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Organizers |
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Tamon Norimoto
Tamon has been in the bay area since 2000 and recently crossed over from the private tech sector to the non-profit sector and is now the Resource Development Director for Asian Americans for Community Involvement (AACI). Tamon can attribute all his current community involvement to First Thursdays. He is also the Vice President of Japantown Community Congress of San Jose (JCCsj), board member of the San Jose chapter of the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL), board member of the California Japanese American Community Leadership Council (CJACLC), past advisory board member to the 2006 Public Allies Program, and Housing and Community Development Commissioner for the City of San Jose.
Tamon hopes to bring in more working professionals into FT to increase awareness and sense of community here in the South Bay.
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Ellen J. Lin
Ellen is a staff psychologist at San Jose State University. She provides a full spectrum of psychological counseling
services to university students and supervises advanced-level clinical trainees. She has presented at national psychological
conferences and is integrally interested in multicultural issues, Asian American perspectives, and various women's issues.
Ellen started volunteering as an organizer with South Bay First Thursdays a year after its inception, and she strongly believes
in its mission to increase awareness of Asian and Pacific Islander issues. She considers herself a life-long learner, and
feels consistently nourished by the educational aspects and community building of SBFT events.
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Dawn Lee
Dawn Lee is currently a PhD student in the Cultural Studies Program at UC Davis. She earned her BA in Political Science,
also at UCD and has an MA in American Studies from New York University. Her MA focused on Asian Americans and popular
culture, more specifically Asian American identity development through hip hop cultural production. After her MA, she
spent 3 years working in the field of higher education, and as a result, her research interests have shifted to
Asian American students in colleges and universities and how diversity policies and multicultural education programs
factor into their identity development.
As a founding organizer of South Bay First Thursdays, she hopes that
SBFT will help foster a greater sense of community amongst and give voice to younger Asian American and Pacific
Islander professionals. She believes it is vital for all Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders to continue learning,
being engaged with, being aware of, giving back and having access to information about what is going on in their
communities.
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Serena Hu
Serena moved to the states from Taiwan with her family back in 93. A self proclaimed 1.5 generation, Serena enjoys examining API issues through her bicultural lenses. In the spring of 05, She found SBFT as an outlet to do so with a group of other young APIs from the south bay. She has been hooked ever since....!
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Amy Hui
As a huge proponent of of life-long and experiential learning, Amy hopes to help fellow South Bayers foster a sense of community through SBFT educational events. Amy is a S.F.Bay "honoary native" and Cal Berkeley Alum. She is a non-profit professional with experience in the environmental and educational fields.
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Michelle Masuda
As a relatively new transplant to the South Bay, Michelle found First Thursdays to be a chance to reconnect with the Asian Pacific Islander community. She soon came onboard as a team player to help others do the same.
Michelle is currently working on her Masters in Nutritional Science at San Jose State University. Her goals are to help others achieve and maintain good health so that they may live their lives to the fullest. She describes herself as a compassionate humanitarian that enjoys volunteering and contributing her time to help others in the community.
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Fidelia Butt
Fidelia is a South Bay Area native, who attended Saratoga schools when only around 5 percent of her Saratoga High School
class was Asian. She is currently a head and neck surgeon at Kaiser Permanente in Santa Clara. She occasionally spends time as a clinical
adjunct faculty for Stanford at the Palo Alto VA.
Impressed by the increased proportion of API's in the Bay Area, she seeks out
opportunities to help build and strengthen relationships within the community. She is a co-founder of the Asian American Cancer Support
Network and is involved with the Silicon Valley Christian Health Alliance, a medical clinic serving homeless in downtown San Jose.
She hopes to help FT encourage dialogue and increase awareness about Asian American/Pacific Islander issues.
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Linda Pham
Linda is a proud South Bay native. A UCSC alum, she was very active to the
Asian American/ Pacific Islander and Vietnamese organizations on-campus and abroad.
She currently is an intern for American Cancer Society and is interested in community health and cultural identities.
Her former position for the Japantown Community Congress of San Jose in partnership with
Americorps Public Allies Silicon Valley connected her to First Thursdays.
As an organizer, Linda believes in collaboration for a stronger Asian Pacific American voice.
