“REAL Asian American Men: Exploring What’s Up” - The College Tour

The premise of this program is simple – to provide Asian Pacific Islander Desi and Arab American (APIDAA) male and female college students an exciting forum to explore what it means to be “real” Asian American Men. 
This is a full day program for your students; engaging them in an intense, exhilarating, and creative venue to bring out deep discussions around Asian American masculine identities. What has contributed to the construction of these social identities? This may be the first conversation many of your students will have around issues of masculinity, femininity, inter-ethnic dating, interracial dating, religion and interreligious dating, relationships, body [image] issues, beauty, assertion and confidence, femininity, sexuality, parental conflicts, career & college major choices, generational conflicts, language conflicts, trans-racial adoption issues, brotherhood, sisterhood, and other campus concerns.

The ideal structure for the program for your students and us would be to have a full day to engage in this exploration and dialogue (from 9am to 4pm with a lunch break). The morning portion and part of the early afternoon will involve small group breakouts. The day will lead to a culmination of group sharing and processing of the identities discussed, and the issues “real” Asian American men face on today’s college campuses.

This program can be a phenomenal tool to help build community within your existing APIDAA students, organizations, and fraternities. Additionally, this program may even help bring out those students who have not been involved with APIDAA specific campus activities or programs. We would be assisting with the marketing of this program and can provide your campus with templates for flyers, emails, etc.

The Facilitators:

Amnat Chittaphong, M.S. is the former Dean of Students at Holyoke Community College, and Assistant Dean of Students at Hampshire College. Previously, he has 8 years of experience as a Director Multicultural Affairs, 10+ years of undergraduate and graduate level teaching, and 16+ years of leadership training and facilitating specifically for APIDAA students. Amnat is 1.5 generation Lao and Chinese American