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| Opponents of disaggregated data were more numerous at the Massachusetts hearing. |
At a hearing Tuesday (Jan. 31) Quincy Rep. Tackey Chan explained his bill, H. 3361 to the Join Committee on State Regultion and Administrative Oversight. The bill seeks more specific ethnic information rather than simply categorize all people of Asian descent as “Asian-American.”
“We should be able to identify ourselves to you as who we are, as opposed to having other people identify for us,” said Chan.
Chan’s bill would require “all state agencies, quasi-state agencies, entities created by state statute and sub-divisions of state agencies” to “identify Asian American and Pacific Islanders as defined by the United States Census Bureau in all data collected” and to have individual data for “the five largest Asian American and Pacific Islander ethnic groups residing in the Commonwealth.”
In Massachusetts, that would mean individual boxes for Chinese/Americans, Vietnamese/Americans, Indian/Americans, Cambodian/Americans and Korean/Americans.
Chan’s bill would require “all state agencies, quasi-state agencies, entities created by state statute and sub-divisions of state agencies” to “identify Asian American and Pacific Islanders as defined by the United States Census Bureau in all data collected” and to have individual data for “the five largest Asian American and Pacific Islander ethnic groups residing in the Commonwealth.”
In Massachusetts, that would mean individual boxes for Chinese/Americans, Vietnamese/Americans, Indian/Americans, Cambodian/Americans and Korean/Americans.
Supporters of the bill say disaggreagated data would allow more accurate data to better serve a variety of public health, social service, and educational goals for the distinct communities.
Opponents of the bill, who greatly outnumbered supporters at Tuesday’s hearing, say it is “essentially an attempt to legalize racial/origin profiling and enables discriminatory actions against a targeted people” and is “unconstitutional at its core, notwithstanding intended or unintended purposes.”
Opponents of the bill, who greatly outnumbered supporters at Tuesday’s hearing, say it is “essentially an attempt to legalize racial/origin profiling and enables discriminatory actions against a targeted people” and is “unconstitutional at its core, notwithstanding intended or unintended purposes.”
A group of opponents calling themselves the Coalition Against Profiling wrote in an online petition. “No White Americans, African Americans, European Americans, Latino Americans or Arabic Americans are asked to further identify themselves based on the regions or countries of their origin.”
The opponents said the bill is an attempt by the government to divide the Asian diaspora by continually asking, “Where are you really from?”
“This essentially labels them as perpetual foreigners in their own land,” the opponents wrote in their statement. “We need to stop any attempt to divide Americans to ‘Real Americans’ and Less Real Americans.’”
The opponents said the bill is an attempt by the government to divide the Asian diaspora by continually asking, “Where are you really from?”
“This essentially labels them as perpetual foreigners in their own land,” the opponents wrote in their statement. “We need to stop any attempt to divide Americans to ‘Real Americans’ and Less Real Americans.’”
The bill's backers say the desire for disaggregated data collected by the state is overwhelmingly supported by the state’s Asian/Americans, by the organizations and agencies that serve them, and by prominent Asian American leaders.
“In the field of education we are continuously working to address achievement and opportunity gaps," noted Boston Teachers Union President Jessica Tang.
"The model minority myth masks the needs of different groups and if we’re not looking at disaggregated data on an institutional level, we miss opportunities to address the needs of our students. Disaggregated data is also important in making sure that we have educators who reflect our student populations and are able to speak their language,” she said.
In testimony prepared for the hearing, Professor Paul Watanabe, Director of the Institute for Asian American Studies, states:
“Given the extraordinary ethnic diversity within the Asian/American community the continued reliance at the state level of a single Asian/American designation often obscures critical differences. Data collected on specific major Asian/American subgroups means that distinctive tendencies and conditions can be identified leading to more appropriate, responsive, and knowledge-based services and policies…stronger, better understood and thus better-served Asian/American subgroups will mean a stronger, better-served Asian/American community as a whole.”
The Massachusetts Asian and Pacific Islanders Civic Action Network (APIs CAN!), a coalition of over 50 service organizations, cited why it supports Chan's bill in a statement:
“In the field of education we are continuously working to address achievement and opportunity gaps," noted Boston Teachers Union President Jessica Tang.
"The model minority myth masks the needs of different groups and if we’re not looking at disaggregated data on an institutional level, we miss opportunities to address the needs of our students. Disaggregated data is also important in making sure that we have educators who reflect our student populations and are able to speak their language,” she said.
In testimony prepared for the hearing, Professor Paul Watanabe, Director of the Institute for Asian American Studies, states:
“Given the extraordinary ethnic diversity within the Asian/American community the continued reliance at the state level of a single Asian/American designation often obscures critical differences. Data collected on specific major Asian/American subgroups means that distinctive tendencies and conditions can be identified leading to more appropriate, responsive, and knowledge-based services and policies…stronger, better understood and thus better-served Asian/American subgroups will mean a stronger, better-served Asian/American community as a whole.”
The Massachusetts Asian and Pacific Islanders Civic Action Network (APIs CAN!), a coalition of over 50 service organizations, cited why it supports Chan's bill in a statement:
- When attempting to understand Massachusetts Asian Americans as a conglomerate, the overall median household income would be $81,505, but disaggregated data accounts for the two largest Southeast Asian refugee communities in the Commonwealth with median household incomes of $56,895 and $57,290 for Vietnamese and Cambodians, respectively.
- When clumping all Asian/Americans together, 35% reported that they spoke English less than “very well,” whereas 61.2% of Vietnamese reported higher levels of limited English proficiency.
- The combined Asian/American family poverty rate in Massachusetts was found to be 8.4%, whereas disaggregated data specified poverty rates of 15.6% for Vietnamese families and 16.7%of Cambodian families.
- Educational attainment among Asian/American subgroups varies greatly, but without disaggregation of data, 57.5% of Asian/Americans in Massachusetts have a Bachelor’s or higher; data disaggregation puts these numbers at 25.9% and 14.9% for Vietnamese and Cambodians, respectively.
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