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Empowering Rural Society The Shin Shin Education Foundation

Austin Pan 1

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I dedicate this piece to the Shin Shin Education Foundation who aids so many people in need. Also, I’d like to thank Freestyle Academy for giving me this opportunity to publish a book about something I’m truly passionate about.

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Table of Contents Preface

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Introduction

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Chapter 1: Overcoming Disparity

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Chapter 2: An Organization’s Legacy

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Chapter 3: Reciprocal Growth

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Conclusion

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Works Cited

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Biography

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Youth Group volunteers

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Preface W

hen I first learned about the requirements of the Junior Documentary project, I didn’t think I’d be able to meet all of the challenges it presented. We had to find an organization or person to document and then interview three people, take hundreds of photos, and write a book of 20+ pages, all in a few months? Impossible. I had no stable connections to any organizations and I had no idea what sort of path I wanted to focus on within my book. What subject would it focus on?

Luckily, however, I remembered that I had gone on a summer camp to China that was hosted by an organization that one of my friends was a part of and had recently been talking about, and chose to see if I could center my documentary project on them. After deciding on my documentary topic, I talked to my friend to see if it would be possible. When she received confirmation, I was very surprised at the fact that I had even found a documentary topic.

My process through this project was very rocky. I had several instances where I wasn’t sure if I had enough content to fill out an entire book and several times where I misinterpreted instructions for the project. My very first interview was before we were even given an audio recorder or told to take photos.

Another problem I came upon was time restriction. With the extremely fast deadline, I stayed up really late for a few nights.

Finally, my last problem was the gathering of photos because my subject was based in China.

The main idea that I want the reader to take out of this paper is the enormity of what the Shin Shin Education

Foundation accomplishes, not just through its values, but also through its actual actions. Also, as I learned more and more about the organization I became increasingly amazed by the amount of work it covers and how it aids various communities all over China. I wanted to be able to convey what I felt and communicate to the reader just how much Shin Shin has helped people in less fortunate surroundings. I also wanted to have this book raise awareness about the amazing work that the volunteers and organizers accomplish so that readers could possibly help them in their cause.

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Youth Group volunteers at a meeting

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Introduction

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conomically, China is known as an industrial nation.

Hidden behind this industrial image, however, a large portion of China’s population lives in rural surroundings.

In these conditions, educational standards are extremely low.

Schools lack desks, teachers, textbooks, and sanitation. The Shin Shin Educational Foundation is an organization that aspires to reverse these restrictions placed upon the learning of the children all over rural China and allow them to grow. By providing funds and needed materials to numerous schools, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation nurtures students nationwide to help them reach their dreams.

“Our mission is to provide resources, long term care, love and services to construct or renovate elementary schools in the remote, rural and despondent regions of China. Our vision is to improve their learning environment, and therefore to promote balanced development of urban and rural education in China” (Shin Shin Mission Statement).

Children from rural areas of China live in houses made of cement and mud, with a lack of reliable running water, heating, and electricity; without their parents, who are working in the cities. On weekdays, they walk for several hours through forests and on dirt paths just to get to their nearest school. At these schools, flies buzz around everywhere, there is a lack of teachers, and rooms lack sanitation and maintenance. When class starts, teachers who lack experience instruct a classroom where multiple students sit around one desk all gazing at a single tattered and torn textbook. During break times, students enjoy themselves by playing games cautiously with their friends while

making sure that they don’t get dirty because without reliable water, they are not sure of when the next time their clothes will be able to be cleaned. The Educational Foundation aims to alleviate these restrictions and give China’s future generation a fair chance at education and wellbeing. The foundation is the tree that brings the students in rural settings up to a new height learning and potential.

Shin Shin’s Youth Group at a meeting

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Chapter 1 Overcoming Disparity

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he Gini Coefficient is a statistical number that represents the level of economic equality present within a country. This number is measured between a value of zero and one, zero being complete economic equality and one being complete economic inequality. South Africa, one of the countries with the highest income inequality, has a Gini Coefficient of about 0.63 while China has a coefficient of 0.47, with almost a third of China’s wealth belonging to the top 1% of the socioeconomic classes.

