Integrity, Consistency, Strength through Coalition

Teresa Zimmerman-Liu for GSA Vice President for Academic Affairs

 

Teresa Zimmerman-Liu is a 2nd year PhD student in the Department of Sociology. Her area of research is Chinese culture and religions, focusing on the Taiwanese Buddhist NGO, Tzu Chi Foundation, which promotes living sustainably and helping the poor. She is a non-traditional student with a wealth of life experiences that enable her to contribute to the community. She is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and Spanish, holds a German-English translation certificate, and did high school study abroad programs in Costa Rica and Germany. Her experiences abroad as a teenager ignited in her a passion for social justice and building bridges across class, gender, and cultural differences. 

 

In 1982, after studying foreign languages and translation at Georgetown University, she went to Taiwan to learn Mandarin Chinese through immersion and to gain first-hand experience of life in a developing country. There she taught English to students from preschool age to adults, focusing on the fostering of cross-cultural understanding. While in Taiwan, she married into a traditional Hakka Chinese peasant family in its first generation off the family farm. Her experiences during her time as the eldest daughter-in-law in this multigenerational household gave her deep insights into the needs and concerns of ordinary people in traditional societies as they grapple with the transition to modern lifestyles.

 

When Teresa and her husband brought their three children to the United States in 1990, she personally experienced life in the Chinese-American immigrant community. She used her translation and teaching skills to help her family, friends, and clients successfully transition to life in America. In her efforts to raise her children to be bilingual and bicultural, she founded, managed, and taught at the Watchman Nee Memorial School, a cooperative, private school for families who are committed to raising bilingual, bicultural children. 

 

Outside of school, she worked more widely in the Chinese-American community in southern California, tutoring immigrant children from the local public schools and translating for newcomers. Her most rewarding translation work was with refugees from persecution in mainland China. She helped them obtain asylum in the United States and then assisted them as they transitioned to American life. Many of these clients had been imprisoned in China, and she worked with each one for several years, helping them obtain the necessary medical and psychological treatments to ensure their ability to function in their new lives. 

 

In 2009, Teresa returned to school to equip herself to teach at the university level where she could expand her efforts to foster cross-cultural understanding. She obtained an MA in Asian Studies at California State University, Long Beach. During her time at CSULB, she further served the campus community as president and then treasurer of the Asian Studies Graduate Society. Under Teresa’s leadership, ASGS screened films on Asian cultures, gave workshops on writing and presenting academic papers, and sponsored one regional and one national academic conference on the CSULB campus. These experiences inform her platform for VP Academic of UCSD’s Grad Student Association.

 

From 2009-2013, Teresa worked to promote affordable, quality higher education in her job as grad student intern at the California Faculty Association, Long Beach Chapter, where she did research projects on trends in higher education and engaged in political activism. At CFA LB she learned the importance of building coalitions among faculty and student organizations to work for common goals and improve the campus climate for everyone. These experiences have helped her transition seamlessly to her current position as the GSA representative to the UCSD’s academic senate committee on Planning and Budget, where she has contributed to discussions on faculty position letters regarding MOOCs and state funding. She reported faculty’s concerns about these issues to GSA executives and worked with them on a resolution about MOOCs and on improving lobbying efforts to obtain state funding for the UC system.

 

In addition to academics and activism, Teresa enjoys reading novels, making mosaics, and playing the viola. She is committed to social justice, community service, and making the world a better place for everyone.