Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage at KID Museum

Join KID Museum’s AAPI Heritage Celebration on May 14th! From 10:00am to 4:00pm, we will have exciting activities celebrating AAPI Heritage and the opportunity for you to meet AAPI artists and makers innovating through creativity, cultural preservation, and activism.

In addition, throughout the month of May, KID Museum will be putting the spotlight on AAPI #HistoryMakers who have innovated, invented, and positively impacted our world.

Thanks to the generous support of Montgomery County Public Schools, any MCPS student and their family can visit KID Museum and participate in a workshop for free through June 30, 2023 (Please Note: General Admission and Workshop Registration have timed entries and are subject to availability). If you are a MCPS student, please complete this form to get your free registration code.

May 14 AAPI Celebration Programming

Soul & Ink: Screenprint Making

10:00am - 4:00pm

Meet the Soul & Ink crew to explore screenprinting and art as activism! Choose from one to four custom designs about Asian American Identity, love, and cultural celebration, and make your own screenprint poster! The 4 designs were created especially for KID Museum and are only available through this event.

Soul & Ink is a mobile live screen-printing business founded by couple Frankie and Sherry Meneses. They bring printmaking out of the conventional studio space and into the streets, inviting everyone to participate in the hands-on screenprinting process.

Washington DC Taiwanese School (WDTS) and Taiwan Fun youth volunteers will lead a hands-on activity to showcase Taiwanese puppets. Join them to make your own hand puppet using recyclable materials and textiles.

Taiwan Fun preserves and showcases Taiwanese culture through multicultural festivals and events. Washington DC Taiwanese School (WDCTS) is a non-profit organization that teaches children from ages 2-18 Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese and exposes children to traditional Taiwanese culture.

Taiwan Fun: Puppet Making

10:00am - 4:00pm

Edamame Champ: Chopsticks Competition Game

1:00pm - 4:00pm

Who loves Edamame? Edamame is a baby soybean! How many Edamame can you move in one minute only using chopsticks? Find out in this Chopstick Challenge!

#EdamameChamp is an annual Spring campaign from Table for Two to promote Healthy eating through Japanese Cuisine with a focus on Soy and to raise funds for teaching food education.

Head to Maker Lounge and sign up for a 30-minute simple cooking demonstration activity using soy. Then, make (and try!) Inari sushi. Inari Sushi is a traditional sushi made with rice tucked inside sweet and salty deep-fried tofu pockets.

Table for Two is a non-profit organization which started in Japan and is expanding globally and was initiated by and is an official affiliate of the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders.

Food Making: Inari Sushi with Table for Two

1:00pm - 4:00pm

Meet a Maker: Trisha Gupta

1:00pm - 3:00pm

Meet KID Museum’s Visiting Artist Trisha Gupta and ask her about how she makes art using printmaking and natural dyes. Get inspired and learn how you can be a maker too!

Trisha Gupta’s two large-scale artworks, titled “Home is Lost/Home is Found” are on view in KID Museum’s Maker Playground. In this artwork, she explores themes of identity, home, and immigration. After being trained in the Western tradition of woodblock printing and as a first-generation Indian-American, Gupta returned to her home in Rajasthan where she learned about Indian block printing with natural plant-based dyes. She specializes in natural pigments from traditional Indian plant sources to create colors that are used in her prints, paints, and dyes. In addition to being an artist, Gupta is an educator and preserves traditional folk art and fine Indian printmaking teaching Asian printmaking processes like Indian woodblock printing, Japanese woodblock, and viscosity or the consistency or thickness of paint.

Celebrating AAPI #HistoryMakers

Isabella Aiona Abbott, PhD (1919-2010)

Ethnobotanist & Phycologist

Do you know what a ethnobotanist does? They study a region's plants and their practical uses through the traditional knowledge of local culture and people. Isabella Ainoa Abott was a famous ethnobotanist and phycologist (they study marine algae). As a child growing up in Hawaii, young Izzy, as she was called, learned about edible Hawaiian seaweeds from her mother. Later she became the world’s leading expert on the algae of the Pacific Ocean basin. By 1972, Stanford University had promoted her directly to full professor of Biology, where she was the first woman and first person of color in that position.

Isabella Aiona Abbott, PhD (1919-2010)
Ethnobotanist & Phycologist

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, PhD (1910-1995)

Astrophysicist & Nobel Prize Winner

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar was a prominent Indian-born American astrophysicist who won the 1983 Nobel Prize for Physics for his studies on the structure and evolution of stars. His work contributed to our understanding of white dwarf stars and black holes. Subrahmanyan was a
long-time member of the Physics faculty at University of Chicago, and many concepts, institutions, and inventions, including the Chandrasekhar limit and the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, are named for him.

Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, PhD (1910-1995)
Astrophysicist & Nobel Prize Winner

Steve Chen

Co-Founder of YouTube

Whether you search YouTube for DIY videos, science experiments, or cute cats, you have to admit it’s a powerful platform, and for that, you can thank Steve Chen. He’s a co-founder of the hugely popular video-sharing website, which launched in 2005 and today supports over 800 million videos! Steve arrived in the US from Taiwan at age eight and worked at 7-Eleven to earn money to go to college. He came up with the idea for YouTube at age 27, after attending a party and realizing there was no easy way to share videos of the event.

