This article documents the paucity of research on Chinese American teachers and discusses how this dearth contributes to the “invisibility” of Asian Americans as frontline participants in the shaping of children, educators, and educational policy. It explores bilingual Chinese American teachers’perceptions of the multicultural course requirement in their teacher preparation program and examines the content and context in which this course is experienced. The following were found to be significant: understanding the reality and complexity of the implementation of multicultural education, questioning personal K-12 experiences, identifying White teacher resistance as the major barrier to implementation of multicultural education, and recognizing the psychological and academic benefits of ethnic studies. Teachers explained that cultural knowledge gained by personal experience and in ethnic studies may be the “content” they perceived to be needed in, yet missing from, multicultural education coursework. They also identified lack of knowledge of other cultural groups and mono-ethnic teaching settings as significant obstacles.
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