Last week, ARISE hosted our Decolonizing Thanksgiving event with our incredible Youth Leaders and Junior Flames. Together, we created a space to reflect upon the real history of “Thanksgiving,” to learn from Indigenous resistance movements and connect it to modern day struggles, and to build community with one another.
Here's a look at what unfolded
We are thrilled to share the highlights of our recent Summer programming, conducted in partnership with CYCLE at Roger Williams University. Over the months of July and August, our high school and middle school students delved into transformative learning experiences through our Ethnic Studies and Hidden Lotus programs.
Ethnic Studies:
In this intensive 2-week program, high school students explored their identities, histories, and issues that matter to them through the lens of ethnic studies. Participants engaged in meaningful discussions on power, privilege, and oppression, examining how these concepts intersect with their own identity markers. By analyzing various historical contexts, students gained a deeper understanding of their identities and the broader social dynamics that shape our world. Our curriculum included intergenerational worldviews, experiences, narratives, and voices from communities of color, utilizing multiple forms of media and experiential learning opportunities.
Hidden Lotus:
The Hidden Lotus program offered middle school students a series of 10 learning exchanges focused on what it means to be a changemaker and a Young Revolutionary. Co-facilitated with ARISE lead organizers, this workshop series invited students to better understand themselves and their community. Through critical analysis of their own experiences and the broader social dynamics influencing our educational landscapes, participants were equipped with the tools to navigate the existing system and lead change efforts for policies and practices that serve them as whole people.
View the video here to see our programs in action!
By Brissia Rodriguez Reyes and Aaliyah Rivera (Read the article on the Boston Globe here)
The Rhode Island State House in Providence, R.I.BARRY CHIN/GLOBE STAFF/THE BOSTON GLOBE
For the past three years, Rhode Island KIDS COUNT has convened youth for the Anti-Racist Education Policy Collaborative in partnership with Youth In Action, Young Voices, Alliance of RI Southeast Asians, Providence Student Union, and Parents Leading for Educational Equity to support equitable educational policies. Students have advocated for changes in our education system, including reducing out-of-school suspensions for non-violent infractions and addressing the youth mental health crisis by increasing access to mental health professionals in schools. Since last year, a major focus has been on the Rhode Island Council on Elementary and Secondary Education, the state board that makes critical decisions on policies that directly impact youth and includes one youth board member.
The Rhode Island Board of Education Act established the Council on Elementary and Secondary Education, with eight members appointed by the Governor. It also creates a Student Advisory Council, including one elected student from each public high school. The members of the Student Advisory Council then elect a chairperson to serve a one-year term as an ex officio and non-voting member of the Council on Elementary and Secondary Education.
Though this youth has a seat at the council table, they are not granted the right to vote on important decisions that will impact them and the students they represent. In contrast, in Massachusetts, a state that Rhode Island often looks to as a model for its policies, the youth chairperson has full voting rights. And it’s not just Massachusetts; states like Washington have two youth members on their council with voting rights. So why hasn’t Rhode Island followed suit?
A glimpse into last March’s House Education Committee hearing provides some insight into the thought process of the Rhode Island Department of Education (RIDE). During the hearing, a RIDE representative argued that they were protecting students from potential lawsuits, both for the youth individually and for the decisions enacted by the council. Though this could be a legitimate concern, measures could be implemented to protect the young person serving on the board.
Last year, when advocates fought for this bill, the RIDE representative argued that serving on the council was a beneficial learning experience that allowed students to build their resumes. We argue that not giving youth voting power prevents them from having the voice and power they deserve. Brookings Institution researchers stress the importance of prioritizing inclusivity, accessibility, and unity in research and practice by centering youth voices and challenging power dynamics. This entails moving beyond tokenism to recognize youth as essential partners. Breaking down barriers and shifting from “giving youth voices” to “centering youth voices” is crucial for restructuring power hierarchies and acknowledging youth’s vital contributions to education research and practice. As student Marco Lima said at last year’s hearing, “I don’t want to go somewhere just to be sitting there and listening. I want to go there to advocate for youth.”
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Youth have demonstrated the need for a voting member on the council. They are demanding this right through House Bill 7614 and Senate Bill 2287, bills they helped draft in collaboration with the bill sponsors.
