Biographic Sketch The Foundations' mission is to help Korean American youth develop a positive, healthy identity through self-awareness, career planning, and mentoring. Each year, the Foundation sponsors an essay contest titled "What America Means to Me" for Korean American youth. The Foundation provides college scholarships to the contest winners. This year, the Foundation is collaborating with WNET Channel 13 to expand the contest to include young people of all ethnic backgrounds. The Korean American Foundation will still provide the winners' scholarships. The Foundation has recently raised money to create an annual career forum for Asian American youth presented by the Flushing branch of the YWCA and the Korean American Network. It also sponsors Korean cultural events and performances for the community that attract performers from across the country. Joon was named to the Advisory Board for Youth Affairs of the Institute for Corean-American Studies, Inc. ( ICAS) in 2000. Dr. Bang has devoted his time to introducing positive images of the Korean American community to the metropolitan area through public television. In 1994, he founded "Korean Friends of Channel 13" and served as president until 1999. In this capacity, he helped WNET Channel 13 develop a number of fundraising events to assist the March 1999 production of "Korean American Spirits", a documentary featuring the lives of Korean Americans in the tri-state area. The programme raised more than $140,000 for public broadcasting. For his contributions, Joon was named the 1997 recipient of the National Friends of Public Broadcasting and Elaine Peterson Distinguished Service Award. In 2001, The Coalition for Asian American Children and Families presented him with Caring for Children Award. Dr Bang was born in Korea and graduated from the Medical College of the Seoul National University in Seoul, Korea in 1970. He came to the United States in 1973 and became a board-certified internist in 1978. He is currently a practising internist at the New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn, New York.
This page last updated 4/27/2002 jdb |
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