MAEC Statement on Asian-American and Pacific Islander Discrimination
(March 18, 2021) Anti-AAPI discrimination and xenophobia has existed for generations in the United States. Over the past year, however, the xenophobic rhetoric around COVID-19 has increased discrimination against the AAPI community, causing hate crimes to skyrocket. Since March 2020, STOP AAPI Hate, an organization that tracks these incidents, received nearly 4,000 reports of anti-Asian hate across the country. Asian American women often experience both racism and sexism, reporting these incidents 2.3 times more than Asian American men.
MAEC continues our commitment to combat anti-Asian racism through education, advocacy, and reflection. The ways in which the AAPI community experiences racism often goes unacknowledged in national dialogues about race. As an equity-centered education nonprofit, MAEC challenges this omission by increasing racial literacy and expanding our services centered on the AAPI community. MAEC’s resources support students, educators, and families as they learn about how to respond to anti-AAPI discrimination and xenophobia, including a webinar on COVID-19, racism, and xenophobia and articles to explore the American heritage of AAPI communities. We want to conclude by encouraging educators to check in with our Asian, Asian American, and Pacific Islander families, friends, students, and colleagues. We need to take care of each other to move forward.