With this economic inequality, cities such as BeiJing and ShangHai benefit greatly because of their massive industrial economies and make for a vast majority of China’s GDP (gross domestic product), a value that estimates the total economic value of goods in a period of time. Unfortunately, however, several other regions and areas face the exact opposite.

The rural communities who rely on agriculture end up making only about 9% of China’s GDP.

The Shin Shin Educational Foundation combats against the difficult circumstances and situations that the people in rural China face as well as those who face troubles back in the US, the

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“Since 1997, Shin Shin has rebuilt or renovated 338 schools in areas where the average household income is less than US $1 a day.”

Shin Shin Educational Foundation provides materials, funds, and volunteers to the community.

Families in rural China face poverty and extreme amounts of difficulties to get by in life and attaining decent education is nearly impossible. They lack what our society considers basic necessities and facilities such as bathrooms, televisions, running water, electricity, stable walls, and transportation. Everyday, students within these regions suffer throughout their households as well as in their education and educational facilities. Schools lack desks, teachers, running water, campus, textbooks, and clean environments. The Shin Shin Educational Foundation aims to provide the resources that the schools are in need of

and improve the situations that rural Chinese communities find themselves in. As their website states, “Since 1997, Shin Shin has rebuilt or renovated 338 schools in areas where the average household income is less than US $1 a day.”

With all of this in mind, the conditions between industrial cities and rural communities is massive. The Shin Shin Educational Foundation tries to decrease this gap for the future generation and students by supplying them with the means to allow them to attain similar conditions to the students in more industrialized and fortunate surroundings. The foundation accomplishes this by training teachers, constructing new buildings for schools, paving roads, and most importantly, providing learning materials, desks, and volunteers. The foundation has teachers from rural settings transported to BeiJing where they

can improve upon their skills of education within educational facilities and workshops. “Shin Shin supports 340 schools in rural China, which includes annual training of Chinese teachers and principals in Beijing,” YanHo (Tan) describes. In doing so, the daily conditions and education that the students face improve drastically and thus their opportunities in the future improve as well.

Every summer, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation gathers volunteers from both China and the US and organizes a trip for them to go to schools in rural China to aid in the transporting of materials, decoration of school campuses, and to help in the education of the students there. Volunteers led cultural exchanges, providing engaging and interesting learning experiences for children who may have never left their own village before.

A renovated classroom in rural China

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Youth Group volunteers handing out materials

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May explains, “We would sit down and compare our customs and we visited houses to see what their lives were like while we shared our own and showed them photos. Then we had trinkets that we brought from the US that we gave to them and vice versa” (Lee). May continues on to describe, “They were dirt poor so what they gave us were paintings, letters, and origami that they made. I don’t know why but I distinctly remember a lotus flower watercolor art with a poem the child made on it. And then this other girl took apart a fake flower crown she had, she really didn’t have anything to begin with, and attached it to pens and gave it to us. Some people gave us actual, live flowers that they picked from the mountains. We visited the fake flower crown girl’s house. It was dreariest house I’ve ever been in. No paint or art on the walls, just cement. And there was really bad lighting too” (Lee).

The volunteers also check on the conditions of the schools. They make sure that the schools have been utilizing the materials and

“There are a total of 36 schools in Sichuan and ChongQing and all of these schools are in China so I have to work at night due to time difference.”

the funds that have been provided in a way that is beneficial to the entire school and they record down what could be improved in the future.

The schools situated in rural settings not only face economic barriers either. Because there are so many rural settings in China, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation can’t manage every single school constantly which can result in unsolved problems due to lack of information present for the organization to work with. YanHo (Tan) remarks, “Since I am the RM (regional manager) for Sichuan province and the city of ChongQing, I need to contact their local schools all the time. There are a total of 36 schools in Sichuan and ChongQing and all of these schools are in China so I have to work at night due to time difference.”

