Vivian Jung

Born in Merritt BC, Vivan Jung wanted to become a teacher but in order to get her teaching certificate, she needed to complete a swimming certificate in 1945. Unfortunately, non-whites were forbidden to enter the pool at the time due to a by-law. In 1928, Chinese parents and children were banned from the only swimming pool in Vancouver, except for one day of the week. She was twenty-one at the time.

In an act of allyship, her classmates and instructor, who were all white, refused to enter the pool, putting their own careers on the line until she was allowed to join. This courageous act was a pivotal moment for the desegregation of public spaces in BC, and eventually the law was finally struck down in 1945.

A mother and dancer, she went on to earn her swimming credentials and became the first Chinese Canadian teacher to be hired by the Vancouver School Board at Tecumseh Elementary School, where she taught for 35
years (1950-1986).

Her story resonates with other significant Canadians like Viola Desmond, who in 1946, challenged racial segregation at a cinema in Nova Scotia, by refusing to leave a whites-only area of the theatre and Rosa Parks, who refused to sit in the back of the bus, in 1955.

In 2012, Vancouver declared a laneway between Harwood Street and Beach Avenue as “Jung Lane.” At the bottom of the sign it says: “Vivian Jung, barrier-breaking teacher.”