Recent Work
SEAA Collaborative Partners Unite For Our Right to Heal
In September, the SEAA Collaborative, community members, and providers gathered at California State University, Sacramento at the third annual Right to Heal event to build deeper connections and developed strategies for sustainable regional mobilization efforts for empowerment and advocacy changes. During the community panel, we explored interracial solidarity, mental wellness from the impact of COVID-19, and community solutions that worked. During the Tiny Teaches sessions, small groups discussed interactive messaging and communications for stigma reduction, the challenges facing the behavioral health workforce, the cumulative effect of racial trauma and microaggressions, and peer support for people with co-occurring mental health conditions. Together, we identified assets and resources by brainstorming the community needs that participants shared across nine distinct California regions during the regional breakouts. Lastly, we recognized and celebrated our participating community partners in the three-year Right to Heal Project (2020–2023) for their commitment to our mental health advocates.
The SEAA Collaborative is grateful to our guest speakers and panelists – Miss Marianna for gracefully and energetically guiding us through our packed agenda, Mary Tarango for a beautiful Land Acknowledgement, Reaksmey “Mea” Lath for her dance performance of the “Robom Tiyae”, and Vicki Kham and the Fresno Interdenominational Refugee Ministries Dance Class for their “Salavan” musical performance.
We thank our California community partners including Hmong Cultural Center of Butte County, The Cambodian Family, Fresno Interdenominational Refugee Ministries (FIRM), California Pan-Ethnic Health Network (CPEHN), Latino Coalition for a Health California, California Consortium for Urban Indian Health, the California Black Health Network, and the Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission.
Development of Cambodian, Hmong, and Vietnamese model curricula with Orange County Department of Education
Throughout this year, SEARAC has been working in collaboration with the Orange County Department of Education (OCDE) to develop three ethnic studies model curricula. This opportunity is created through SB 895 and AB 167 to develop a model curriculum related to Cambodian, Hmong, and Vietnamese history and cultural studies. The curriculum projects will assist educators in teaching Southeast Asian American history and culture to K-12 students in California. SEARAC, The Fresno Center, Vietnamese American Roundtable, Center for Empowering Refugees and Immigrants, United Cambodian Community, and The Cambodian Family were involved in shaping the first draft of the curricula and/or hosted listening sessions and focus groups to gather feedback from Cambodian, Hmong, and Vietnamese communities in California on what they would like to see in the curricula. (Photo to the right features feedback and input from Cambodian community members during a SEARAC engagement session, on what they hope the model curriculum would include.
Local mental health advocacy in Butte, Orange, and Fresno Counties
Through a grant with the Mental Health Services Oversight and Accountability Commission and California Pan-Ethnic Health Network, SEARAC and partners have worked to bring awareness to the challenges and issues facing diverse racial and ethnic communities through advocacy, training, education, and outreach and engagement at the local levels. Over the course of three years, SEARAC has collaborated with SEAA organizations: Hmong Cultural Center of Butte County, The Cambodian Family of Santa Ana, and Fresno Interdenominational Refugee Ministries in Fresno, to engage local mental health stakeholders. Each year, partners host listening sessions, produce an annual report, and convene a statewide mental health event to share learnings and recommendations. All of these activities come together with the end goal of building local stakeholder capacity to conduct mental health advocacy, furthering the vision of a mental health system that is responsive to the needs of California’s communities of color. (Photo to the right features community members Thongdy Mangala and Sok Heang Teng for in-person listening session that explored mental health needs and access among adult Lao community members in Fresno. Photo by Allen Keo)
