 Hi everyone, welcome Aloha and Ta Lopa. My name is Ileana and I'm a librarian for the San Francisco Public Library. We're so happy that you're here with us to celebrate Asian-American Pacific Islander Heritage Month with Talk Story with Tui, presented by PyTest. Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge that I am here in San Francisco, California, on the unceded land of the Ramatish Aloni people. The Ramatish Aloni people still work, play, and live on these lands. I encourage you to learn more about the land you were on. This is part of our AAPI program series in which we celebrate Asian-American and Pacific Islander History, Culture, and Heritage, a celebration that we believe should take place not only during May but all year round. Thank you for joining us to continue understanding, respecting, and celebrating the diverse Asian and Pacific Islander histories and cultures from San Francisco and beyond. Check out the dedicated webpage at sfpl.org slash AAPI to see our upcoming events, watch past programs, find great books by AAPI authors and illustrators, and more. Before we start, a huge thanks to the friends of the San Francisco Public Library for their generous support of this special series. We would not be able to do this without them. In the Talk Story with Tui series, presented by Pacific Islanders, Encouraging Fun, Engineering, Science, and Technology, you are going to meet a Samoan scientist and hear about the stories, successes, and tips to inspire, empower, and connect STEM with the community. Paifest is a non-profit organization that was founded in South San Francisco, California, by Pacific Islander parents in search of a community with STEM. A very special thank you, Mahalo Nui Loa and Fafnitai Lava, to Lola and Matthew Mallele for your partnership, advocacy, and time. You can follow Paifest on Instagram and Facebook and their website, wearepaifest.org, to stay up-to-date with their latest offerings. Talo Falava, my name is Andrew Potty, a young shipman, and I am Samoan. I am a Pacific Islander, and I was born and raised in the village of Falinu in American Samoan. I come from a family of five, so I have an older sister and three younger brothers. Currently, I am a scientist in the immunology group at the company called Dren Bio. What do you enjoy most about being a scientist? What I love about my job, and I guess what I love about science in general, is that every day is different. There's always something new and exciting happening. What was life like for you growing up? Typical island childhood, you know, a lot of memories. It was a very happy childhood. I think it was also a very balanced childhood. There was always, you know, someone that kept us in track, right, that made sure that on top of having fun as a child, that we also had, you know, certain responsibilities that we had to adhere to, and that was the, you know, the primary role that my mom played in all of our lives. When did you become interested in science? In the 10th grade in high school, so this was 2002. It was the introduction to my high school teacher, so Dr. Joe Sprills, and he was really the figure with the expertise in science and research that came to American Samoa, started a high school class called Specialized Science Class, and that was my first exposure to science experimentation. So how to do science experiments, how to ask questions, he taught me sort of the scientific process, the different steps, how to do an experiment, and that is essential for anyone who wants to become a scientist, right? So this is the basic foundation of becoming a scientist. This was a program that was specifically offered in Tafuna High School. So the students who went through this program were definitely lucky to have that exposure because all the other students in other high schools did not have that exposure and did not have someone like Dr. Rose provide that necessary early training that you need in science. It had so much success. A lot of students went on to colleges pursuing, you know, academic degrees in science and math because of this introduction to STEM from this one program. What kind of education did you need to become a scientist? The training and education that I received that prepared me for a career in science include getting a bachelor's degree. I got a bachelor's degree in biology and a minor in chemistry and from the University of New Mexico. And after that, I went on to grad school and I trained at UCLA where I got my PhD in biological chemistry and structured biology. And following my PhD training, I got a fellowship to do independent research as a postdoc fellow, the pharmaceutical company Genentech here in San Francisco. So in addition to getting your bachelor's, your PhD, and doing a postdoc fellowship, I did in most summers after school, I would do summer programs. And I did that because I needed, I felt I needed more training. I felt I needed more experience as working in the lab. But I was also prepared to apply for the next step in my career. So when I was in college, I participated in these research programs which prepared me with laboratory skills, but also it was a list of activities that I could add to my resume to prepare me for applications to grad school. And when you're applying to grad school, they often look for hands-on research experience. So I filled my summers accumulating these experiences, not just to help me hone my skills, but also because I knew I wanted to go to grad school to get a PhD. And I knew I had a time that I was competitive to go into these fields. So I had to find ways in addition to having good grades, in addition to having good GRE scores, many other people have good grades and have good GRE scores. So you really needed to stand out now. And that helped with getting into getting offers. How long did it take? In total, it took me 15 years, I would say, to get to now starting my career as an independent research investigator. So it's a long time and I highly recommend the experience because you definitely learn a lot and you build confidence and you become independent. But also you know a lot of things about the field. You know what's right, you know what's wrong, you know how to troubleshoot certain things. But it's not the only career path to becoming a scientist. One can make a career of being a scientist right after college, right after you get your bachelor's. Because there are many different levels of sciences. So you could become a scientist with a bachelor's, you could become a research associate and then you can build your career from that. But it's going to take much longer to get from a research associate to perhaps a scientist level. So definitely going higher in your education can help you, you know, get higher positions, more responsibilities, better composition. What were some challenges that you had to overcome? The main first challenge was leaving home. You know, I was born and raised in American Samoa. I did all of my schooling there and I graduated high school and I moved to the U.S. And this was the first time that I made a long-term move. You know, I was able to come to the