Primary Issue Areas
- Lack of community and access to resources
- Price of living: housing, education, transportation
- Discrimination
Policy and Legislative Actions Needed
- Identify and have a focal person for new immigrants to approach for assistance
- Funding for AANAPISIs from the state and federal level
- Data disaggregation
- Asian American Studies
- Mental Health support
- Increased access to resources: English classes, scholarship opportunities, small business training
- Aid and resources for first-time home and car buyers
- Other programs that would be helpful: opportunities to restart a career, how to find a job, housing, etc.
- Correct translation services of government documents, especially RMV and housing assistance.
Main Issues highlighted by Presenters.
- Need a focal person for new immigrants to approach for assistance with housing, schooling, etc. As there is no focal person, the local pastor must be on call 24 hours a day, assisting more than 200 Burmese community members living in Lowell.
- The federal government provides Burmese refugees with work visas and SSNs. Still, they have a limited ability to speak English, so they do not know where to access services available for refugees.
- Communities that settled in Lowell lived with family and friends in cramped quarters, causing the spread of infectious diseases.
- Parents find meeting their children’s teachers challenging as they work full-time or lack language abilities.
- Need to have access to English classes so that the refugees can eventually take the US citizenship test, apply for a driver’s license, and report sexual harassment or discrimination to appropriate authorities.
- Providing catering and small business training for women
- Lack of housing and transportation are the community’s biggest challenges.
- Counselling and mental health support is needed for new refugees.
- Humanitarian parole: people on humanitarian parole do not have the same rights as those who come as refugees, as they cannot work in the US.
AAPI Youth Council alum, Lowell High School student
- As a student, she has observed AAPI students being harassed and assaulted or violating their civil rights.
- More common AAPI students face microaggressions and name-calling lines and are avoided due to ethnicity.
- Urgent need for bills related to AAPI hate, including resources and organizational support available for AAPI communities.
Asian American Center for Excellence & Engagement
- Asian American Center at UMass Lowell works to increase feelings of belonging and access to resources.
- AAPI students in September reported a stress level of 7 out of 10 days before midterms or finals happened, just being on campus. Resulting in many Southeast Asian students dropping out of school because their parents are working; they need to look after their siblings or work
- PTSD is a problem among students and parents.
- Priorities for AAPI Commission and State Legislature: data disaggregation, Asian American studies, state funding for AAPI students
Open Discussion
- Cost of education and applying to college is prohibitive
- High student-to-counselor ratio
- Lowell High School: 1 counselor for 364 students
- Language and cultural barriers: many parents do not speak English, so they aren’t able to communicate with counselors or other school admin
- Aid and resources for first-time home and car buyers
- Other programs that would be helpful: English classes, opportunities to restart a career, how to find a job, housing, etc.
- Discrimination of Burmese families in housing
- Lack of Burmese representation