Adults often pride themselves on being the holders of wisdom and position themselves as strong moral compasses for youth. However, adults often overlook the strong moral compass youth already have due to their lived experiences. What would it look like to provide an opportunity to center youth voice as the moral compass in our decisions regarding the education system? This is that opportunity! We need to empower youth’s voices today, not tomorrow.
Brissia Rodriguez Reyes is a Youth Advocate and board member with Young Voices and a student at Classical High School. Aaliyah Rivera is a Youth Leader for the Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE) and a student at Classical High School.
Last Friday, as the day got colder and the sky got darker, ARISE hosted its annual Decolonizing Thanksgiving event. This transformative evening unfolded as a tapestry of group activities, story-telling, political education, personal reflections, and community celebrations — woven together with the overarching theme of Indigenous Joy.
The event began as it always does: with an abundance of delicious food, ordered from our beloved community member and star-chef, Chantevy! Youth mingled as they ate, reconnecting, reuniting, and coming together to celebrate this opportunity for community gathering.
The event kicked off with a spirited icebreaker: the Marshmallow Towers challenge. Youth Leaders and Junior Flames teamed up to construct towers made of nothing but marshmallows, spaghetti, string, and tape. The room got loud with giggles, laughter, and yelling as each group raced to build the tallest structure within the allotted time. The only rule: a marshmallow must crown each creation.
Amid the marshmallow mayhem, youth demonstrated the kind of loving, caring teamwork that thrums at the heart of everything ARISE – and as the adult allies watching on, we couldn’t have been more proud. The laughter and camaraderie that filled the space not only set a perfect tone for the evening, but encapsulated the very unity and intergenerational understanding we aspire for in the amplification of Indigenous joy.
The evening continued with a Gallery Walk, featuring portraits and stories of Native and Indigenous leaders, dreamers, and changemakers throughout history up until now. It showcased the diversity of identities, strengths, and talents of Indigenous changemakers, from artists to activists, while simultaneously combatting the harmful myth that Indigenous resistance is relegated to the past. Together, we celebrated the living Indigenous cultures and knowledge systems that continue to shape the world.
This moved us into our teach-in about Palestine. Participants developed an understanding of settler colonialism and imperialism as systems of power, domination, and exploitation rooted in the same ideologies of Western, white supremacy. The session explored how these ideologies led to devastating genocide in across the globe, mass displacement, land theft and destruction of homes, from the Americas to Southeast Asia to Palestine. Youth participants mapped out the “roots” and “symptoms” of colonization through sorting ideologies, tools, and symptoms onto a tree diagram.
With the death tolls in Palestine surpassing 11,000, we held a moment for mourning and collective action. Learn more here.
In close, the Decolonizing Thanksgiving event transcended its role as a gathering; it became a platform for unity, understanding, and celebration. Participants left not only with a deeper awareness of historical and global struggles but also with a renewed commitment to advocating for justice and celebrating the resilience and joy within Indigenous communities.
Our event's teach-in followed from a PASS workshop earlier in the week, where youth explored how the school to prison pipeline is rooted in the same transnational Prison Industrial Complex that generates the ongoing genocide in Palestine. You can read about our workshop here!
What does the school-to-prison pipeline have to do with Israeli occupation?
Understanding the Prison Industrial Complex as a transnational system
The Providence Alliance for Student Safety is an intergenerational coalition, made up of several youth-centered organizations, all fighting for the removal of police from Rhode Island schools. Over the last month, in collaboration with PSU and PrYSM, we’ve been conducting political education workshops to build and bolster our analysis of policing. This week, in light of the ongoing massacres, we led a workshop on how our struggles (from Rhode Island to Palestine) are all interconnected, via the transnational Prison Industrial Complex. Youth learnt about how:
The Prison Industrial Complex generates profit (via private prisons, police equipment, detention centers, and more) by turning people into criminals and incarcerating them
The same powers that profit off the criminalization of American youth are also benefiting from the oppression of Palestinian civilians
The fights for American civil rights and Palestinian liberation have been linked since the 1970s
Members had the space to ask questions, share their emotions, and then take action, by writing letters and testimonies forPalestine. Some of these are pictured below.
