Yuri Kochiyama insisted that \"people try to build bridges and not walls.\"<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Yuri Kochiyama<\/strong> was a civil rights activist. In the early 1960s, she became one of the first Asian women<\/i> to actively speak out against social injustices<\/strong> towards all marginalized communities. She was an advocate of countless human rights causes, like Puerto Rican independence<\/strong>, the civil rights<\/strong> movement, and freeing U.S. political prisoners.<\/strong><\/div>

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Kochiyama was also a major voice on the frontier for reparations<\/strong> and a formal government apology for Japanese-American internees<\/strong> through the Civil Liberties Act. What started out as sit-ins, protests, and educating herself on black history<\/strong> developed into a lifelong work of justice for all BIPOC<\/strong>. Her focus on intersectionality<\/strong> truly showed that every person\u2019s unique struggles are valid<\/strong> and meant to be fought for.<\/div>

As such, Kochiyama is a pivotal figure in Asian Youth Act’s Hall of Fame<\/strong> and continues to inspire and guide the values and ideas<\/strong> of our organization today.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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Asian Youth Act's Journey<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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June 8, 2020<\/b><\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Asian Youth Act is Founded<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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July 21, 2020<\/b><\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Social Media Campaign Launched<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Today, amassing 13 million interactions on Instagram.<\/i><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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January 10, 2021<\/b><\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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First Chapter Created<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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April 10, 2021<\/b><\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Asian Youth Act Merges with Circulation<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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July 4, 2021<\/b><\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Asian Youth Act Reaches 10,000 Followers on Instagram<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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January 18, 2022<\/b><\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Asian History Education State Legislative Bill Passed<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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A collaborative effort with Make Us Visible New Jersey.<\/i><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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And more yet to come...<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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A Welcome from the Executive Director<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Hello, I\u2019m Ng\u00e2n L\u00ea, a Co-Founder and the Executive Director of Asian Youth Act!<\/p>\n

From a young age, I have always loved exploring and interacting with a myriad of communities. During my childhood, I moved often and was fortunate to learn from people of diverse backgrounds. Through listening to their stories, I truly started educating and enriching my knowledge on how to embrace and celebrate differences in our cultures rather than assimilate and conform.<\/p>

As I grew older, I became more curious about the experience of minorities and kept on pressing about the elephant in the room. With the ongoing discourse about social injustice in the news and media, there had been many instances where I found scenarios that clashed with my personal morals. Equipped with a sense of courage, I reached out to a handful of my acquaintances and discovered that many others had grown up in an environment that was not welcoming to addressing change and action despite the pleas of the oppressed.<\/span><\/p>

One issue at a time, I hope to greatly contribute towards our mission – working to educate and empower people, especially youth, to critically think, form their own opinions, and create unique solutions to combat the underlying issues in their own communities.<\/span>
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A Hello from our Co-Founder<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Hi! My name is Aurora, and I’m a co-founder of Asian Youth Act, and a sophomore in college. I’ve always been very interested in current events and civic engagement. To stay on top of current events, my younger self would always watch nightly news segments and do lots of research by myself.<\/p>

After entering high school, I got a lot more involved by joining youth climate organizations. We live in a pivotal moment in time where we must act on climate change before the worst effects hit us. When I first joined these groups, it was definitely disheartening and discouraging to see so little Asian representation in climate activism, so this inspired me and allowed me to take action by founding Asian Youth Act.<\/p>

I hope that AYA can serve as a way for Asian youth to become informed about current events, and get involved with organizing and activism on modern issues that matter to us.\u00a0<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Meet the rest of our team!<\/h2>\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tOur Team<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1921 – 2014 Yuri Kochiyama insisted that “people try to build bridges and not walls.” Yuri Kochiyama was a civil rights activist. In the early 1960s, she became one of the first Asian women to actively speak out against social injustices towards all marginalized communities. She was an advocate of countless human rights causes, like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":184,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"elementor_theme","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","footnotes":""},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false,"htmega_size_585x295":false,"htmega_size_1170x536":false,"htmega_size_396x360":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Spencer Tan","author_link":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/author\/spencertan\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"1921 – 2014 Yuri Kochiyama insisted that “people try to build bridges and not walls.” Yuri Kochiyama was a civil rights activist. In the early 1960s, she became one of the first Asian women to actively speak out against social injustices towards all marginalized communities. She was an advocate of countless human rights causes, like…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4369"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/184"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4369"}],"version-history":[{"count":60,"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4831,"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4369\/revisions\/4831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/asianyouthact.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}