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This year marks 50 years of Hmong refugee resettlement and immigration to Minnesota. MPR News will feature Hmong Minnesotans in a variety of careers through the month of May as part of our “

” series. This series highlights Minnesotans from diverse and often underrepresented backgrounds who are making an impact. 

When Bee Chang started playing soccer in high school, she said she had no idea what she was doing. She remembers running down the field and telling herself to “just kick the ball and go.” Soon, a group of Hmong girls took her under their wings and her passion for the sport began to blossom. 

Chang grew up on St. Paul’s east side. Her parents and two older siblings arrived in Minnesota in 1990 from a refugee camp in Thailand. 

“My parents are the best, they gave us everything coming here with nothing,” she said. 

Chang grew up as the middle child of six children: three boys and three girls. “We are all very close to each other and we all have our own story to tell. This is my story,” she said. 

She spent her free time at McMurray Fields near Lake Como. Her first game, practices and the yearly Hmong soccer tournament every summer — all of it happened at McMurray. Soon, her practice paid off and she was offered a training position with the Minnesota Aurora FC, the pre-professional women’s soccer team.

While playing with the team, she invested in her community through coaching soccer camps, encouraging young Hmong players to join and their families to fill TCO Stadium, where the Aurora play.

This year, she had to step down due to repeated concussions. She is pursuing a degree in exercise science at Anoka-Hennepin Technical College and that was her plan — until she got a phone call during her interview with MPR News on April 10 asking her to be the new assistant coach for the Aurora 2, the developmental team.

Why did you decide to try out for the Minnesota Aurora? 

Honestly, at first it was to prove myself, to see where I was at. And then, after making it as a trainee player — it was just very surprising that I made it — and then being on the team, and then growing as a player and a person, my community looked up to me, so that grew a big part of me as well.

What are you doing with the Aurora now, and what does your future look like there?

Last year, I helped coach the camp with Aurora and then after that, I helped with the evaluation for tryouts, and now I just got an offer as an assistant coach for Aurora 2. So that's super exciting. I'm super excited. I don't know what to say right now. Like to me, I think that's like a dream come true, to be from nowhere to somewhere — that's crazy. 

I was out because of concussions so because of that, I decided not to play anymore. But then there was an offer as a coaching offer, and I took the chance, and luckily, I made it … I’m excited to put myself out there. Hopefully my community will come and maybe join me. 

I think a lot of us in our community, we don't really see women going too far with soccer or any other sports because, in our tradition, the women are always, you grow up, you go to school, you get married, and then you have a family. That's it. So as a girl, this is like a big path for myself, plus my community. 

I want them to come in and show themselves that they can do it too, and they should do it because sports, to me, it's really big. It's like you can learn so much from playing, from being in a sport, like leadership, you know, mentoring, determination and all that sort of confidence and all that sorts of stuff.

You said you are pursuing a degree in exercise science and you want to focus on helping Hmong girls and women, why is that so important to you? 

In the Hmong community, I think fitness is so hard for the Hmong woman, just because of the things that we're supposed to do as a woman. I think that having someone to pursue that degree or that major, I think it will open doors for them to come out and be more comfortable, to work on themselves, physically and mentally. 

I think health is so important, and I want to support the Hmong woman with health and fitness. I think women in general, we judge ourselves so much that we don't give ourselves credit that we're trying to work out health issues.

What do you want the Hmong community to know about the Aurora? 

I would love the Hmong community to come out and try it out. Maybe if they see a familiar face, they will maybe come out and now a familiar coach too.

I think, with the girls that are in my community, I've seen so many talented players that just don’t have the confidence to go and try out for Aurora. 

And for me, that was, like one of my biggest things is I want to be part of Aurora, so then they can come out and try out, because I believe that they can do it. They just don't have that person to push them to do it yet, or they're not comfortable, or they don't have that confidence to do it. So I want to be that person to bring them in.

Sam Stroozas

Author

Bee Chang started playing soccer in high school and was offered a position with the Minnesota Aurora FC, the pre-professional women’s soccer team. She’s now the new assistant coach for the Aurora 2, the developmental team.

‘Dream come true’: Soccer player aims to inspire Hmong women like her to play sports

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