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The Center For Asian American Media A Community Agency Presentation by John Cajulao
Vision Statement, Mission Statement, and/or Purpose Statement
● The vision of the Center For Asian American Media is to show Asian American films to as many people as possible.
● The mission of CAAM is to fund and release films made by Asian American filmmakers.
● How CAAM’s mission give to an effective cause is that they’re combating anti-Asian sentiment by providing and promoting Asian-American stories.
Values
The values of the Center For Asian American Media are:
● Community: CAAM wants their filmmakers to connect to their communities for their stories.
● Resourceful: CAAM can provide their filmmakers any resources they need to make their stories come to life.
● Perspective: CAAM wants their audience to think about everyone around them while watching their movies.
Focus Area
The focus areas of the Center For Asian American Media are:
● Empowering would be filmmakers to their full potential
● Connecting filmmakers and their stories with a sense of community.
● Showcasing films and the filmmakers to audiences.
Strategic Objectives
Most of the films that were provided by the CAAM would air on PBS, one of the major contributors to the organization. Showing one of their films on PBS is an accessible way of showcasing their projects to audiences.
Another way they showcase their films is through the festival CAAMFest. CAAMFest is a yearly film festival where they would screen over 100 films for ten days. The festival has then influenced many major cities in the U.S. like New York and L.A. to have their own Asian American film festivals.
CAAM’s services help provided the community by giving a spotlight to not just Asian-American filmmakers, but to the Asian-American community. During a time when films about Asian-Americans are so low during the organization’s beginning, CAAM see an opening and used every opportunities like PBS and creating a film festival to bring positive visibility to the Asian American community.
Goals
The goal of the Center For Asian American Media is to present stories that confront the negative stereotypes and promote the advocacy of Asian Americans, made by Asian American filmmakers.
● Presenting these films helps audiences give a better understanding of Asian-American communities.
● Showing their films means that they are saying that Asian Americans too can make movies as well.
● They hope that the films they made can bring a positive visibility to the Asian American community as a whole.
Questions & Concerns
● What are the entry requirements to join the Center? ● What is the limit of the Center to give money for film budgets? ● Does the Center have a time limit if a film production goes over schedule? ● Can the films made by the Center be released somewhere else besides CAAMFest or
PBS? ● Does the Center vet any scripts to see if it’s good enough to go into production? ● Can you make only one project to get any help and resources from the Center?