In addition, there are several instances of miscommunication between the school, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation, and the local government. The schools may not fully comprehend

work hours of girls on average by 0.751 h per day which amounts to about an additional 5.3 h per week and a substantial increase compared to the average amount of time spent on domestic work by girls in households without migrants. Further, if both parents out-migrate, then the impact of migration on girls domestic work hours would increase to 10.6 h per week. While these estimates may seem small, the increased workload could have adverse implications for children’s well being when taking into account the intensity of work, the conditions under which the work is conducted and if the work is required to be done at certain times which may actually interfere with schooling.” their limits and power, which leads them to not fully utilizing the opportunities that Shin Shin provides for their students. Even setting up schools can be a challenge. The proposals have to be approved by the government, the materials need to be gathered in the rural area, of which the location could be hidden within hills resulting in cost in both money and time, and the adults have to be convinced to allow their children attend school because the majority of children in these rural areas are known as “liu shou er tong”, or left-behind children. Left-behind children are children whose parents have to leave them for years in order to make money for their family in more industrial cities. Often times, these children will spend their entire childhood only with their grandparents and sometimes get to a point where they don’t even recognize who their parents are. They are also often needed in the fields or have the responsibility of taking care of the house and elderly residents, limiting their freedom to attend a school.

According to researchers Xiao Yuan, and Fiona MacPhail, authors of “Labor migration and time use patterns of the left-behind children and elderly in rural China”, “The specific estimate is that the impact of one parent migrating increases the domestic

Youth Group Volunteer May (Left) teaching students a dance

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Chapter 2 An Organization’s Legacy

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n addition to their aid in China, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation has also recently installed a Youth Group, a community service and leadership extension of the Shin Shin Educational Foundation located in the US, aimed at volunteers at the ages between twelve and eighteen. With the goal of continuing on the Shin Shin Educational Foundation’s legacy, the Youth Group promotes leadership and exposes its members to the different conditions that individuals throughout the world are situated within. As YanHo (Tan) puts it, “We now want young Americans to learn about Chinese culture, to learn to give back to the society, and to be able help other people.”

The Youth Group is divided up in order to improve upon a specific set of skills to be utilized in different events and for more organizational management. In addition to these specialized tasks, the Youth Group, as an entirety, also frequently participates in general community service activities in the US, and make up a

“We now want young Americans to learn about Chinese culture, to learn to give back to the society, and to be able help other people.”

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large portion of the ones who volunteer in China.

As a group, the Shin Shin Youth Group is made up of several divisions. These divisions are the human resources, publicity, the IT department, the finance department, program planning and execution, and public relations. Each of these individual divisions are in charge of a segment of the Youth Group’s responsibilities. The human resources division is the general manager of the entire Youth Group. It is in charge of making sure that every single division works together, keeping track of volunteer service hours, and most importantly, it also assigns new members to the divisions that they are best suited for. The publicity division manages the Youth Group’s public Youth Group members learning robotics

image and publicizes information about recent events and guest speakers through a variety of social media platforms.

The IT division is in charge of providing technical aid to others while also maintaining the Youth Group’s website. It also holds service events to educate others in technical fields, both in the US and China. In China, the IT division brings computers to the classrooms of the rural schools in China and educate the students there on technical skills, furthering the children’s future opportunities. Next, there is the financial department. The financial department is in charge of counting and managing the money that the Youth Group takes in. It also looks for different methods to use the money raised to benefit the Youth Group and society, which could be in the form of donations to charity or sponsorships of more trips to provide aid for others. The program planning and execution department finds different volunteer opportunities and sends Youth Group Volunteers helping make bioswales

Youth Group Volunteers helping make bioswales

them to the cabinet to be implemented for the entire Youth Group to participate in. Finally, Public Relations represents the Youth Group at gatherings with other organizations and maintains contact with them to create a good impression and improve the chances of working together in the future.

