Tips For Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AA NHPI) Community Engagement

This guide was developed courtesy of the Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AA NHPI) Interest Group within the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Community Engagement Alliance (CEAL). The purpose of this document is to provide helpful insights for new CEAL researchers and community partners seeking to engage with AA NHPI populations. The team is led by Dr. Keawe Kaholokula (University of Hawai’i at Mānoa) and Dr. Grace Ma (Temple University) and includes members from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences; Johns Hopkins University; Mississippi State Department of Health; NICOS Chinese Health Coalition; NIH, NYU Grossman School of Medicine; Philly Counts; Scripps, SoCal Pacific Islander COVID-19 Response Team; University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA); University of California, Riverside; University of California, San Francisco; University of Houston; and University of North Texas Health Science Center. A special thank you to Kawaiopua Alo and Kawen Young (SoCal Pacific Islander Response Team), Mona AuYoung (Scripps), and Gloria Kim (UCLA) for sharing their insights, expertise, and recommendations for CEAL teams, as well as others.

Getting Started (for Those New to Engaging AA and NHPI Populations): Where to Go?

How we “enter into” a community is critical to fostering trust. Here are some effective approaches to keep in mind.

Identify Potential Strategies for Engaging AA and NHPI Communities:

• Conduct outreach with the Association of Hawaiian Civic Clubs. There is one in every state where you may find many NHs in the community.
• Engage faith-based organizations with large AA and/or NHPI populations. Some, not all, communities will have specific faith-based organizations. Others may belong to mixed congregations.
• Partner with small community-based organizations or cultural organizations representing PIs or AAs in different areas.
  • SoCal Pacific Islander Community Response Team (SoCal PICRT) has several Pacific Islander partner organizations, and those organization leaders have many contacts. For example, the Hawaiian Inter-Club Council of Southern California (HICCSC) has a large organization in Southern California.
  • In general, there are organizations that focus on promoting culture/health/wellness for different PI and AA communities (contact information may be shared with permission).
• Consider engaging hula schools, other PI entertainment organizations, and their networks. These organizations attract people from various populations but have a core network of PI populations.
• Work with student associations at universities and colleges.
  • Pacific Islander Student Associations
  • Asian American Student Associations (there may be different degrees of specificity, suchas for  South Asian, Vietnamese students, etc.)
• Involve veterans’ groups.
  • NHPI or AA groups
• Pay attention to specific AA and NHPI communities that are often overlooked when outreach is focused on a broad set of demographics (e.g., Hmong farmworkers, Marshallese meatpacking workers).