In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month in May, CPC  launched the “Our Community, Our Stories” campaign to share the personal stories of community members directly impacted by CPC. Through these stories, we celebrate our collective impacts and our community's contributions and resilience.  

Our second community story features Mary Cheng.

Mary is not only a CPC alumnus, but thanks to that experience growing up, she is now CPC’s Director of Childhood Development Services. 

The CPC experience growing up empowered her, and also inspired her to become who she is today. Mary now sees herself as CPC family for life. Growing up she and two of her three siblings attended the CPC afterschool program at P.S.130, as would Mary's own two sons.

Mary Cheng was born and raised in Chinatown, New York City, as the second oldest of four children. Her parents were new immigrants and her mother had only arrived three years prior. Though Cheng attended Catholic School, her parents had her and her two younger siblings enrolled in the CPC P.S. 130 afterschool program. 

The problem Mary points out, was as a child she hated school, where she was bullied. 

"So when I got into CPC, I was in that mindset where I just didn't like school. I didn't like anything I did. I didn't. I was just unhappy." 

CPC helped get Mary out of her shell.

"Learning through CPC was where I got a chance to meet different people, and I got a chance to really understand, that it was these intentional created experiences that showed me there's more to life” 

Her experience at CPC planted the seed to pursue teaching and early childhood education. Mary also knew that she wanted to give back to the community. 

Initially Mary just saw herself as a teacher, but CPC pushed her to grow and to eventually become a director. She began to realize that just as she can inspire a classroom of thirty students as an educator and an advocate, now as a director she could inspire the teachers to do the same for the children and their families.

What Mary appreciates about CPC is that even when things seem hopeless, the philosophy is how do we change this, how do we move on. 

And just as when Mary was growing up, CPC is still a real lifeline to many families. This is what keeps Mary inspired every day at her job. 

Share Mary's story on social media using #cpcstories.

By sharing the stories of our community members, CPC hopes to inspire and empower all our communities and allies to use their voices to set forth the change they want to see as we rally together to #StopAsianHate.

ABOUT CPC

The Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC) is a social services organization that creates positive social change. Founded in 1965, CPC is the nation's largest Asian American social services organization and aims to promote the social and economic empowerment of Chinese American, immigrant, and low-income communities of New York City. CPC is the trusted partner to individuals and families striving to achieve goals in their education, family, community, and career. 

關於華策會

華人策劃協會（簡稱“華策會”）是一個致力於創造正向社會變革的社會服務機構。華策會成立於1965年，是美國最大的亞裔美國人社會服務機構，旨在促進紐約市華裔美國人，移民，及低收入社區的社會權益和經濟賦權。華策會是為實現其教育，家庭 ，社區及職業目標而努力的個人和家庭可信賴的機構。