Tawainese Students Association (TSA)
What is TSA
The Taiwanese Students Association at Carnegie Mellon University is an organization that serves to bring cultural awareness, provide service to the community, and create a safe environment for students throughout the CMU community via cultural, philanthropic, and social events. Some annual activities include Culture Night, Booth, Ski Trip, and ITASA Conference, which are detailed below.
My Leadership - Vice President & Public Relations Chair
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Annual Activities
Booth
Booth is one of the biggest activities of Spring Carnival, an annual community-wide festival celebrated by students, faculty, alumni, and Pittsburgh residents. Each student organization participating in booth builds single or double-story structures based on a specific theme decided every year. The booths consist of elaborate paintings, crafts, architecture, and even family-friendly games!
Every year, TSA participates in booth and competes in the “Independent” organization category. Booths are critiqued on the overall design, paintings and crafts, game, safety, and even sustainability. In 2018 and 2019, TSA won 1st place for booth! Unfortunately, due to COVID-19, Spring Carnival was canceled in 2020 and 2021. However, the experience of putting together an entire structure from scratch, forming a camaraderie with each other as we worked in freezing temperatures throughout the night, is something I’ll never forget and always cherish with TSA.
Culture Night
The annual TSA Culture Night is one of the biggest events for cultural student organizations on CMU campus. With over 500 attendees each year, Culture night exudes the best representation of cultures present within the CMU community. The organizations bring together a collection of dances, music performances, skits, movie projects, and even spoken word poetry to showcase the amazing diversity among the student body and bring to light every culture's uniqueness and beauty.
Ski Trip
Every winter, TSA puts together a ski trip for its members to getaway for the weekend and tackle the snowy slopes of Pittsburgh together. While this is a smaller internal event compared to others, it helps bring together the newer and older members (even alumni!) of the TSA community in creating everlasting memories. From private skiing/snowboarding lessons, to accidental bruises, to late night DDR competitions, and collaborative cooking efforts, each ski trip provides a series of unique and unexpected fun and excitement to last the entire year!
ITASA
The Intercollegiate Taiwanese-American Students Association (ITASA) is a non-profit organization that provides the resources, support, and network for college students across the nation to connect with Taiwanese culture and heritage. Learn more on their website: itasa.org.
CMU TSA has been an active participant in annual ITASA conferences on the east coast and midwest. Each conference consists of a full weekend of seminars, workshops, and activities focused on building leadership and professional skills, highlighting Taiwanese and Asian American issues and ways to overcome them, and connecting students from all corners of the world. Through ITASA, I was able to connect with students at other universities, meet and learn from Asian American professionals and entrepreneurs, and take time to reflect and grow my personal skills as well.
