To form an outlet for Asian students from all over the world, the Asian-American Association at MU has put together a list of events to bring the Asian community together.

The group’s purpose is to provide a social network for Asian-American students at MU, according to the AAA website.

“We want to try and connect Asian Americans on campus because it can be hard to find an outlet,” AAA secretary Morgan Buscher said. “When you come from a different culture, it can be really hard in a new society. We want to connect people from different Asian cultures on campus, and we also want to do a lot of advocacy events.”

AAA likes to discuss Asian-American concerns across the country, Buscher said.

“We have guest speakers come in and talk about issues,” she said. “We talk about different API, Asians Pacific Issues, and bring awareness of the Asian-American community on campus.”

AAA has done a lot of planning these past four months, Buscher said.

“For the UnificAsian that we had on Sunday, three of us worked on planning it from the time school let out last semester, doing things like ordering food and (discussing) how we were going to split everything up into groups and group leaders,” Buscher said.

This upcoming week, AAA will host a fall welcome week, where it will split up between the umbrella organizations. These organizations include Asian Interest Sororities, the South Asians Association, Philippine Students Association, a dance crew and the Asian Christian Fellowship.

“We have all these different umbrella orgs, and we assign each of them a day of the week where they host different events so that people get to know them a little bit better,” Buscher said.

Tina Zhang, a AAA member, said there is more to the organization than just discussing Asian-American issues.

“Our goal is to learn more about Asian-American issues going on in the country as well as form friendships between the members of AAA so everyone can get to know each other and have fun,” Zhang said.

Zhang said AAA holds general body meetings every other Thursday. There are also service events and social gatherings members can attend.

One way all of MU can get involved in the AAA is during the Asian American Awareness Week.

“In April, we have Asian American Awareness Week.” Buscher said. “Every day of the week we have all kinds of events planned like Asian street market. Here, we set up at Lowry Mall, and we have a lot of food from different restaurants around town. We give everyone a chance to sample the Asian cuisines in town.”

Buscher talked about the AAA’s goals for this year.

“Hopefully we’ll get a whole bunch of freshmen and try to keep them,” she said. “That’s a hard job for any organization, to get new interest and maintain interest.”

Buscher said she is confident about the AAA executive board.

“We all have known each other for a very long time, and we’re really good at communicating and are comfortable with each other,” Buscher said. “I think that is a big asset when it comes to spending the $26,000 that we get a year. So, it does take a lot of planning.”