“[…] Chinese for Affirmative Action, a group that advocates for civil rights for Chinese Americans, formed the collaborative as a way to partner with multi-racial, multilingual groups and reach as many parents in the African, Central and South American and Chinese immigrant communities as possible.
The collaborative was formed in 2017 to educate and attempt to boost civic participation among immigrant communities in San Francisco, according to Hong Mei Pang, director of advocacy for CAA.
It consists of the African Advocacy Network, CARECEN, CAA, Coleman Advocates for Children and Youth, La Raza Community Resource Center, Mission Economic Development and Mission Graduates.
The groups held workshops, led trainings, and created brochures and other material in six languages. They estimate that they were able to reach more than 60,000 potential voters in San Francisco.
The outreach consisted of workshops and forums that taught parents not only how to register to vote but where they could talk about the importance of voting as a conduit to affecting their child’s education.
‘Our work at that moment was to educate the community of these new rights that they had, to inform them of the risks associated with participating in the elections, and to refer community members to the vast networks of safety nets that exist,’ Pang said.”
