Maggie used the Asian American Studies Summer Research Award to research for her senior thesis on the 1982 International Ladies Garment Worker Union Chinatown Strike in NYC. She visited the Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives at NYU and Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation & Archives at Cornell University. Here she researched union records, oral histories, photographs, propaganda, and memorabilia to study the mobilization tactics of around 20,000 Asian American women who facilitated one of the largest Asian American strikes in history. In Maggie's words: As I entered my last few years of college, I have been thinking heavily about what I wanted to do with my love for history. This was the first time I got to pursue solo archival research, and it was an incredibly enlightening experience. You can hear about other people's experiences again and again, but until you have the chance to pursue it yourself with a topic you are passionate about you truly won't know if you love it. I am so grateful to have the opportunity to go, it really solidified in my mind that archival research is what I want to pursue." Post graduation, Maggie plans on researching Asian American labor history through archival work and graduate school.

― Maggie Lu Asian American Studies Summer Research Award Winner 2025