April 2012

During the weekend of January 14-15, 2012, six current teachers and two alumni of Concordia Leadership Academy (CLA) met together in Jiangmen, Guangdong, China to support each other and to advance the CLA program.  CLA is a leadership and life skills training program developed by CWEF and implemented by middle school & high school teachers at their schools.

The meeting participants came from Xiangshan High School (Guangdong), Heshan #1 High School (Guangdong), and ECNU #3 Middle School (Shanghai).  The Guangdong schools have been involved in the CLA program for several years, and their annual winter meeting is a time for teachers to come together, share successes, learn from one another, and build community.  The two Shanghai teachers, Xie Xinchun & Yan Yingchun, are launching CLA with migrant students at their school during Spring semester 2012.  Being new to the program, it was invaluable for them to be welcomed into this community of teachers in Guangdong who see the value of CLA for their students and wish to share their knowledge with other educators.

The group discussed the purpose of CLA and ideas for how to improve evaluation of the  program’s impact.  Teachers also formed teams to plan sample CLA lessons and together they demonstrated these lessons to the rest of the participants, followed by discussion and suggestions for improvement.

We were also very pleased to have two alumni of CLA come back to join the meeting.  Jenny Xu and Ocean He are former CLA participants at Xiangshan High School.  Both are currently attending university and plan to become teachers themselves.

In the last six months, 20 village volunteers shared what they have learned through giving training to 1,205 Chinese villagers in basic health concepts following the methods of the Community Health Education (CHE) program.

Starting six months ago, CWEF staff trained 20 villagers in CHE concepts. Since their first training, those trainers have led an additional 33 training sessions.

Long is 35 years old. He is a  villager in one of the villages where CWEF trained local CHE teachers. He has four people in his family, including his wife, son (3 years old) and daughter (9 years old). His daughter studies in primary school. She goes to school on Sundays and returns to the village on  Fridays after her classes complete. The government  school in his village area is too far away for her to  travel there and back each day for class, so she boards at the  school during the week. Last year their family income  for the year was 8000RMB (US$1250, or 85¢/day each). Their family has been fortunate that they have not had serious illnesses.  Long’s family participated in the CHE trainings given during the fall. Since the training, his family members now all brush their teeth every day. CWEF will continue to encourage the local trainers in all of the health topics as well as monitor the village situations to look for longer term changed habits and improved health and sanitation conditions.

In a country that floods annually during the rainy season, Cambodia’s amount of water available is not always a problem. The problem for many rural communities is the cleanliness of their water. CWEF supports rural communities through a partnership with Resource Development International to meet a need for clean water.

RDI is a Christian organization that has developed a water filter unit for families. The device consists of a plastic container, a clay pot, one plastic O-ring, a spigot, a scrub brush for cleaning, and a plastic lid. All components are specially designed for the purpose of cleanliness and efficiency.

A filter unit lasts 2 to 4 years before it needs replacement.  It filters out harmful bacteria, viruses, and chemical components. RDI manufactures, supplies and teaches about the use of their filters, but they aren’t able to reach every town and village.

Last month CWEF distributed 40 filters to Bos Pul in northern Cambodia and this month 40 filters will be given to more families in the same area. Volunteers participating in service learning events are trained to distribute and educate families about the filters. The volunteers teach in groups of two, with the help of translators, to small groups of villagers consisting of 7 to 10 people.

For many, clean water is the difference between sickness and health, working or staying home, sanitation or filth. CWEF plans to continue distributing filters and educating about clean water use, striving to serve the great need in Cambodia.

Many of you have served with CWEF through one of our short-term service learning trips. A majority of CWEF’s volunteers share their talents with us through those special programs on location in one of our partner communities. CWEF also has special needs as an organization related to our communication and    administration functions. We are blessed that volunteers also share their unique gifts with us in those areas. Some times these volunteers are already familiar with us through participation in our short-term events. But, volunteers also learn about CWEF and our mission through the internet. Last summer we were blessed to have four volunteers serve with us for one month. All four were students finishing their MBA program through the highly regarded Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School. This MBA program integrates a “Giving Back” program as part of its corporate social  responsibility coursework. All  students in the program seek out a non-profit agency through which they can complete a project relevant to their interests. These four students spent a month in our Kunming office. They reviewed our current processes and made recommendations for improving CWEF project information tracking. In addition, they reviewed available information management systems and made recommendations to us for systems that would meet our needs as well as be accessible  across our various offices. The tracking improvements were instituted already in the fall and the  information management improvements are being implemented throughout this year. Keep an eye out this month for our new website that is a part of these improvements. Thank you to Milena Loayza, Julian Sanchez, Miguel Ortega and Carlos Forey for their contribution to CWEF’s mission to improve lives through education and service.