My Research and Publications

• Since 2009, at the urging of my late mentor Dr. Don Nakanishi, I have been studying the racial politics of affirmative action policies, with a focus on Asian Americans. I am currently working on a book tentatively entitled Justice or Just Us?: Asian Americans in the Racial Borderlands of the Affirmative Action Debate. Some of my other relevant publications in this area include:

  • Poon, O., Segoshi, M., Tang, L., Surla, K., Nguyen, C., & Squire, D. (2019). Asian Americans, affirmative action, and the political economy of racism: A multidimensional model of racial ideologies. Harvard Educational Review, 89(2), 201-226. This paper was originally presented at the 42nd Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Higher Education, Houston, TX in 2017.

  • Poon, O., & Segoshi, M. (2018). The racial mascot speaks​: A critical race discourse analysis of Asian Americans and Fisher v. University of Texas. Review of Higher Education, 42(1), 235-267.

  • Surla, K. L., & Poon, O. A. (2015). Visualizing social influences on Filipino American and Southeast Asian American college choice.  Journal of Southeast Asian American Education and Advancement, 10(2), 1-26.

  • Poon, O., & Byrd, A. (2013). Beyond Tiger Mom anxiety: Ethnic, gender and generational differences in Asian American college access and choices. Journal of College Admissions, 221, 23 - 31.

  • Poon, O., Ong, P. M., Lee, C. A., Shek, Y. L., & Tran, D. L. (2009). Asian Americans in Public Contracting: Policy and Analytical Challenges. Washington, DC: Asian Americans Advancing Justice. 

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• From my studies on the racial politics of affirmative action, I have become very concerned about how poorly informed the debate over affirmative action as well as ethnically disaggregated public data collection have become, especially among Chinese Americans who have now taken on public leadership in campaigns against these policies. In response, co-founded Chinese Americans Reimagining Leadership (CARL), which coordinated an inaugural youth leadership program in Boston.

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• In 2018, my colleague Dr. Badia Ahad-Legardy and I co-edited Difficult Subjects: Insights and Strategies for Teaching about Race, Sexuality, and Gender.​ This book is intended to serve as a resource for college educators interested in cultivating classroom pedagogical approaches in difficult political times.

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