With youth taking a stand in activism, school clubs are starting to embrace this idea of informing and spreading awareness of various situations in the world today. The Dear Asian Youth Organization (DAY) opens its new chapter at Ayala High School that works toward bringing about equality, diversity, and inclusivity specifically toward our Asian population of students. 

“The goal of Dear Asian Youth is to promote awareness, identity empowerment, advocacy, and intersectional activism from Asian youth for Asian youth,” Club President James Lam (10) said. 

What began as a mere idea after hearing an announcement calling for new chapters, Lam thought about starting this club during quarantine through the help of his friends. Although there were many Asian clubs on campus, he wasn’t able to find any Asian activism-based clubs that fought against the misrepresentation of the Asian community. 

“There’s an Ayala Asian Club, and their purpose is focused more around culture. For us, it’s more of an activism club. So it’s focused more around social issues and cultural issues that stem within the Asian community such as the LGBTQ+ community and Asian women,” said Lam. 

Janelle Medina (10), the Dear Asian Youth Club UCC Representative, said, “I’m Asian, and so I wanted to be a part of making a change and to be able to create a bigger platform and space for people who care about sticking up for people.”

A few of the events Dear Asian Youth Club hopes to fulfill throughout the school year includes guest speaker opportunities, mass fundraising events, and some fun challenges like the spicy ramen eating challenge for members. But most importantly, there will be discussion forums for members to talk about anything related to current Asian news, issues that are being debated on, and more. 

“I feel like people have so many built up stereotypes and misconceptions, and I feel like people will have more of a feeling of understanding and inclusivity here on campus,” said Lam. 

Amidst the amount of Asian hate crimes during and following the pandemic, now more than ever is the time to speak out about these issues. Whether that is from school clubs or activism on social media platforms, anything that is done to bring awareness benefits the cause. 

Dear Asian Youth Club is on a mission to bring about awareness and be a club of activism on campus. Meetings are every 2nd and 4th Mondays of the month during lunch in Room B139 (Ms. Park’s Room) and members can earn service hours from volunteer events and attendance. 

“I joined because of friends and then also because it seemed interesting from the topics that were discussed in the meeting,” sophomore Alicia Tse said. “I think in the future the club will be really great with the committee that they have.”