The Shin Shin Youth Group meets up every month, inviting guest speakers, updating volunteers on the current happenings of the organization, and playing icebreakers to get to know each other better. They discuss the different volunteer events that are coming and the ones that they have accomplished. The events that the Youth Group accomplish include both community service events and fundraising events. In community service, the Youth Group locates and organizes

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Youth Group members at a meeting

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local projects for volunteers to participate in. These range from helping out at senior centers to aiding the environment. The Shin Shin Youth Group has cleaned farms to enrich the lives of special needs children, served breakfast at Hope’s Corner, managed booths at a kite festival, taught children robotics after receiving tech lessons from Roboterra, and transformed a planting strip into a functional bioswale that will eventually help filter stormwater runoff. “Basically we planted plants near roads to filter stormwater to prevent chemicals from entering the bay.

We got to learn a lot about how these filters work, how humans impact the environment and I got to help pass on this knowledge to the Youth Group members I was leading through this project”, Justin (Cai) remarks. Also, at Stop Hunger Now, Justin (Cai) comments that “We just packed a whole bunch of meals. We worked together in a sort of assembly line fashion, with a lot of other Youth Group members. It was really great even though it

may sound boring. Basically you packed a lot of food. You poured seeds, rice. It was a great way to learn teamwork as well as getting to know other people.” The Youth Group also holds long distance video chats with students at schools where electronics have been installed in by Shin Shin, where Youth Group members educate the students in China online. Justin (Cai) adds, “I teach rural Chinese schools about English and talk about America; I’ll get to practice my own Chinese by speaking to them as well.”

Youth Group Members at a meeting with a guest speaker

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Chapter 3 Reciprocal Growth

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fter numerous years of supporting the schools within rural China, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation has been able to expand its boundaries and reach new heights.

The Shin Shin Educational Foundation has created a program that successfully aids rurally impoverished children by providing for them. By establishing new training facilities for education workers, funding construction of new educational facilities all

“Perhaps the most essential point is this: no one succeeds on his own. There are plenty of bright, hardworking, energetic people in developing countries who remain poor - not because they lack abilities or are not making sufficient effort, but because they work in economies that don’t function well” 24

YanHo recieving an award for Shin Shin

over different campuses, providing learning materials, and paving new roads around student homes, Shin Shin constructs the groundwork upon which the future generation of rural China will walk upon. To reach, to grow through education and learning and arrive at a point where their newly attained skills will carry them into new expanses where they can be successful and follow their dreams.

In addition to the several relieves that they have brought to China, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation has also impacted the lives of several individuals back in the US. With the establishment of the Shin Shin Youth Group, there has been a great increase in the aid that Shin Shin has been able to bring towards others. And in doing so, volunteers not only help others, but themselves; they get the chance to improve their leadership skills, practice teamwork and independence, and gain knowledge that one couldn’t learn from a textbook

by exposing themselves to the different conditions that less fortunate individuals face daily.

“Perhaps the most essential point is this: no one succeeds on his own. There are plenty of bright, hardworking, energetic people in developing countries who remain poor - not because they lack abilities or are not making sufficient effort, but because they work in economies that don’t function well” (Stiglitz 107).

In the book “The Price of Inequality,” Stiglitz emphasizes how the economic situations that several people find themselves within is vastly dependent on the situation and already present economy that they find themselves within, a situation that is largely influenced by the government and other authorities. However, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation changes the situation that the students within these conditions face by providing needed materials and volunteers who not only give to the community there and in the US, but who also take out several values, a better understanding of the situations throughout the world, and an enormous amount gratitude from the students, teachers, and families they have aided. On one of May (Lee)’s trips to a Shin Shin school,

...On the second to last day we were there, they called all of us volunteers to a room, and it was weird because they didn’t tell us where we were going. But as it turns out, it was actually the kids from the upper grades which only had about 40 kids A Shin Shin Education Foundation meeting

because the school was really small with a small community. They were all there and they all made presents for us and then they were talking about how they were really truly thankful. Like I’ve never seen anyone so appreciative of something so small. First we sat, then they went through, almost like a program. Kids got up to say anything that they really wanted to say, some sang songs, and there was a gift giving session where they just asked us to sign their notebooks and gave us gifts and we also played games and it was really touching. It was really cool how because they all grew up together, they knew everything about each other and you could see it how it was almost as if they had their own little family.