In August, 10 of our Youth Leaders attended the Youth Leader Institute (YLI), where they led the workshop "What's love got to do with it?." With a class of over 30 youth participants, the workshop highlighted the way love can be used as a catalyst for resistance.
As organizers, we spread our capacity thin as we constantly mobilize against systems of hate, racism, and oppression. Participants interfaced with the topic of love, especially self-love, as they explored different types of self-care, what that looks like for them, and learn that self-care is a form of resistance. Refusing to be burnt-out means standing up against the oppressors and acknowledging our healing as the center of a revolutionary act as we move toward justice.
We have had a summer FILLED with joy, change, and transformation. On the morning of August 19th, our Executive Director – Chanda Womack – woke up to this beautiful letter from one of our workshop participants (a rising senior at Alvarez) and I am reminded of why we do what we do.
After spending only 2 days with 26 PPSD students, one of them chose to locate her email and express his thoughts. Read it below!
Hey Chanda,
I hope you are doing well. I wanted to take a moment to express my sincere gratitude for bringing ARISE to talk on oppression and the fight you and many others are doing to combat it, whether it be through teaching others or suing the state yourselves! It was an incredibly eye-opening experience for me, and I wanted to share my thoughts.
The seminar provided me with a platform to delve deep into the topic of oppression, a subject that has always intrigued me. I've always wanted to engage in meaningful conversations about it within the classroom, but often felt there wasn't enough room or space to do so. But your time with us has created such a nice space to talk about such topics that would never be taught in my classrooms. Because the truth is, in a school system being predominantly black and Hispanic, I still don't know my history the way I should, and there is no reason it should be this way. So I am grateful for the work you are doing!
The insights and perspectives shared during the two days were truly enlightening. I liked the way the topics were taught and how they would make me think even more critically and harder about the oppression I have been comfortable with.
I wish I would've heard of an organization like ARISE earlier in my education, I wish organizations like yours were advertised in schools because these are things EVERY student needs to be hearing about. I'm going to try to encourage my younger sisters to join Arise.
Once again, I want to express my gratitude for your dedication to providing a space for important discussions. Your commitment to broadening students' horizons and encouraging critical thinking is amazing. I look forward to more opportunities to engage in meaningful conversations and continue our journey toward a more just and equitable world.
Thank you again
Best regards,
Terrell Osborne
Over these last 2 weeks, our high schoolers have been exploring their identity, hxstory, and issues that matter to them through the lens of Ethnic Studies.
Ethnic studies is an interdisciplinary study of race, ethnicity, and indigeneity with an emphasis on the experiences of people of color in the United States. Ethnic studies is also a practice of love and holistic humanity.
And as usual, learning happens both in and out of the classroom, as we learn through with and from our BIPOC community members. This year, we were fortunate enough to be hosted by Movement Ground Farm for a day of foraging clams, using Indigenous techniques. Our youth learnt about both land and food justice, all while being in physical relation with the environment. Huge thank you to Kohei Ishihara for having a vision and allowing us to be part of it.
To top it all off, we were treated to the masterful cooking of the one and only Sarath Suong, our board member and favorite chef!
For more information about ARISE’s annual Ethnic Studies program, click here.
I came to Park View half-expecting to have no friends. I guess you could say elementary school wasn’t the best experience. During my time in elementary school I constantly felt like I was trying to cover up who I really was just to fit in with the “popular girls,” and I ultimately knew that was wrong, but I didn’t bother to change. That was, until I met people that looked like me and liked the same things as me, a more diverse community where I felt like I didn’t need to pretend I was some sort of athlete that only wore expensive athletic clothes.
Op-ed by Ngan Nguyen, Deputy Director of Programs & Curricula at the Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE). Article originally published on Reappropriate.
I am from district Nha Be in Vietnam, just a bit outside of Saigon.
I immigrated to Minnesota with my two older brothers when I was 8 years old. My oldest brother arrived as a refugee with nothing and worked as a waiter to save up money for my parents’ plane tickets. In my family’s first house in Saint Paul, Minnesota, we rented out the top floor with an attic room, where I spent most of my time doing homework and chatting with my father. On chilly autumn days, I would sit there breathing in the smell of his cigarette and coffee, working on my homework, and listening to stories about Vietnam. Given my identity and background, college was never a natural place for me to be.
