Arizona, Singapore, and the World: JessicaWei Huang’s Transformative Spaces for Belonging and Socio-Cultural Inclusion

The diaspora, defined by communities dispersed outside of their geographical homelands,

and Third Culture Kids (TCKs), individuals who have spent significant portions of their

developmental years outside their parents’ passport country/culture, often encounter very

similar cultural journeys.

Many diasporas feel obligated to assimilate into the dominant culture of the country in which

they reside. As they grow up, many TCKs struggle to figure out where they belong culturally.

Many TCKs and diaspora, as a result of their multicultural experiences, create spaces to

support the broader community.

Organizations led by TCKs and diaspora, such as Families in Global Transit and TCKs of

Asia, seek to foster a sense of global and international belonging for diaspora and TCKs

worldwide, demonstrating a strong sense of acceptance and belonging.

Another way this sense of belonging is fostered is through education.

Therefore, this piece will explore the role of equity education in international environments

and how this work further supports diaspora and TCK communities.

In this article, ROOTs had the opportunity to speak with equity education consultant and

leadership coach, Ms. Jessica Wei Huang, a second-generation Asian American living in San

Francisco.

A Third-Culture Experience

Ms. Jessica Wei Huang

In terms of heritage, Ms. Huang is ethnically Chinese, with her maternal side from Taiwan

and her paternal side from Vietnam.

Before her work as an equity education consultant, Ms. Huang worked in education, with

experience as a teacher, principal, and vice principal for 20 years in San Francisco.

Fascinatingly, Ms. Huang also taught at UWC East as the vice principal of wellness and

wellbeing.

Despite growing up in the US, Ms. Huang describes the concept of travelling internationally

as familiar to her, as her parents always brought her back to Taiwan as a child. Additionally,

Ms. Huang chronicles her experience at the foreign service school at Georgetown, where

many students studied abroad during academic semesters. Therefore, the idea of international

exchange has always been one of Ms. Huang’s interests.

Being born and raised in Arizona, in the Phoenix area, in a town called Chandler, there

weren’t many ethnically Asian communities there. Ms. Huang notes that she was one of the

only Asians in her elementary school, specifying that this experience impacted her identity in

various ways:

1. Loss of Linguistic Identity

Ms. Huang recounts her bilingual experience, speaking Mandarin at home and

English at school. Her bilingual gift sometimes made her a target, where she was

teased or made fun of for accidentally speaking Chinese in conversations. As a result,

Ms. Huang often suppressed her Chinese usage, which caused her to forget a lot of the

language. This experience is perhaps reflective of a larger diasporic or TCK

experience, where language is often forgotten or rejected to find belonging and

assimilation.

This loss further occurred as Ms. Huang never experienced learning to read and write

in Mandarin. “I think language is connected to culture,” she says, reflecting a larger

idea that linguistic abilities are essential to the construction and transfer of cultural

heritage, experiences, and norms among communities with shared culture.

Interestingly, Ms. Huang also brings up the idea of prejudice and assumptions

regarding TCKs who also have different linguistic backgrounds. She notes that in the

United States, English abilities must be proved through testing. Ms. Huang’s personal

experiences relate to this, where she recounts being categorized as an English

Language Learner and having to take English tests multiple times:

“There’s this idea that English is better, and if you speak another language, you must

not speak English well.”

2. Dominant Culture & Assimilation

“I think that growing up as a non-white person in a predominantly white community

anywhere in the States has that effect on you, right? There's this idea of assimilating

into the dominant culture.”

Ms. Huang’s experience demonstrates an almost inevitable clash in the TCK identity.

While her parents tried to preserve their Asian heritage, as a second-generation Asian

American, there was pressure to assimilate. Additionally, Ms. Huang implies the

importance of environments in creating cultural preservation, saying her teachers

didn’t create a space for her to take cultural pride at school.

Reconnection & Reclamation

When we asked whether she tried to reclaim or reconnect with her Asian heritage, Ms. Huang

shared her journey of extraordinary effort. She notes that the phase of assimilation and

assimilation happened during her middle school years, and while she began to understand the

beauty in the nuances of complex identities in high school, her reclamation efforts shone the

most during a study abroad program, where she spent a year in Hong Kong and China.

There, Ms. Huang recalls taking Chinese classes every year in college, and putting in a lot of

effort to reclaim her language. “It’s much better now,” she says, “but, you know, not the

greatest.”

