Youth Programs

Afterschool Program

Starting in January 2004, OCAPICA officially launched their new and FREE afterschool program. Made possible through funding from Orange County United Way, this program provides junior high and high school-aged youth with a safe environment to receive mentorship and academic advising. Through a variety of activities, the program aims to provide opportunities for academic and character maturity for low income students in the community. Click here for afterschool program application.

API Martial Arts Program

OCAPICA offers the API Martial Arts Program for youth of all ethnic groups. The Martial Arts Program provides free martial arts classes every Saturday for children and teenagers from low-income households.

API Unity Games

API Unity Games is an Olympics-style event that brings together more than 200 API high school students from all over Orange County.

API Youth Coffeehouse

Coffeehouse serves as a safe and nurturing place for youth to hang out and meet other youth from around the county, and a forum to discuss issues they are dealing with, learn more about API issues, philosophize, and show off their talents.

Financial Literacy - New Economics for Teens

This program provides training to API youth to help their families and communities out of poverty by learning about a wide range of personal finance topics.

TAPIOCA

OCAPICA produces a newspaper developed and written by Asian and Pacific Islander American youth in Orange County. This newspaper, entitled TAPIOCA, focuses upon issues of concern and interests of API youth.

Mendez v. Westminster Curriculum

This curriculum, a project of OCAPICA and the Anaheim Union High School District BTSA/Induction Program, includes lesson plans, strategies and a video guide for teaching civil rights in a local context by introducing Mendez v. Westminster into the classroom.  The momentous case of Mendez v. Westminster affected all schools in California, and seven years later, set the precedence for Brown v. Board of Education, which desegregated the educational system nationwide.   

The curriculum was written by two local teachers in Orange County, Adam Wemmer and Jackie Counts, and is aligned to California State Standards.  Teachers can download the curriculum free of charge.  Click here for curriculum (note: large PDF file-17.5MB) The video guide supplements the Emmy-awarding winning documentary, “Mendez v. Westminster: For All the Children / Para Todos Los Ninos,” produced by Sandra Robbie, KOCE.  Please refer to the KOCE website for information on this documentary. Funding generously provided by Wells Fargo Bank.

Multicultural Civil Rights Curriculum

OCAPICA developed a curriculum around the diverse history of Orange County-teaching about the history of collaboration between different ethnic groups and populations, as well as individuals who have made great strides in the struggle for civil rights.

Vietnamese American Education Curriculum

OCAPICA enriches the education curriculum in Orange County schools, through a curriculum for 7th - 12th grades.  This nationally-recognized curriculum on the Vietnamese American experience helps to supplement and meets California teaching standards in social studies, language arts, and U.S. history.

In collaboration with the Southern Poverty Law Center, our first edition titled, "Vietnamese Americans: Lessons in American History" can be downloaded for free at the Tolerance.org website at http://www.teachingtolerance.org/vietnamese.  There is also an order form for the second edition.   If you would like to purchase the hard copy, please click here to download the PDF order form.

*NEW* CA Department of Education has the Vietnamese American: Lessons in American History (Second Edition) in CD-ROM format available for purchase, under item #007101. Please click here for more information.

Policy & Advocacy Programs

All of OCAPICA’s programs integrate a policy component. Our policy activities encompass issues related to immigrant rights, health care, education, affordable housing, language access, workers’ rights, and other issues.

Supporting the community to increase their role in civic participation in Orange County is another important aspect of our policy programs. Important activities for the community include census, redistricting, voter registration and education, becoming involved in policymaking, advisory committees, and coalitions.

Policy Mixer

Supporting the community to increase their role in civic participation in Orange County is another important aspect of our policy programs. Important activities for the community include census, redistricting, voter registration and education, becoming involved in policymaking, advisory committees, and coalitions.

Community Health Programs

ACCT: Achieving Cancer Control Together

This collaborative project between four agencies focuses on building capacity for cancer control and prevention in both the Chinese and Korean communities.

REACH 2010-Promoting Access to Health for Women

This program focuses upon reducing disparities in breast and cervical health among seven different Pacific Islander and Southeast Asian populations in LA and Orange Counties.

• Promoting Access To Health (PATH) Needs Assessment Version 2
• Cambodian women's health brochure
• Chamorro women's health brochure
• Chamorro breast self-examination "susu" brochure
• Chamorro Cervical Cancer brochure
• Chamorro Lay Health Educators guide
• Chinese women's health brochure
• English women's health brochure
• Hmong women's health brochure
• Korean women's health brochure
• Laotian women's health brochure
• Laotian breast self-examination brochure
• Laotian cervical health brochure
• Marshallese women's health brochure
• Samoan women's health brochure
• Samoan breast self-examination brochure
• Samoan cervical health brochure
• Thai Health Resource guide
• Thai women's health brochure
• Tongan women's health brochure
• Tongan breast self-examination brochure
• Tongan cervical health brochure
• Vietnamese Health Resource guide
• Vietnamese women's health brochure

Vietnamese Breast and Cervical Cancer Program

OCAPICA helps to introduce Vietnamese women to breast self-exams through trainings and dissemination of culturally and linguistically appropriate materials.

Vietnamese outreach materials for the breast and cervical cancer program:

• Program brochure (inside cover) / (outside cover)
• Young women's outreach flyer (front) / (back)
• Vietnamese Mother's day flyer (front) / (back)

APIHEP: API Healthy Elders Program

A program focused upon improving the health opportunities of API older adults. Program partners outreach to Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese older adults in Orange County about hypertension, tobacco cessation, physical activity, nutrition, diabetes, and other chronic diseases.

HAPAS: Health Access for Pacific Asian Seniors

HAPAS focuses upon reducing health disparities among APIs 60 years of age and over. The program focuses on: adult immunizations, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.

Men’s Health Project

The goal of this project is to improve the health of API males in Orange County by working with men from the community to develop and conduct a comprehensive health education and awareness campaign.

• Cambodian men's health brochure
• Chamorro men's health brochure
• Chinese men's health brochure
• English men's health brochure
• Hmong men's health brochure
• Korean men's health brochure
• Laotian men's health brochure
• Samoan men's health brochure
• Thai men's health brochure
• Tongan men's health brochure
• Vietnamese men's health brochure

Cultural Competency in Health Care

OCAPICA works with both health care providers and the community to improve each other’s knowledge and skills in working to improve access to needed health care for all. This includes working in partnerships with hospitals and providers to improve their accessibility, knowledge and supporting and educating community members about their rights and responsibilities.