
Joanna Kong
Co-Chair and Board Member
Executive Director, The Sun Family Foundation
For Joanna, inspiring the next generation of Asian Americans to get involved in philanthropy is crucial. While she loved the study of law at UCLA School of Law and devoted several years after getting her J.D. to the practice of corporate law, including at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, she wanted to work in a field where she could be creative and help solve pressing social issues. In 2018, she joined the Sun Family Foundation, a private charitable foundation focused on advancing educational opportunities and the well-being of the underserved in Orange County and Taiwan. As Executive Director, Joanna has helped to expand the Sun Family Foundation’s grantmaking to include over 40 local nonprofit organizations and five scholarship programs. Joanna is also the Co-Chair of Asian American Futures and the Membership Chair and Advisory Board Member of Orange County Grantmakers. Joanna also sits on the Board of the Guang Yuan Charitable Foundation in Taipei, Taiwan, founded to offer scholarships to honor her grandmother, who was a beloved high school biology teacher in Taichung, Taiwan and a single mother to three children. The Foundation is unique in that faculty and administrators select the students to receive scholarships; they are looking for character, not top grades, in the belief that every person has value and every job is important.