Her career in Asia also supported her reconnection:

“I taught in Taiwan and Singapore, and had a lot of students and teachers who looked

like me or had the same experience as me, predominantly from the Asian diaspora.”

Ms. Huang describes being able to create communities with others who shared her

journey allowed her to create a support group.

The Impacts of a Multicultural Experience:

Ms. Huang’s experiences have not only shaped her perception of concepts of belonging and

identity, but also her pedagogy as a result of these perspectives.

Being raised in the US and teaching at public schools in the country, Ms. Huang said she

understood racism and identity from an American lens, mentioning the history of identities

and discrimination in the US, such as slavery or the Chinese Exclusion Act. The US,

therefore, allowed Ms. Huang to experience race and identity from a structural perspective.

Contrary to this, moving abroad to Taiwan and Singapore influenced her, as it introduced her

to the unique contexts of international schools in Asia.

Ms. Huang believes that international educational environments in Asia provide immense

opportunities for students to flourish and broaden their understanding of different identities.

However, Ms. Huang notes that every context has their shortcomings.

After working in American and British international schools, Ms. Huang identifies the

paradox: international school communities have positive intentions of unifying and providing

students with a well-rounded education. On one hand, international schools provide fantastic

opportunities for students, yet on the other hand, there are still certain forms of biases within

these environments.

Ms. Huang categorizes certain types of biases within these environments by using the 4 I’s:

1. Ideology - Often manifests in the form of belief; for instance, the idea of racism,

sexism, homophobia, and ableism, etc.

2. Institutional - A reference to the institutions and policies that affect inequalities. For

instance, which students can use which bathrooms, tuition fees, and the differences in

access to resources, despite being in the same environment.

3. Interpersonal - The interpersonal bias that is subconscious and present within every

individual. These biases are shaped by the ways we are raised through mediums like

media, families, the people we know, and the interactions we have.

4. Internalized - A reference to the subconscious adoption of negative societal

perceptions of one’s own identity. An example of this is when students feel obligated

to present an English name, rather than their native one, to help teachers with

pronunciation.

An interesting experience arose when Ms. Huang first entered the international education

system:

“I was surprised when I first entered an international school that the teachers were

predominantly white. You know, I was one of the only Asian American teachers at an

American international school in Taiwan. And I was the only non-white school leader

at the time when I was at UWC. And I think that is structural, but it's also based on

hiring and recruitment bias. I think there are a lot of folks who say, “There are not a

lot of people, you know, people of colour in the pool for leadership.” But also just

thinking about what the structural barriers are that allow that to happen?”

This, therefore, exemplifies how many environments, despite being exceptionally diverse,

can still hold subconscious biases.

Dialogues & Safe Spaces: Solvency for Biases

Beyond identifying biases in international educational environments, Ms. Huang also focuses

communities.

Ms. Huang explains that understanding a school’s unique cultural environment is essential to

her work. “ I always learn more about a school and the context of what's happening at a

school,” she says.

Around five years ago, Ms. Huang started an API community support group for international

educators, and the members still meet virtually every month. Just last month, the group spoke

about the difference between gratitude and guilt in an Asian family.

A common theme of fostering safe spaces for dialogue therefore emerges across Ms. Huang’s

many efforts, especially in our increasingly conflicted world. She believes in storytelling,

practising a culture of micro-affirmation, and institutional improvements such as diverse

hiring.

As such, Ms. Huang strongly believes that forums can be transformative spaces that foster

belonging and further conversation on belonging and identity. However, forums must be

upheld strongly by norms and agreements. As an organizer and coach of many workshops,

Ms. Huang explains that there are many prerequisites, including becoming aware of and

working on personal triggers and mannerisms, to facilitate and hold safe spaces for others.

The participation of students in these conversation circles seems especially valuable to Ms.

Huang, as she suggests that students are often more compassionate and braver about sharing

their opinions.

However, Ms. Huang maintains that it is predominantly the role of international schools and

educators to create equitable structures and inclusive spaces to foster belonging. She provides

that students are able to learn from one another, and that simple protocols like randomized

seating plans can allow students who prefer meeting new people to foster greater connections.

In our increasingly globalized yet conflicted world, “it’s important to create a socio-cultural

space for students to be their best selves and to be the best citizens they can.”

With simple actions like sparking new conversations with peers you’ve never spoken to,

creating grade-wide forums and student-led initiatives, collaborating with the Dover DEI

community, safer spaces for cultural exchange and acceptance can flourish.