API Summit 2023

 

Wednesday, June 7, 2023
The Commonwealth Club, 110 The Embarcadero, San Francisco
9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

The Asian Pacific Fund, celebrating its 30th anniversary, is hosting its annual Asian and Pacific Islander (API) Summit back in-person!

This year’s Summit, “Honoring our Roots, Charting our Path: APIs in the Racial Justice Movement,” will create space for leaders to gather, reflect, and gain insights on how the API community can continue to work in alignment with other communities of color toward healing, recovery, and collective action. As our community emerges from the pandemic and continues to face anti-Asian hate, the 2023 Summit will focus on how the Asian and Pacific Islander community works alongside other communities of color toward healing, recovery, and collective action.

Curious about what was discussed during our 2022 API Summit? Click here for details.


  • AGENDA
  • SPONSORS
  • SPEAKERS
9:00 – 9:30 a.m.Registration & Breakfast
9:30 – 9:45 amWelcome
9:45 – 11:00 a.m.Opening: Anchoring to Strength, Who We Come From
 
The day will start with anchoring – a reminder that we have been in the racial movement for decades. Hear from “community anchors” who have been leading voices and actors on racial equity in the AAPI community.

• Estella Owoimaha-Church, Empowering Pacific Islander Communities (EPIC)
• Nikki Dinh, Leadership Learning Community
• Pam Tau Lee, Retired
• Peggy Saika, Common Counsel
• Vivian Huang, Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN)
• Leafa Taumoepeau, Taulama for Tongans
11:00 a.m. – 11:45 a.m.Data Panel: Anchoring to Data, Making the Invisible Visible
 
Systemic inequities that impact communities of color impact the AAPI community, too. Hear from AAPI Data on the latest survey data that shows how systemic inequities impact the AAPI community and how those impacts are similar or different from communities of color, broadly. Understand the importance of making meaning, framing, and developing narratives around data so that we can work in solidarity with communities of color. 
 
• Karthick Ramakrishnan, AAPI Data
11:45 – 12:45 p.m.Lunch
12:45 – 2:20 p.m.Action Panel: Anchoring to Promise, Sharing Examples from the Field, Models for our Future

It’s hard to be what you can’t see. Hear from Asian Pacific Fund affiliates and their partners who are intentionally working in cross-racial solidarity.

• Asian-Black Solidarity Project (Asian Health Services + West Oakland Clinic)
• Black Pacific Alliance (a project of EPIC)
• How I Keep Looking Up (Chinese Culture Center of SF + Calle 24 Latino Cultural District)
2:20 – 2:35 p.m.Break
2:35 – 3:30 p.m.Narrative Panel: Anchoring to Story, Widening the Lens of the Problem to See Better Solutions
 
S/he who frames a problem gets to also frame the solutions. Narrative change is a powerful tool to drive systems change. Hear from thought leaders doing the work to reclaim and shift narratives about the AAPI community, to get to solutions that better meet the needs of our community and communities of color.

• Viet Thanh Nguyen, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Author
• Helen Zia, Writer and Activist
3:30 – 3:45 p.m.Closing: What Racial Justice Looks Like for Our Community
 
Hear from statewide leader on the importance of driving cross-racial systems change in the bay area and statewide.
 
• Rob Bonta, Attorney General of the State of California
3:45 – 4:00 p.m.Closing Meaning Making, Appreciations, Evaluations
 
• Carolyn Wang Kong, Asian Pacific Fund

Event Sponsors

Platinum Sponsors


Silver Sponsors


Bronze Sponsors


Additional Support Provided by

Courtney-Savali Andrews

Co-Founder, Black Pacific Alliance
Assistant Professor of African American and African Diasporic Musics, Oberlin College & Conservatory

Rob Bonta

Attorney General of the State of California

Nikki Dinh

Co-Executive Director, Leadership Learning Community

Stephen Gong

Executive Director, Center for Asian American Media (CAAM)

Vivian Yi Huang

Co-Director, Asian Pacific Environmental Network

Jenny Leung

Executive Director, Chinese Culture Center and Foundation of San Francisco

Julia Liou, MPH

Chief Executive Officer, Asian Health Services

Viet Thanh Nguyen

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Author

Estella Owoimaha-Church

Executive Director, Empowering Pacific Islander Communities

Robert Phillips

President & CEO, West Oakland Health

Thu Quach, Ph.D.

President, Asian Health Services

Karthick Ramakrishnan

Founder & Director, AAPI Data

Susana Rojas

Executive Director, Calle 24 Latino Cultural District

Peggy Saika

Common Council Foundation

Leafa Taumoepeau

Executive Director, Taulama for Tongans

Helen Zia

Writer & Activist