She wants to hear important cultural issues that have not been mainstream in the U.S. and engage our community to see new critical and civic approaches through FT forums.
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Janice Casil
Janice received her BA in Psychology from University of San Francisco in
2004. Upon graduation, Janice joined Public Allies of Silicon Valley and worked as an after school programs coordinator at the Mountain View Whisman School District.
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Mary Ho
Mary Ho currently works at Santa Clara University as the Associate Director at the Center for Multicultural Learning. Originally from Southern California, she received your Masters in Higher Education Administration from New York University and her Bachelor of Arts from the University of California, Irvine. In her spare time, she enjoys watching Grey's Anatomy and coordinating the Traveling Trunk Show with her partners.
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Mike Nguyen
Mike aspired to be the first Asian American male on MTV's The Real World but was cut on the first round. After recovering from his devastating rejection, Mike graduated from U.C. Berkeley majoring in American Studies with a minor in Asian American Studies. He worked for the Asian Pacific American Leadership Institute (APALI) as a Program Associate.
Following APALI, Mike worked in the private sector for an advertising firm, before returning to public service. He now works for Congressman Mike Honda (CA-15). Mike is excited to be apart of First Thursdays so that he can continue to keep Asian American young professionals involved in the community after college.
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Volunteers |
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Rommel Ruelos
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Annie Yang
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David Lin
As a member of the public, David wishes to contribute back to the community with his technical skills in areas such as software technologies, photography, and podcasting to assist First Thursdays reach a greater Asian American & Pacific Islander (AA&PI) communities on the Internet. David also volunteers at BUILD, an organization that provides underserved students with educational and entrepreneurial opportunities that would otherwise not be available to them.
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Alumni |
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Christine Padilla
Christine Padilla is a Field Representative and Liaison to the Filipino and other API communities for the Office of Congressman
Lantos (CA - District 12). Christine's dedication and commitment to community building also keeps her eventful as a consultant.
Her expertise is in event production, public relations, marketing and project building. She works with numerous arts, community and
entertainment organizations, and holds the position of Program Director for the Asian Heritage Street Celebration in San Francisco.
Christine was the first San Jose Coordinator for NAATA's San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival in 2001, helping
expand the festival's reach and availability in the South Bay.
Christine is a native of the Bay Area and holds a degree in
American Studies from the University of California at Santa Cruz.
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Debbie Chen
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Grace-Sonia Lee
Grace-Sonia is the outreach coordinator for the College of Engineering at San Jose State University. Prior to her work at the
College, she was the Director of Community Relations for the Camera Cinemas, where she diversified the film and festival programming
for the Silicon Valley art house theater chain. Currently, Grace-Sonia serves as a project consultant for Contemporary Asian Theater
Scene. Her interests include arts education, queer advocacy, and movies with subtitles.
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Herbert Ho
Herb is a professional software engineer and a recent Midwest transplant from Chicago. He is a staff member for Asian Americans for
Community Outreach (AACO), a volunteer-run, Bay Area organization dedicated to creating a forum for both area professionals and
students to meet and foster the common goal of community service.
His interests in First Thursdays include technology
and it's role in the API community and issues related to community involvement balanced with a full-time for-profit career.
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Lynda M. Yoshikawa
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Nathan Zanon
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Ryan Nagahori
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Ryan Young
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Shelley Tadaki
Shelley started her work in the nonprofit field as a Program Associate, running scholarship programs for the Asian Pacific Fund.
She has a strong interest in education policy and is currently the assistant director of the Asian American Activites Center at
Stanford University. Prior to that she was the conference coordinator for Asian Pacific Americans in Higher Education's (APAHE)
2004 national conference.
Shelley also serves on the Board of Directors for the Stanford Asian Pacific American
Alumni Club and is a founding organizer of Third Thursdays, First Thursday's sister organization in San Francisco.
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Warren Fujimura
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Billy Lu
Billy is a staff member for Asian Americans for Community Outreach, a community organization providing a range of volunteer opportunities
for API professionals in the Bay Area. Billy has been active with other organizations such as Third Thursdays and Drink Club Social
Awareness.
Professionally, Billy is a retired engineer who is starting over in marketing. Billy hopes to build a network of
opportunities for all Bay Area API to participate in the community.
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