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Global Citizenship Initiative

The Chinese Cultural Center at San Diego State University aims to nurture the global competence of our campus community. Global citizenship is about understanding our shared responsibility to each other and to the planet. By educating individuals, empowering communities, promoting sustainable practices, advocating for human rights, and fostering peaceful governance, this initiative sets the foundation for individuals to take meaningful action toward a more connected, just, and peaceful world.

  • Vision: To foster a sense of shared humanity and responsibility across the world, cultivating sustainable, inclusive, and peaceful societies through education, cooperation, and action that transcend borders, cultures, and backgrounds.
  • Mission: To promote global citizenship by encouraging empathy, understanding, and collective responsibility to address the world’s most pressing challenges—such as poverty, climate change, inequality, and conflict—through collaboration at local, national, and global levels.

Goal: Promote global awareness and understanding.

  • Target Audience: Students, faculty, staff, and community leaders.
  • Actions:
    • Curriculum Integration: Incorporate global citizenship education into our curricula, focusing on topics such as human rights, sustainable development, global issues, and cultural diversity and creating digital archives accessible to 
    • Cross-cultural Exchanges: Support student and professional exchange programs to facilitate firsthand experiences of different cultures, creating opportunities for learning and empathy.
    • Activities include seminars, lectures, panels,  cultural events, scholarships and grants.

Goal: Empower student communities to act on global issues and promote shared solutions.

  • Target Audience:  youth, marginalized groups
  • Actions:
    • Community Projects: Support grassroots initiatives that address global challenges locally, such as sustainable agriculture, clean water projects, or refugee integration.
    • Collaboration Networks: Create a global network for local organizations to exchange knowledge, share best practices, and collaborate on solutions that have global implications.
    • Youth Engagement: Involve young people in leadership programs that encourage them to advocate for global issues, supporting them as active agents of change.
    • Activities  include working with Associated Students, Residential Students, faculty and students.

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Goal:Using Storytelling to Address Period Poverty and Transform Health Education

We believe in the power of storytelling to shed light on critical issues, inspire change, and transform lives. By combining narrative traditions with innovative health education strategies, we aim to address some of the most pressing challenges faced by women and girls around the world, including period poverty, child marriage, female genital mutilation (FGM), and transactional sex for menstrual products.
For millions of girls and women across the globe, the inability to afford safe menstrual products forces impossible choices—between food and hygiene, between dignity and survival. In some of the world’s most impoverished communities, adolescent girls are often driven to transactional sex to afford menstrual supplies, exposing them to the risks of exploitation, disease, and early pregnancy.
This issue isn’t just about physical health. It’s a systemic crisis that robs girls of their time, education, and potential. Without access to affordable menstrual products, millions of girls miss school, fall behind, and ultimately drop out. Women lose workdays, reducing family income and perpetuating cycles of poverty.
In partnership with SDSU’s Honorary Associate Professor and Founder of CouldYou?, Christine Garde-Denning, we’ve expanded traditional forms of storytelling into powerful performative storytelling, such as The Period Monologues. This innovative program combines personal narratives with live performances and community workshops to:
  • Educate Communities: Raise awareness about period poverty, FGM, and harmful practices like transactional sex.
  • Empower Girls: Equip them with knowledge, confidence, and sustainable solutions like the CouldYou? Cup.
  • Shift Cultural Norms: Use storytelling to challenge taboos and encourage conversations that inspire change.
Inspired by "stories under the trees" in rural Africa—where older girls mentor younger ones by sharing their experiences—The Period Monologues amplifies the voices of women and girls in a culturally sensitive way, addressing issues like menstruation, child marriage, FGM, and transactional sex while engaging audiences locally and globally.
Building on the success of The Period Monologues, we are working to scale this storytelling-driven health education model across Zimbabwe, Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, and Liberia. This effort integrates CouldYou?’s expertise in sustainable menstrual health solutions with CCC’s leadership in education and empowerment, creating a holistic program that includes:
  1. Sustainable Menstrual Products:
    • Distribution of 200,000 CouldYou? menstrual cups, providing 10 years of safe, reusable menstrual solutions for girls.
    • Supporting local economies by hiring marginalized women to produce storage bags and employing youth for data collection.
  2. Workshops and Health Education:
    • “Train-the-trainer” programs equipping local educators and NGOs to deliver health education and normalize menstruation.
    • Life skills and hygiene education for boys and girls, addressing gender-based taboos and promoting equitable practices.
  3. Storytelling and Community Engagement:
    • Workshops and docuseries rooted in storytelling to challenge harmful norms like FGM, child marriage, and transactional sex.
    • Performances that engage communities and elders in a culturally respectful, indirect way to inspire behavioral and social change.
For over 30 years, the Chinese Cultural Center has been a leader in education and empowerment, advancing the health and well-being of women and children in China, Africa, and beyond. Under the leadership of Dr. Li-rong Cheng, CCC has:
  • Delivered over 50 lectures and workshops on women’s health, education, and empowerment.
  • Authored influential books, including Raising Silent Voices, amplifying the stories of resilient women from Asian and Pacific Islander communities.
  • Supported education initiatives across Africa, from drilling wells for schools in Zimbabwe to promoting Ubuntu values with the Wole Soyinka group in Nigeria.
  • Collaborated with global organizations, including the WHO, to develop action plans addressing hearing loss and speech disorders.
These efforts demonstrate that education is most impactful when it is accessible, culturally relevant, and rooted in the lived experiences of the communities it serves.
At the core of this initiative is the belief that stories have the power to challenge stigma, elevate voices, and drive change. By presenting these narratives through performances, docuseries, and multimedia campaigns, this program sparks dialogue and action both locally and globally.
Highlights of our vision include:
  • Global Reach: Performances in local communities and international venues such as NYC’s Lower Eastside Girls Club, the Africa Centers in New York and London, and San Diego’s La Jolla Playhouse.
  • Cultural Sensitivity: Contextualized storytelling that honors each community’s unique traditions while promoting universal health and equity goals.
  • Sustainability: Empowering communities to continue these conversations through training, mentorship, and local leadership.
This initiative will not only provide tangible solutions to period poverty but also catalyze systemic social change. We aim to:
  • Equip girls with sustainable menstrual solutions.
  • Educate millions through performances, workshops, and multimedia campaigns.
  • Reduce school absenteeism, transactional sex, and FGM prevalence.
  • Shift cultural norms to promote gender equity and menstrual health.
The San Diego State University Chinese Cultural Center invites you learn more about creating a world where no girl has to choose between her education and her dignity, where period poverty is a thing of the past, and where every woman and girl has the opportunity to thrive.