By admin 
The Sacramento Bee and Nehemiah Leaders Programs are celebrating this year’s 60 Change Makers. Join them at our gala at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 13 at the Grand Sheraton in downtown Sacramento. Buy tickets at sacramentochangemakers.com.
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Cirian Villavicencio teaches his students at San Joaquin Delta College about American politics and institutions, international political economy and how to compare different governments around the world.
What he actually wants them to take away from his classes is how to become engaged citizens who use their voices to amplify their communities’ needs.
Villavicencio has been teaching for more than two decades. For about as long, he has advocated for the rights and representation of Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. That passion took root in high school. In the Bay Area’s Filipino American hub of South San Francisco and Daly City, 40% of the student body at his school was – like him – of Filipino descent. Despite that, he didn’t see anyone who looked like him in leadership positions.
“I started questioning that: Why have our communities been invisible? And I wanted my career to address that,” he said. “Representation matters. I’ve always been combating the invisibility of our communities.”
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As former chair of the California Commission on Asian and Pacific Islander American Affairs, Villavicencio helped pass legislation to disaggregate public health data for diverse AAPI groups that were otherwise lumped into a few major categories. He worked on human trafficking legislation and advocated for Filipino World War II veterans to receive the Congressional Gold Medal. Later, Villavicencio helped to create an ongoing program to support the needs of California’s first-generation, low-income AAPI students in the community college system.
Now, as a faculty representative on the California Community College board, his aim is to be a voice for students from historically marginalized communities.
“His service reflects a lifelong commitment to empowering communities, fostering leadership, and advancing equity well beyond the scope of his professional responsibilities,” said Khydeeja Alam, who currently serves as CAPIAA’s executive director.
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