An Asian-American Outreach Coordinator will be hired by Fall Quarter to begin working with Asian-American student groups, professors and students, University President Henry Bienen announced Thursday.
Funding for the long sought-after position was added to NU’s 2001-2002 budget, which was finalized Thursday afternoon.
“I’ve always thought it was a good idea in terms of trying to be respondent to the needs of a significant number of students,” Bienen said.
Asian-American students, who compose 18 percent of NU’s student population, have been seeking an outreach coordinator since 1991. The position was one of the demands listed when students went on a 23-day hunger strike in the spring of 1995 to lobby administrators for an Asian-American studies program.
The coordinator also will help Asian-American student groups plan events to improve groups’ programming and ensure that events don’t overlap. He or she also will create a link between Asian-American studies professors and students to build stronger student interest in classes.
Vice President for Student Affairs William Banis said his office will begin searching for the coordinator once he is officially notified that the funds have been budgeted for next year. He said he is confident that someone would be found by September.
“We’ve had a need for an adviser to work more closely with Asian-American student groups on campus, and we’ve had some stumbling in the past year with the groups,” Banis said. “Having a professional adviser and advocate on the staff will help student groups be more effective and do a better job, and it will help Asian Americans develop a stronger sense of community at Northwestern.”
African-American and Latino outreach coordinators were hired in 1999. Both work from the student affairs office.
Weinberg administrators created the Asian-American studies program in 1999 and have hired two assistant professors: Dorothy Wang, in English and Ji-Yeon Yuh in history.
Weinberg senior Vishal Vaid, an Asian-American studies minor who has been involved in lobbying administrators to fund an Asian-American coordinator position since his freshman year, lauded the administration for appreciating the needs of students.
“The coordinator has a dynamic role that will totally benefit many aspects of Asian-American students on campus,” he said. “We have our own set of concerns when it comes to being students on this campus that aren’t addressed by any current administrators.”
Vaid said the coordinator also would help attract a more diverse Asian-American student body to campus. He said most Asian Americans on campus were ethnically Chinese, Korean or Indian. A coordinator would help NU recruit students who were linked to parts of Asia that were not yet economically prosperous in the United States, he said.
A coordinator also will help build bridges between Asian Americans and members of other minority groups on campus, Vaid said.
Asian-American students were not alone in the quest to hire a coordinator. The Undergraduate Budget Priorities Committee lobbied Bienen and Senior Vice President for Business and Finance Eugene Sunshine to include funding for the coordinator in the budget.
Associated Student Government President Jordan Heinz, a UPC member said the decision to hire a coordinator showed that students and administrators could work together to better students’ lives.
“Administrators are open to student input if it’s presented to them in an amenable manner,” Heinz said.
