What We Do

What does HUPF do?

HPF's activities fall into three main categories: culture, education, and service.

For culture, HPF is asked to perform at several cultural shows every year, most notably Cultural Rhythms, Harvard's premier event showcasing the diversity at the college, Kamayan, District One's annual cultural show. At the beginning of each semester, HUPF hosts a welcome breakfast with spam, eggs, and rice to welcome new members to the Pamilya and for current members to catch up with others. HPF also holds study breaks every month featuring delicious Filipino food and snacks, games, and more fun!

For education, HUPF invites speakers to campus every year to speak to students about pertinent Filipino and Filipino-American issues. Past speakers include Prof. Alex Orquiza, history professor at Providence College and author of Taste of Control: Food and the Filipino Colonial Mentality Under American Rule, Justine Ramos, author of Halo-Halo: A poetic mix of culture, history, identity, revelation, and revolution, Mark Sanchez, Harvard University History & Literature instructor, Jia Tolentino, staff writer at The New Yorker, and Anna Marie Cruz, founder of Entrepinayship and Harvard’s 2024 Commencement Speaker, Maria Ressa, founder of Rappler.

For service, HUPF conducts an annual J-term trip to the Philippines, during which a team of approximately 15 students fly to Manila to conduct a project of their choosing. In 2013, the first year that the trip was held, the team of students created a mobile library to be used by non-profit organization Child Hope Asia in their street education sessions for street children. They also held a series of self-expression workshops for the street kids, who, at the end of the three weeks, put on a fundraising performance. Read more about the J-term trip here.