LONG BEACH >> Ryan Ly, 21, is a second-generation Cambodian immigrant and the first in his family to attend college.
The Cal State Long Beach student, who is studying sports psychology and leadership, recalls the uncertainty of his first days on campus as a Cambodian-American seeking a college degree in order to care for his parents in their later years.
“I didn’t know what to expect, being a first-generation college student,” Ly says. “I didn’t have the resources, or people to guide me in the transition to college. It was nerve-racking.”
Ly is joining CSULB President Jane Close Conoley and other campus officials Tuesday in Sacramento to tell state lawmakers the story of Cambodian-Americans on campus, with hopes to dispel myths about Asian students generally and garner more support for Cambodian students specifically.
According to U.S. Census Bureau estimates from 2006-2010, only 13 percent of Cambodian-Americans in Los Angeles County have a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 47 percent of Chinese residents and 44 percent of Caucasians.
Long Beach is home to the largest population of Cambodians outside of Southeast Asia, and Ly and others from CSULB want more support from Sacramento in terms of deeper outreach into the community and broader support services, including Cambodian-American counselors who can serve the roughly 700 Cambodian-American students on campus.
“Most people think if you’re Asian, you’re supposed to be smart, you’re supposed to get a degree,” Ly says. “The Asian population is extremely stereotyped when it comes to school. But here in Cambodia Town, not many are going to school.”
In the early 1960s, CSULB hosted more than 100 Cambodian studentsseeking to acquire industrial skills, as part of a student exchange program. Many of the students came from affluent homes, where their parents worked as government diplomats or urban professionals. They formed a Cambodian Student Association.
But by the mid-1970s, Long Beach began to see waves of Cambodians seeking refuge from the Khmer Rouge and the atrocities it committed in Cambodia. The regime slaughtered about 2 million people between 1975 and 1979.
The devastation has had a multigenerational impact on the Cambodian community in Long Beach and across the United States, as refugees struggled to find their footing in a foreign culture.
More than 29 percent of Cambodian-Americans live in poverty, higher than any other Southeast Asian group outside of Hmong- Americans, and 35 percent of Cambodian-Americans drop out of high school, according to The White House’s Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.
Sara Pol-Lim, executive director of the United Cambodian Community, says the lack of education has led to 40 years of high rates of unemployment and at-risk youth among Cambodian-Americans in the city.
Pol-Lim, who will be among the CSULB delegation to Sacramento, says higher education as a value is not necessarily handed down by a generation of Cambodian-Americans who came to the United States with a survival mentality, content with necessities like shelter and food.
“The challenge of higher education attainment among our community in Long Beach is due to the ripple effects of the trauma, the PTSD that their parents brought,” Pol-Lim says, referring to post-traumatic stress disorder. “Some of the challenges they face are having less support from family. And when your parents came from little education themselves and there are high culture and language barriers, they have very little to offer in parental guidance.”
JOURNEY TO SUCCESS
Cambodian-Americans are among the lowest in the nation when it comes to educational attainment, when compared with other Asian- American ethnic groups.
The numbers may be a shock to people who no longer see Asian-Americans as an underrepresented group on college campuses or a demographic in need of support services.
CSULB officials say there is a misguided “model minority” image when it comes to Asian-American students. The campus has the largest number of Cambodian-American students in the Cal State University system.
Conoley says she will be talking to lawmakers about what the university is doing to help the Cambodian population in Long Beach. She wants to remind lawmakers not to lump all Asian-American groups together when it comes to funding and policy decisions and convince them that student services are vital to the Cambodian community.
“That’s key. It’s not just getting students into school, but can we have an adviser that can be dedicated to them?” Conoley says.
In 2010, the Chancellor’s Office of the CSU brought together Asian-American Pacific Islander community leaders to talk about strategies for reaching young people. The result was the Journey to Success program to educate AAPI students and parents about college and financial aid.
CSULB works with groups such as the United Cambodian Community, Khmer Girls in Action and Khmer Arts Academy.
Campus officials say state-funded outreach and retention programs like the Educational Opportunity Program have helped Cambodian-American students succeed. EOP gives support services to first-generation and low-income students, including academic and career advising, tutoring and peer mentoring.
CSULB reports that the campus has enrolled 102 Cambodian-American students in EOP. They have an average six-year graduation rate of 57.7 percent going back to 2003, according to campus officials. That’s compared with 46.2 percent for Cambodian-American students who did not participate in EOP.
Conoley points to a Ly as an example of what EOP can do for Cambodian American-students.
“He’s going to talk to lawmakers about how he’s benefiting from these services,” Conoley says. “If they want to help, they can help us with giving them the support they need. There’s a lot of pulls for them to leave college.”
Ly’s father works in a post office, while his mother is a homemaker. He has three younger siblings. Ly hopes to work for a professional sports team one day, “taking care of athletes” through sports medicine.
Cambodian-Americans have too few resources when it comes to learning about college and programs such as financial aid that can help them enroll and graduate, Ly says. Often young people see gangs as a way to survive and support their families.
But there is light. Ly says many families, like his own, have worked hard to instill college as an attainable goal.
“For me, to go to school is fulfilling not only a dream for me, but for them,” he says.
Contact Josh Dulaney at 562-714-2150.
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