Paul Fong

• Biography:

  As a professor and Community College Trustee—on the local, state and national levels—I change young lives through education.

  I was a young leader. Community elders recruited me to a life of activism. I became a founding member of Asian Americans for Community Involvement.

  I worked with my father to build our nursery in Sunnyvale. As a young man I opened the Flower Cottage to sell what my family grew.

  But I turned the back room in the flower shop into a place where we built community power through grassroots politics.

  Receiving the 2004 Wall of Tolerance Award signed by Rosa Parks was my proudest moment.

  I fought for equal housing and educational opportunities. I marched at the first Earth Day and have been a lifelong pro-choice advocate.