Bonding Over Shared Experiences

By Arleigh Rodgers '21, April 23, 2021

Asian American alumni discuss activism and culture in panel.

ICUnity and the Asian American Alliance welcomed back several alumni earlier in the month.

On April 15, ICUnity and the Asian American Alliance (AAA) student organization hosted a panel featuring Ithaca College alumni who identify as Asian American. Panelists discussed their paths and how different experiences — including several from their time as Ithaca students— continue to impact them today.

Ami Maki ’94, Vivian Lin ’15, Elena Haskins ’18, Kathleen Barnes ’19 and Tarshene Greaves ’91 spoke as panelists. Moderating the panel was Jamie Shum ’17, director of engagement for ICUnity. Shum works as an admissions adviser at State University of New York at Purchase.

Haskins discussed the awakening she had when she arrived at Ithaca — a place where she met other Asian American students who helped her put into words how isolated she had felt as someone who was adopted by white parents and lived in a predominantly white hometown.

“The first year was definitely a huge learning curve for me. I don't think I would have been able to do it without groups like the Asian American Alliance. It gave me a starting point that I'd never had before.”

Elena Haskins ’18

“Growing up, I did feel out of place, but I didn't know why,” she said. “When you're a seventh grader, you don't want to be the one who's different, so you suppress it. I feel like I was able to talk more about it by my junior year, but the first year was definitely a huge learning curve for me. I don't think I would have been able to do it without groups like AAA. It gave me a starting point that I'd never had before.”

Maki is a chief exhibitions and collections officer at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, a contemporary and modern art museum in the Bay Area. She spoke about her overlapping desires to include activism and personal beliefs in her work.

Ami Maki ’94 often talks about systemic racism in her work.

“The way that museums started, if you think about the history of museums, it's taking things from other cultures and putting them on display,” she said. “Even in modern and contemporary art, there's a lot of history that relates to how certain types of objects have been shown. There are so many ways in which we preference certain races and genders at museums, and so, in my work, I've had to really talk about systemic racism from the institutional perspective and also from a personal perspective.”

Lin also incorporates that balance — and lessons from her time at IC — into her work as an Asian American Pacific Islander success coach and academic adviser at Bunker Hill Community College.

“Who we are is tied intrinsically to our professional work,” she said. “Being a person of color and a woman of color at Ithaca at the time, I don't think I knew it, but I think every single day I take my experiences that I had as a student at Ithaca and put it into my work with students today.”

Greaves also touched on her time at IC, recalling that in times of hardship, support for one another should be a priority.

“That's what I learned at IC. I became stronger because my friends of different cultures came together.”

Tarshene Greaves ’91

“People who are of different cultures have to come together and support each other, and I think that's what I learned at IC,” she said. “I became stronger because my friends of different cultures came together.”

Barnes said people must lean into uncomfortable conversations and situations to learn, while also balancing the need to take care of their mental health.

“There's also that balancing act between knowing when you're expending too much of your own effort and then have to protect your own self and your own mental health,” she said. “I think that's just constantly a balance that we have to find.”

Kristin Ho ’23 said it was encouraging to see Asian American alumni incorporating social justice in their work. Ho works in the college’s Center for Inclusion Diversity Equity and Social Change (IDEAS) and said that Maki’s story about balancing work with activism struck a chord.

“I think it's really important that people acknowledge the different hardships that people experience to get to the same place as other people or to be able to further their promotions in the workplace.”

Kristin Ho ’23

“I work with diversity and at bringing awareness to different situations that impact minorities,” they said. “I think it's really important that people acknowledge the different hardships that people experience to get to the same place as other people or to be able to further their promotions in the workplace.”

Hana Cho ’21, co-president with Elena Chang of AAA, said that the organization wanted to highlight panelists in various stages of post-graduation life.

“We wanted to collaborate with ICUnity to have a broader range of alumni,” they said. “It was great to get a lot of insight from people at different points in their lives and career.”