Conference Sessions
Prioritizing Pasifika: Disaggregating and Decolonizing API
The Pasifika population is a highly underrepresented group in higher education. Pacific Islander (PI) students, staff, and faculty members are seldom across university and college campuses, but this can only be discovered through disaggregating the data between the Asian and/or Pacific Islander (API) racial grouping. The reasons in which PI representation is distorted is because if the Pacific is ever referenced, it is most often through the use of terms such as API, APA, AAPI, or other variations that tie together thousands of unique racial and ethnic identities. Utilizing racial labels such as API has created an extreme misrepresentation of Pasifika people. In relation to higher education, PI voices will typically go unheard of, or it will be grouped with their Asian counterparts thus formulating a homogenized narrative. This session will dive into why the API demographic must not only be disaggregated, but also decolonized through Pasifika centric frameworks.
Presenter
Haley Kanoelani Okamoto
(she/her/hers)
Aloha mai! My name is Haley Kanoelani Okamoto (she/her) and I was born and raised on the island of Kauaʻi in Hawaiʻi. I grew up in a Native Hawaiian/Japanese/Filipino mixed-race family and have utilized academia to explore the intersectionality between my identities. I am currently attending Oregon State University and am pursuing my master’s degree in College Student Services Administration. At OSU, I am the Graduate Assistant for the University Exploratory Studies Program. Previously, I attended Portland State University and received my B.A. in Communication Studies. Some of my hobbies include taking care of my plants, going on adventures near the ocean, and tracking the Hawaiian moon calendar.