Without affirmative action advocating for college admissions offices to view students as holistic people, I wouldn’t be who I am now.
My admission to Macalester College in Saint Paul gave me a chance I didn’t know I had or needed. As a double major in educational studies and American studies at Macalester College, I had the opportunity to explore both theory and application connected to my identity as an Asian American woman. Without this formative educational experience, I wouldn’t have been able to develop my own critical consciousness and engage in work to better my community.
During my junior year, I met an admissions officer who recognized me when I introduced myself to her. I’ve never met her in person, but she was able to tell me exactly what I wrote about in my essay and how she saw my application holistically. If college admission was based on just merits, I wouldn’t have made it. I know through learning about the hidden narratives of the United States that educational opportunities were never equal. My college admission was not based on my ACT score of 26 or SAT of 1200 (back in 2013). Rather, someone at Mac saw I had the potential to learn and the potential to make a difference in the various communities to which I belong.
An anticipated Supreme Court ruling in the next few weeks threatens to eliminate this pathway to higher education—and subsequent upward economic mobility—for students like me. Given the conservative makeup of the Court, decisions in these cases against Harvard and the University of North Carolina are expected to roll back significantly, or completely dismantle, the admissions policies that academic institutions have in place to diversify their campuses. The white, conservative strategist behind these lawsuits has weaponized Asian American faces under the umbrella of his Students for Fair Admissions group to support his efforts to smother racial and ethnic diversity.
As a student and an educator, I am both surprised and not surprised that our current reality requires anyone but white elites to defend our education, our values, and our humanity. The argument against affirmative action is built on the legacy of white supremacy that permeates our lives.
The argument against affirmative action is built on the legacy of white supremacy that permeates our lives.
As a teacher in an urban school district, I witnessed firsthand the brilliance my students possessed. Yet, many of them cite the typical admission requirements such as test scores and grades deterring them from pursuing a college education that could further enrich their passion. According to data from Southeast Asia Resource Action Center, only 14% of Laotian Americans, 17% of Hmong Americans and Cambodian Americans, and 27% of Vietnamese Americans have a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 54% of Asian Americans overall.
Without affirmative action advocating for college admissions offices to view students as holistic people, I wouldn’t be who I am now. My undergrad education allowed me to pursue my master’s and now my Ph.D. to continue learning about my passion.
I know many students like me—a first generation, low-income, Asian American student—wouldn’t have had the opportunity to pursue what we wanted if it wasn’t for affirmative action.
Ngan Nguyen is currently a Ph.D student at the University of Minnesota in Culture & Teaching. She also serves as the Deputy Director of Programs & Curricula at the Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education (ARISE). She works alongside youth in leadership development and community organizing in order to mobilize Southeast Asian and other Rhode Island & Minnesota youth of color for education justice.
As parents, youth, and community members deeply concerned for student safety, we are deeply troubled by the call for increased support for school resource officers. This bill denies the years of research showing that SROs not only fail to keep our students safe, but actively harm and endanger them...
The Alliance of Rhode Island Southeast Asians for Education Justice (ARISE) stands in full support of House Bill 5959’s proposal to allow those who are at least sixteen (16) years of age to register to vote and to vote in school committee elections in municipalities where school committees are elected entities…
In 2022, I served as a research fellow on a report assessing the state of civic education in Rhode Island. We found that only 12% of Rhode Islanders who attend a public or middle school “definitely could” explain the rights and responsibilities of U.S. citizens. As a high schooler myself, I only recently became part of this 12%. Even though I have the privilege of attending a private high school with a challenging curriculum, by the age of 17, I still failed to identify what “civic education” meant. The failure of Rhode Island schools to create an educated citizenry is unacceptable: students should not have to look outside of their own schools to receive an education in civics.
As people striving for Southeast Asian liberation, we at ARISE are indebted to and guided by our Black predecessor ancestors that paved the way before us. We would not be here were it not for our Black thinkers, organizers, artists, mothers & caretakers.
A quick guide to SEA/Black history:
