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Asian American Faculty Association

UNC SOM AAFA meeting with the Undergraduate Asian American Center, April 2022

We invite you to join the UNC School of Medicine Asian American Faculty Association (AAFA) with the goal of supporting, empowering, and celebrating our Asian American (AA) faculty and fostering opportunities for networking, communication, and growth.

Our Mission:

  1. To Increase education and dialogue on issues affecting Asian Americans
  2. Support leadership, career development, and advancement among AA faculty
  3. Foster the exchange of diverse intellectual, social, cultural, and political perspectives from the AA faculty
  4. Enhance the University’s diversity commitment to teaching, service, and outreach to the Asian American community
  5. Collaborate with other UNC organizations to advance diversity, equity, and social justice

Association Leadership

Committees

  • Communications: develop and create regular communications (interest stories, opinion pieces), communicate with SOM and healthcare system, managing website (or whichever communication platform is determined to be best), provide updates from other committees.

Drs. Ganesh Kamath, Michael Wang, & Michael Yeung

  • Networking: event planning with an eye towards strengthening specific AAFA networks (e.g., professional role, ethnicity, mothering, sports interests, other), fostering member engagement, opportunities to meet and network.

Drs. Arielle Perez, Muneera Kapadia, Lee-Ching Zhu, & Priyanka Vedak

  • Advocacy and Community Engagement: Explore ways to engage with the local and national Asian American community with a focus on service and advocacy.

Drs. Vibhor Kirshna, Vimal Derbail, Vinay Chaudhry, Zahra Girnary, & Mia Kang

  • Professional development – create seminars, workshops, lectures around promotion and leadership building, utilizing UNC resources e.g., SOM Faculty Development, other UNC leadership programs on campus.

Drs. Michelle Itano, Zev Nakamura, Koyal Jain, Karina Whelan, Chrissy Kistler, Weiming Tang, & Dana Iglesias

  • Mentoring: Connecting with undergraduate students, medical students, and residents to advise, mentor, coach and support future AA scientists, physicians, and healthcare providers.

Drs. Hannah Coletti, Moe Lim, Rumey Ishizawar, Christine Peat, Mehul Patel, Young Whang, Emily Chang, Joseph Tucker, Gaurav Dave, Kathleen Wang, Shrunjay Patel, & Jimmy Chen

Other Asian American Affiliates at UNC

Founded in 2020, the Asian American Center’s mission is to cultivate a critical understanding of Asian American peoples, cultures, and histories. Through education, organizing, and advocacy, the AAC will engage and empower Asian American students, faculty, and staff and the greater Carolina community. The AAC will enhance the University’s commitment to excellence by expanding access to interdisciplinary learning and preparing the next generation of leaders for an increasingly multicultural society.

Learn More