kai kai mascareñas

Kai Kai Mascareñas is a mother, educator, organizer, and a creative collaborator between various communities.

After graduating from Loyola University Chicago in 2012, Kai Kai served as a community organizer with the Alliance of Filipinos for Immigrant Rights and Empowerment (AFIRE), where she developed curriculum that introduced conversations on identity, immigration, and civic engagement to high school and college students. Alongside other community-based organizations, Kai Kai helped enhance the growing political strength of Chicago’s Asian American communities through Get Out the Vote initiatives, as well as coordinated legislative visits with Illinois elected officials through Pan-Asian Voter Engagement to advocate for issues related to domestic worker rights and health access. Through Kai Kai’s relationship building, she strengthened and tripled AFIRE’s grassroots volunteer base within one year.

Kai Kai moved to the DMV to pursue her Master’s in Education in Student Affairs at the University of Maryland, College Park. Within the Leadership and Community Service-Learning office, Kai Kai advised student coordinators in building and maintaining relationships with community service organizations, as well as facilitated bi-weekly short-term service- learning projects. Within the Multicultural Involvement and Community Advocacy Office, Kai Kai advised and provided support to the largest racial minority on campus. Additionally, she served as the expert advocate to campus administration and the broader higher education community on unique needs, experiences, and challenges faced by the Asian American student community. Kai Kai fostered purposeful and cooperative partnerships with offices that work with Asian American students, which developed into an opportunity to be an adjunct professor within Asian American Studies to create a class around activism and organizing.

Most recently, Kai Kai dedicates her time to grassroot organizing in the DMV. She continues to build intentionally with community-based organizations, such as BAYAN USA, International Coalition for Human Rights in the Philippines, and Malaya Movement, leading to meaningful cross-cultural and racial collaboration on various social justice initiatives. Through this work, Kai Kai is a founding member of the first chapter of the International Women’s Alliance in the United States, a global alliance of grassroots-based women’s organizations, institutions, networks, and individuals committed to advancing national and social liberation and gender equality.