a diverse, suburban, Mid-Atlantic state flagship university, and a predominantly white, rural Midwestern university; and one of the country’s most notorious prisons. My classrooms have been filled with aspiring doctors, future artists, first-generation college students, and men serving life sentences—all deeply committed to learning and improving themselves.

In each of these spaces, I have seen what happens when students—many of them Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI), many the first in their families to go to college—encounter their revelatory histories, the systemic struggles and indelible contributions of their communities, and their intersectional identities in the curriculum for the first time. I have seen the relief of recognition. The spark of possibility. The deepened capacity to analyze and address social inequities.

Our new report, Horizon of Opportunities: Asian American Studies Programs at Research Universities and Liberal Arts Colleges, shows how rare these moments still are. Fewer than one-third of top colleges and universities offer formal AAS programs—even on campuses with significant AAPI enrollment. Nearly two-thirds of Asian and multiracial students we surveyed wanted to take an AAS course, but only 27% had done so. Those who did often described the experience as transformative for their sense of identity, belonging, and purpose.

These sobering numbers are precisely why we felt it was critical to commission an updated picture of the AAS landscape. Almost 50 years had passed since the last national inventory of AAS programs in higher education, leaving a major gap in our understanding of where the field stands today. Horizon of Opportunities offers a snapshot of AAS at nearly 200 institutions, surfacing both where programs exist and where they are missing altogether. We created it as a starting point for students, parents, faculty, administrators, alumni, and donors to explore what’s happening—and what’s missing—on campuses across the country. Our hope is that these findings will help galvanize efforts to establish new AAS programs and strengthen existing ones, so that far more students can experience the kinds of transformative learning and mentorship I’ve seen in my own classrooms.

These moments matter not only for AAPI students, but also for non-AAPI students, for whom AAS can be a powerful, empathetic “window” into the conditions, challenges, and contributions of AAPI communities in the context of other communities of color. This kind of cross-cultural education lays a foundation for empathy, solidarity, and coalition-building. I’ve seen this in my own classrooms: a Russian American pre-med student at Hunter in my “Asians in the U.S.” course was so inspired by his final project—an interview and site visit to the Charles B. Wang Community Health Center in New York’s Chinatown—that he left determined to someday start a similar clinic for his own Russian immigrant community in Brooklyn. At Miami University of Ohio, one of my students from a rural part of the state wrote an original country song for his final project, “Sounds Pretty American To Me,” weaving in key concepts, themes, movements, and figures from Asian American history and culture. His chorus—“We pray, we work hard, and we love being free… sounds pretty American to me”—was a heartfelt act of learning, empathy, and bridge-building, reframing Asian American identity in a language and genre familiar to his community.

I’ve also seen how my former AAPI students have carried their AAS learning into diverse fields, including law and advocacy, creative and cultural leadership, and mental health. One former student, now an attorney, told me that taking my Asian American history and literature class, and receiving mentorship on a final paper about Grace Lee Boggs, made a significant impact on her path to Harvard Law School—especially as a first-generation college student. Another student who took my Asian Americans in Media course at UMD left with a sharper lens on representation and power, and now works in international marketing at Searchlight Pictures. Still another UMD alum called my Korean American history, literature, and culture course “life-changing,” crediting it with deepening her understanding of her own identity and inspiring her to pursue a counseling career focused on Asian American clients.

And then there’s a former Wellesley student, also a first-generation college student, who now works to expand college access for first-gen, low-income, and BIPOC students—in many ways, paying forward the kind of support and opportunities she once received. Her work reflects what our new TALA (Thriving AANHPI Leadership Accelerator) initiative seeks to achieve on a larger scale, through TAAF’s relationships and influence across a broad network of corporate and nonprofit partners. This social capital allows TALA to reach far more first-gen, under-resourced AAPI students, providing the mentorship, opportunities, and AAS-informed leadership development that can open pathways to meaningful, impactful careers.

Some of the students I’ve mentioned attended elite, highly selective schools where they had access to these opportunities—but that’s exactly the point of TALA: to bring these opportunities to campuses like Hunter, where I first taught AAS and where my passion for community-engaged teaching and mentorship took root. That’s why it feels like a full-circle moment to now bring that passion to TALA as a co-facilitator, alongside our nonprofit partner, Asian Pacific American Leadership Institute (APALI), in our San Francisco pilot site.

This work is about more than just expanding a field of study. It’s about building pathways for leadership, belonging, and community impact—ensuring that the kinds of opportunities once available to only a select few can become the norm for many more. The question now is whether others will join us to meet the moment—and whether all of us will act to realize the horizon of opportunities that our students so clearly see for themselves.

Because our students are ready, and they deserve nothing less.

Terry K Park, PhD, is TAAF's Education Program Officer. He draws on his Asian American Studies expertise—shaped by years as a professor, storyteller, and community advocate—to lead strategic grantmaking and build educator networks that expand high-quality AANHPI history implementation in K–12 schools across the U.S. He also helps advance TAAF’s signature programs and projects like TALA, the AAPI History Hub, the Horizon of Opportunities report, and our Fighting to Belong graphic novel series.

‍