TIFFANY GARNACE UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA
Hello, my name is Tiffany Garnace. I am from Atlanta, Georgia. To begin with, I want to thank everyone who made this program possible. I am extremely blessed to be a part of the inaugural cohort of 6 Filipina Americans despite being virtual this time around. I could not have asked for a better group of strong independent Filipinas to experience this with. To Mary Sue Bissell, Glenn Lau-Kee, and Marlon Young, thank you all for creating this program for aspiring young professional Filipino Americans. A huge thanks to the Philippine Embassy in DC and His Excellency PH Ambassador Jose Rommaldez for supporting the program. Special thank you to Zev and Temi for checking up on us throughout the summer to make sure we are comfortable in our internship placements. Lastly, thank you Kent Tong and Jae Shim from OCA National for being accommodating and the best Programs supervisors during my internship at OCA.
I graduated from the University of Georgia in December of 2018 with a BS in Psychology and a BA in Anthropology. After college, I served a year in City Year AmeriCorps in Jacksonville, FL as a 4th Grade ELA Student Success Coach in a Title I Elementary School. During my time in Jacksonville, I met with the Southern Region Chair of the National Federation of Filipino American Associations (NaFFAA) and she appointed me as their secretary. From there, she showed me this opportunity to be a part of the IMPACT! Program and thought that I would be interested. Granted, I have no background in public policy nor legislative jargon, and I could have never imagined myself working in DC before then. But, what drew me in was the program’s purpose of helping young professionals like me to become citizens involved in the Filipino community in hopes to increase representation in the political arena and in civic engagement in the future. So, I applied and the rest was history.
After USAI’s orientation week, I was placed in OCA Asian Pacific American Advocates as their in-house programs intern. What was really cool about this placement is that I also had another cohort just like the IMPACT! one, but instead of 6, this one had 20 other interns that were also either placed in-house with the national headquarters or in other agencies throughout DC. Working within OCA’s staff was interesting as I had a different perspective of OCA than the others who were working as OCA interns in other organizations, however, this was an amazing experience overall because this gave me a first-hand experience in working in an Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) advocacy non-profit organization.
Working in advocacy spaces has been something that I am passionate about and was the reason why I served in AmeriCorps. I have never worked within an AAPI specific space and I was ecstatic to get involved with the community at a national level. The beauty of being virtual is that we have the freedom to communicate with other OCA chapters and non-profits throughout the nation when we can. I was paired up with a fellow intern to present two advocacy modules to young high school advocates with OCA-Greater Houston and Mi Familia Vota and we got a warm reception from the attendees. It was super inspiring to teach the future of America the vocabulary to navigate through advocacy and if they never had that curriculum provided to them, I am glad that I provided them the words they need to speak up for themselves and for others.
What provided me the most gratification was working in OCA and Center for Asian Pacific American Women’s (CAPAW) Womxn’s Conference which was a week-long virtual conference with more than 30 professionals from the AAPI community providing their advice on how to navigate their workplace and life as an AAPI woman. I was taught a lot of skills on how to create a virtual conference and how to manage the logistics with a team, but also being in a space with successful AAPI women was super inspiring for me as an AAPI woman myself knowing that I too could be like them. Addressing issues on how Asian women are groomed to settle for what we have, and have a tendency to self-deprecate instead of promoting ourselves is something I learned from the conference. It is our duty to unpack, unlearn, and dismantle that mentality in order for us to move forward in our careers. Having these leaders, especially Asian American women there to speak upon their struggles and their rise to prominence in their respective fields was empowering to hear. Also, this was a great event to network with other women throughout the nation with different professions and backgrounds from the comfort of our computer screen. I am grateful for the fun and informative experience this conference was.
After interning with OCA, I have narrowed my prospects on what I would like to do careerwise. It fills my cup whenever I work with the underserved community and I have found a sense of inclusion and belonging while working with AAPIs and other marginzalized groups through intersectional issues. Combining the passions of mine is something I would like to continue after my internship and luckily I have found a couple of people I networked with in OCA that are based in Atlanta with their organizations here. I hope to find a base there for a while prior to eventually taking up law or public policy.
As for now, I continuously show up and show out for Filipino Americans as the community provided me this opportunity this summer. Using the knowledge I gained from my experience, I hope to promote the Filipino spirit and the resilience of our people through advocacy and civic engagement at a local and national level. I am a proud Pinay and am not afraid to show it through my work. I am forever humbled and blessed to be now a part of the USAI family.