Steve Chen
Co-Founder of YouTube

Steven Chu, PhD

Nobel Prize-Winning Physicist & Former Energy Secretary

Steven Chu, a mega award-winning energy scientist, is kind of a powerhouse himself! He’s published over 280 papers, directed major labs, and in 1997, won the Nobel Prize in Physics. Then, in 2009, President Obama named him Secretary of Energy, making him the first scientist ever to hold a Cabinet position. In that job, Steven advised the President on how to invest in clean energy, reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and address the global climate crisis. As a child growing up in St. Louis, he loved to build models, leading to a lifelong interest in chemistry and physics.

Steven Chu, PhD
Nobel Prize-Winning Physicist & Former Energy Secretary

Kapulei Flores

Activist & Photographer

How do you protect a volcano? Native Hawaiian photographer and activist Kapulei Flores uses her skills as a photographer to protect Mauna Kea, a dormant volcano sacred to the Kanaka Maoli people. Kapulei, her family, and her community are fighting to prevent an 18-story telescope from being constructed at its summit. She’s photographed the protests and ceremonies held on Mauna Kea over the past decade as a way to honor her community, raise awareness for their cause, and make their culture tangible for people around the world.

Kapulei Flores
Activist & Photographer

Ruby Ibarra

Scientist & Rapper

Meet Ruby Ibarra, a Filipina American rapper, director, and spoken word artist whose work reflects her cultural heritage and her experiences as an immigrant. Ruby is also a former biotech scientist who worked on the frontlines of developing the COVID-19 vaccine. Today she uses her music to educate the public about challenging contemporary issues like immigration, social justice, and climate change because “music is accessible, it’s a way of getting information to many people from all backgrounds.” She has also created “Pinays Rising,” a scholarship program for young women in the Filipino community.

Ruby Ibarra
Scientist & Rapper

Jim Lee

Artist & Comic-Book Creator

If you’re a fan of Superman, Batman, the Flash, or Green Lantern, you’re also a fan of Jim Lee. He’s the comic-book artist who heads up DC Comics, the largest superhero comic book publishing company in the world. Jim came to the U.S. from Korea as a child, and soon fell in love with the X-Men characters, whom he saw as outsiders like himself. By high school, Jim was already creating his own comic characters. He entered the industry by working as an artist for Marvel Comics, which owns X-Men, and is now one of the leaders in the comic-book world.

Jim Lee
Artist & Comic-Book Creator

Maya Lin

Architect and Designer

What are the odds that someone with no professional experience might win the largest design competition in American history? Pretty good, if you’re Maya Lin. Maya was a 21-year old architecture student when her concept for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was chosen out of 1,420 competitors. Her unusual design in the form of a V-shaped wall of black stone, etched with the names of fallen soldiers, faced a lot of criticism at the time. Today, it’s the most-visited memorial in the nation’s capital, in addition to influencing a new style of monument design around the world.

Maya Lin
Architect and Designer

Yo-yo Ma

Cellist & Peace Activist

Asian American cellist Yo-Yo Ma has recorded 90 albums, won 19 Grammy Awards, and performed for audiences all over the world. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest living classical musicians. He’s also a UN Messenger of Peace who is recognized for his volunteer work for people in need. Yo-Yo sees music as a way to bring people together, and his group, Silk Road Ensemble, draws inspiration from widely diverse countries and musical traditions, including American bluegrass, traditional Chinese melodies, and Argentine tangos. KID Museum was pleased to present Yo-Yo Ma with a Maker Award at its 2020 Fête for the Future.

Yo-Yo Ma
Cellist and Peace Activist

Sahra Nguyen

Storyteller & Entrepreneur

What is your favorite thing to make? Writer-activist-entrepreneur Sahra Nguyen loves to create stories, celebrate underrepresented voices, and facilitate empowerment through the writing process. A first-generation Vietnamese American whose parents fled their country by boat after the Vietnam War, Sahra is a maker in many ways. She has started a youth literacy program, directed a university writing program, and founded a coffee company that is successfully introducing a new source of coffee beans from Vietnam.

Sahra Nguyen
Storyteller & Entrepreneur

Monica Rho, MD

Physician (US Women's Soccer) & Professor

Remember when the US women’s team took top prize in the 2019 World Cup? If you were watching, you might have caught a glimpse of Monica Rho, MD. She’s the head team physician for the US Women’s National Team. Monica trained as a physician of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. She decided to practice sports medicine at age 13, after suffering a minor knee injury and realizing how few women were in that specialty. Her goal is to help women athletes perform at the highest level of their own abilities.

Monica Rho, MD
Physician (US Women’s Soccer) & Professor

Alice Wong

Activist & Author

Ever want to blend in and not be noticed? That's how Alice Wong felt growing up. As one of the few Asian American or physically disabled students in her school, she struggled with internalized racism and the desire to fit in. When she was in her twenties, Alice began to fight for access and visibility on her own terms, working to enact systemic change. She began to conduct research and provide assistance to others with disabilities, and in 2013, was appointed by President Obama to the National Council on Disability. In 2014, she launched the Disability Visibility Project to elevate the voices and stories of disabled people, and in 2023 published her memoir, Year of the Tiger: An Activist's Life.

Alice Wong
Activist & Author

Special thanks to our advisors who helped shape our AAPI Heritage celebration programming.

Michael C. Lin: KID Museum Board Member and former biomedical scientist at the National Institutes of Health
Aryani Ong: Board Member, The Asian American Foundation, Director of Anti-Hate & Belonging
Janelle Wong: Director, Asian American Studies/ Professor, American Studies and Government and Politics
Yi Shen: Asian Liaison, Montgomery County Council, Office of Community Partnerships

Access for Every Maker

KID Museum is dedicated to expanding access to STEM and maker learning opportunities for all by providing free and reduced-cost opportunities to participate in our programming.

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