Retreat Photographs and Notes

[All photos are taken by Anchalee Pongsrirojana]

Group #1- Betty Lee Sung

· Membership List is being compiled by V.T. Alexander

· 450 members of CUNY faculty. Invite them to AAHEC and AAARI

· Asian Faculty Directory is being compiled.  Should we distribute it?

· Invite those who have given lectures to become members.

· Outreach to Queens College: use student unions to invite student leaders to join.  Research, teaching, and services should be emphasized.

· General membership should be created

· Research membership should be created

· Link to other Asian-American Institutions

· Interface with other Asian communities

· Benefit to join should be emphasized. E.g. girl scout-research center, recruit young volunteers

· Make our goal and functions clear to other groups

· Collaboration with other groups

· Duty and obligation for members

$$ Fundaising $$

· $50,000 was granted to AAARI after 9/11.

· CUNY endowment fund is being considered to provide support for research in the four areas that AAARI is interested in.  We should try to  restore operating funds from private organizations

· Use faculty power to do research and also as part of source for fundraising

· Focus on the interest of other people.  Think about what they need.

· Look for grants from governmental organizations

· Show others that we are capable of service provision.

 

 

· CUNY/Student:Trade off credit with internship for AAARI

· Provide honorary membership for high donors

· List the contacts who contribute 

· How to approach those donors?

· By advertising on local newspaper

· Invite reporters to come to our activities

· Mail our documented materials to donors

· Search websites on the Internet for workable projects

 

 

 

Projects/Activities

· Mobilization

· Continuing Education

· Emphasis on activities or research

· Research topics/resources related to Asian cultures, Asian economics

· Student research presentations

· Each Dept. in AAARI, e.g. Asian American Studies, East Asian Studies, South Asian Studies, Trade/Technology Studies, Everyone should have its own projects, to outreach to its community, and to raise funds.

· Co-sponsor with other conference about Asian issues

· Faculty/student endowment matching funds collected from others.  Contributions can start as low as $1.00

· CUNY campaign for paycheck deduction can contribute to AAARI

Group #2- Marvin Spira and Thomas Tam 

$$ Fundraising $$

· Fundraising involves $ and people

· Methods:

· Get more people involved

· Create database (to establish direction, to do planning)

· Student body- 24,000 Asians: a source of support

· Faculty:400 plus, a strong source of support

· Industry: business that can assist AAARI (create database)

· Upcoming Events should be utilized to help fundraising

· Banquet-how to increase income? Create Corporate Tables!  Need committees and volunteers!

· Grants: Government (research based). E.g. Perception of public to genetic food.  Find out how to get grants.

· Community is the key! Reach out to them

 

 

 

Membership

· Problem:

· People not motivated

· Little time? Grade conscious?

· Faculty too busy?

· How to motivate them?

· Do we have a good program to attract them?

· What do I get for my time, energy and money put into AAARI?

· Extracurricular credits? Kingsborough Community College transcript and statement would indicate their students' extra curricular activities. AAARI can take the lead and persuade other campuses to do the same.

· Define the concept of Asian American so that people know that they can belong to the group.

· Faculty-promotion/survival. Help them.  Develop those from the community.

· Students need help to find jobs. Prepare them for job interviews, train them with  interview techniques, help them find internship.

· Structure of AAARI must be improved.  Identify and develop individuals on campus to liaison with AAARI. Publish Reference guide to campus liaison, as well as faculty and staff's specialties and expertise.

· Graduate students from other universities should be informed of our activities, because they may want to attend our meetings.

· Use Blackboard for online meeting (chat room, distance learning) to avoid geographic barrier-less physical meeting

· Need special issues-categorized together into seminars-get together experts from community academia and industry to conceptualize and stimulate one another

· Other groups' techniques that we can find out and use for ourselves.

 

 

 

 

· Funding source-  An important source are the private foundations.

· AAFNY has conducted a survey on the  psychological impact on Chinatown residents from 9/11 (funded by Robert Wood Johnson)

· Shao Chee Sim has conducted an a survey on economic impact.

· Cultural impact?  How to educate better the next generation?

· Other organizations can raise funds from clients. Alumni? Embassies?

· Form committees and involve volunteers!

· Expand the section who are we in the promotional brochure!

· Send out questionnaires to faculty! E.g. Find out what they need, seminar on tenure process, community meeting: traffic condition in Chinatown etc.

· Lonely crowd mentality is something we have to avoid. This self protective mode will keep others at bay and isolate ourselves.

· Need to reach out-get students, industry, faculty involved. The problem is time-Outreach is very time consuming.

· The more people we get, the more volunteers we have for committees. We need at least one representative from each campus to be a liaison to AAARI.  Maybe we can call that person, an AAARI delegate.  How to proceed?

· At registration time on campus, can we set up a table for AAARI?

· Few people know about AAARI. More know about CUNY. Need ongoing contact with them and corporations. Invite them to speak about their involvement with Asian American community. This builds up relationship.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

· No acronyms! Don't just use AAARI.  People don’t know what they stand for. Spell it out!  Asian American / Asian Research Institute!

· What can companies gain from us? Look at it from their perspectives

· What can AAARI do for students? Reach out to them through student participation as interns, etc?

· Data: e.g. number of conference attendees, number of banquet attendees.  Who are they?  Is there a particular niche for AAARI?

· Keep them connected to maintain and improve relationship. Don’t concentrate only on Asian American corporations. They received a lot of requests already

· Tell the story of how Asian American students and community contribute to 9/11 relief

· Chinese, Korean, Indian TV and media, newspapers. Contact them- have programs with them.

· Asian American events-Work with ECASU.

· Develop friendship with reporters. Offer resource person for them

 

 

 

 

 

· Identify AAARI as a resource center. Series of articles about AAARI? Focus on Education.

· Activities during Asian Month-April/May?

· Participate in them

· Have a day for Chinese New Year

· Lunar New Year for Vietnam, etc?

· Do we have a mandate for Asian American issues from CUNY?

· Retirement party to keep AAARI long-time supporters in contact?