(Lee)

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Youth Group volunteers learning about bioswales

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Conclusion

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he Shin Shin Educational Foundation has been aiding the rural community in China for several years. Through its constant contributions there, and community services in the US, the organization creates change in all settings and circumstances to benefit others. It is constantly expanding and improving upon itself, with the recent establishment of the Youth Group, and with the constant catering towards specific needs of schools.

May recalls, “In the school I go to, for the past few years, we’ve been bringing them these box sets where they have colored pencils and notebooks and erasers...it didn’t seem like much but then every time at the end we would have a ceremony where we would pass them out to every child and they would be really happy and sometimes they would instantly open the box and sometimes draw some art and they’d present it to us” (Lee). She goes on to explain, “Even though they did not have much to begin with, they always show their gratitude so well and they are always so thankful for what they have” (Lee). Through the efforts of numerous volunteers, the Shin Shin Educational Foundation aims to reach more and more schools, putting more smiles on children’s faces and helping them to attain an education that will allow them to realize their dreams.

Youth Group Volunteer May (standing) teaching a class in rural China

“347 schools, 3000+ programs, 1400+ principals and teachers holding up hopes and dreams of 100,000+ children.”

You can contribute to these efforts by visiting www.shinshinfoundation.org.

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Works Cited Cai, Justin. “Shin Shin Interview.” 26 Mar. 2017.

“China: Poverty Reduction Project Empowers Farmers to Help Themselves.” World Bank, 11 Jan. 2016, www.worldbank. org/en/news/feature/2016/01/11/in-rural-china-poverty-reduction-project-empowers-farmers-to-help-themselves. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

“China.” The World Bank, www.worldbank.org/en/country/china. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

Guo, Lin. “Migration and the Well-Being of Left-Behind Children in China.” The China Health and Nutrition Survey (CHNS) Is a Project of the UNC Carolina Population Center, www.cpc.unc.edu/projects/china/publications/1967. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

Lee, May. “Shin Shin Interview.” 27 Mar. 2017.

Macphail, Fiona, and Xiao Yuan. “Labor Migration and Time Use Patterns of the Left-Behind Children and Elderly in Ru ral China.” Research Gate, Dec. 2011, www.researchgate.net/publication/251565593_Labor_Migration_and_Time_Use_ Patterns_of_the_Left-Behind_Children_and_Elderly_in_Rural_China. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

Madrick, Jeff. “The Cost of Child Poverty.” The New York Review of Books, 8 May 2015, www.nybooks.com/dai ly/2015/05/08/child-poverty-case-for-cash-allowances/. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

“Promote Balanced Development of Urban and Rural Education in China.” Shin Shin Educational Foundation, www.shin shinfoundation.org/new_site/index.php/language/en/. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

Stiglitz, Joseph E. The Price of Inequality: New York, W. W. Norton & Company, 2013.

Tan, Yanhe. “Shin Shin Interview” 23 Jan. 2017.

Tobin, Dr Damian. “Inequality in China: Rural Poverty Persists as Urban Wealth Balloons.”BBC News, BBC, 29 June 2011, www.bbc.com/news/business-13945072. Accessed 28 Mar. 2017.

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Austin Pan

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ustin is a high school junior who attends both Mountain View High School and Freestyle Academy, studying digital media. At school, he enjoys chatting with others and playing badminton. Outside of class, he likes to tutor others, play video games, procrastinate, draw, and program. He aspires to major in computer science and possibly minor in an art related subject.

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