U.S. during some summers when I was in high school for the summer to do some research programs, summer research programs. But this was the first time that I had to move and basically live independently. So that was the biggest challenge was, you know, not having your family around, not having your friends around, not having your community around, not having to, not having people to speak with, you know, to speak your language with. And that was, you don't realize what you take for granted about your culture until you, until you move to a place where you rarely run into, you know, Pacific Islanders, Samoan Tongans. So that was the biggest challenge. But I also wasn't going to let that get in the way of reaching, you know, reaching my dreams, reaching my goals, right? So this was a challenge that I overcame just by keeping myself busy, keeping myself occupied, making new friends, but still, you know, staying in contact with my family back in Samoan. Do you have any advice? Provide early exposure of different, of a variety of different things for their kids. This can be STEM or other things such as, you know, music or cooking or making bracelets. That early exposure early on can definitely light, you know, a spark in kids to help them define what they want to do when they grow up. What can early exposure to STEM look like? We collaborated with PiFest and we facilitated a workshop where we provided fold scopes or paper microscopes that the kids can build, you know, their own little microscope from a paper. This microscope, they can, you know, observe really tiny objects and kids were able to go around the park and pick up all kinds of samples. So some kids picked up, you know, bed insects and dirt and flower petals. Some kids also clocked their own eyebrows to, to, to observe under this microscope. And so we, you know, we've really had such a wonderful time because we actually did not expect such excitement coming from the kids. Seeing the kids say, you know, wow, this is so cool or, you know, mom, look at this. This is such a warm feeling for both of us. But also particularly for me, you know, having grown up in Samoa and didn't have this type of exposure when I was a little kid. So my introduction to science really happened in high school. So the, so it was awesome to be able to provide this type of exposure, even if it's something as, you know, as small as making a paper microscope. Hi, my name is KP and I'm eight years old. My favorite part was that I got to meet a real scientist and that I got to make a full scope with him. The cool thing about it is that, is that it actually works. Hi, I'm CC and I'm seven years old. We're making this microscope. It was all paper and there was a lot of folding and there's like these three magnets that stick them together and I had so much fun. The coolest thing that I got to look at was the ant because I never saw an ant that close. They make you zoom in with the grass. You can zoom in with an ant. You can zoom in with a flower or something really small. I just love it. I want to do it so many times. My favorite part of the day was when they were making the microscopes and we meeting the scientists. I thought the prime first event this past weekend was a lot of fun. It was cool to see my son and as well as my nieces and nephews excited about science. So this was cool to see that the kids got to partake in this opportunity. So yeah a lot of fun and my son he got the hands on experience on building a paper microscope which was pretty awesome and he was excited to show me what a piece of hair and flower look like under the microscope which was also really cool. Hi my name is Lucio and I'm a light every new magnets can make a microscope and saw a muscle that looks like a hair. This looks cool. It's fun. Yeah I'd like to do it again. My favorite part I got to look at the stuff and draw it because it looked really cool because how it looks and normal but then when you look it at the camera it doesn't look normal. I have fun this part about Saturday was for the whole the papers because I really like learning new stuff. Hi I write chess and I am nine years old. When you look at a microscope it gets bigger but then when you look in your eyeballs it's small so then you won't be able to see it that way. Microscope you can see it on your eyes it's really you can really see it like big. I think it was really good to actually see actual scientists coming in there and teaching the kids exposing to the microbiology but there's something I never got to I didn't get that early exposure now to school so to see the kids actually interact with android magazine there was really I was really impressed there was really good that happened and for them to actually build the microscope and actually go find the materials for them to look into was really well it's good exposure for them to actually go and find stuff instead of stuff and give it to them. Hi my name is Liliana Paolo and I am eight years old. Yeah I really like how we were learning and having fun at the same time and we were actually looking through built microscope and we actually looked at samples and then we tested out me and CeCe's hair and our hair looked like pretty different. Mine was black and hers was brown and it was really cool because it was fun and we were learning too. My favorite memory of Saturday was seeing how excited the parents were right parents were as excited as the kids. We had a little piece of device that you attached to the phone so the parents were trying to image their slides with the phone and they were you know they were having such a good time with the whole process so and I think this to me was pivotal moment because this is how you get kids into enjoying various things right this is how you get kids enjoying slides is if the parents are also right there with them you know working with them hands-on doing experiments with them so having this amazing positive response from the parents and I think the parents were also you know excited to see their kids you know loving the process right loving science because oftentimes you know there's a stigma with science that it's hard it's complicated we don't want to do it but it's all about exposure right it's all about that one experience and having that fun experience and realizing anyone can do it okay but also I want to add one more thing but you know we're we're so proud of PiFest we're so happy to meet Lola and Matt and we're really thankful that they've you know started this organization it's a brand new organization they just recently turned one year old and I think it's such an important project it's an important message to get our kids you know to get the youth but you know importantly to get the parents involved in STEM and showing that there's space for civic islanders there's a space for Tongans for Samoans for Tahitians for you know every ethnicity within our you know Oshania community to be a part of to be a part of science so this is such a remarkable effort from their end and we're so you know we're so thankful that they invited us and we're excited to do this again thank you Andrew and Matthew