Tag: Alumni

MSU Beijing Alumni Club Global Service Project: Rural Women’s School of Beijing

Michigan State University recently began engaging the entire global MSU community in a “Global Service Day.” It is a great cause that gives Spartans an opportunity to collectively give back in one, big, global effort. On April 18, Spartans around the world will organize their alumni clubs to engage in service projects in their community. The website they’ve SWP_2015_GreenShieldput together is pretty cool; you can follow the activities of Spartans around the globe on #MSUServiceDay on Twitter.

Our alumni club in Beijing wanted to get involved in this great event, and began seeking opportunities where we could make an impact. One of the advisors for our club is a professor at Eastern Michigan University (we Michiganders in China stick together!), and she has been volunteering at this place called the Rural Women’s School of Beijing (officially known as the “Beijing Cultural Development Center for Rural Women”). I decided to look into it, and after visiting, I knew right away this was a great cause for us to get behind.

What is the Rural Women’s School of Beijing?

From the English website: “The Center is an NGO promoting the advancement and personal development of rural women. It includes the Practical Skills Training Center for Rural Women, the Migrant Women’s Club, Rural Women Magazine ‘s grassroots activities centers and projects for women’s development in rural communities. It is a non-profit organization with an integrated program that “supports the poor and empowers rural women by combining development projects, news media and information services, and dissemination of the outcome of our research.”

Looking deeper, I found that the original founder, Wu Qing, was a revered member of the Beijing

Principal Luo Discusses the School (click picture to link to the video)
Principal Luo Discusses the School (click picture to link to the video)

Municipal People’s Congress, and is even a Schwab Social Entrepreneurship Award winner.

The school is administered by Principal Luo Zhaohong, who has been serving the school for over a decade. In 2013, Caixin Online did a piece about the school and recorded a great video interview that really captures the principal’s  servant spirit and the impact this school has made over the years.

According to Principal Luo, the school operates on a budget of about 2.5 Million RMB (roughly $400,000), which comes mostly through private donations.

My Visit

The school is located wayyyy outside the 6th Ring road in Beijing. Quite a trek for those of us used to staying in the confines of the CBD or Sanlitun area. (Even though it can be rough sometimes, my advice is to get out of the central part of the city at least once a month anyways to remind yourself there is scenery in life other than pollution, bars, hotels and skyscrapers! Did you know there are mountains surrounding Beijing? :)).

Principal Luo and I
Principal Luo and I

When I met Principal Luo and her staff, I was immediately greeted with a spirit of warmth and gratitude. They were very gracious that I would have done something as simple as even paying a brief visit to the school! The principal walked me around the grounds for a tour, and spent a great deal of time showing me the pictures they’ve displayed of volunteers, both Chinese and foreign, that have given their time at the school over the years.

I learned that the school has served tens of thousands of women from across China, representing pretty much all of the ethnic minority groups that have clans in China. Normally, the women will come for 3 months at a time to receive training in different fields like school teaching, medicine, or leadership. The key objective is to help the women become more creative and resourceful, to be able to grow and impact their home communities.

Girls from Guizhou Training at the School
Girls from Guizhou Training at the School

I had the privilege of engaging some of the girls in the current cohort. These girls are all between the ages of 16 – 20 and come from poor, rural communities like Guizhou in southern China, and have come to receive training to be Kindergarten teachers back home.

I really learned a lot and built a connection, and felt strongly compelled to make this school the cause our club would contribute to for the MSU Global Service Day.

Service Activity: Secondhand Item and Monetary Donation Drive at Home Plate Sanlitun

To make a more lasting impact and to provide the school with resources it needs, we decided to extend the service project beyond the April 18th day to give people the opportunity to donate. This gives MSU and non-MSU alums in Beijing the chance to make an impact! Graciously, Home Plate Restaurant in Sanlitun, which also hosted many of the Spartan NCAA tournament game watches, volunteered to act as a depot for RURAL WOMEN'S CLUB DONATION DRIVEitem drop off and cash donations.

The drive began only a few weeks ago, and already we’ve gathered many items that will be useful for the school – printers, paper, pencils, crayons, and even kitchen appliances. The biggest items they need are a new fax machine and laptop computers to enhance their training activities.

The Drive has started to pick up momentum, and has been featured in The Beijinger magazine.

Join Us on April 18

The Donation Drive is going on from now until April 17th at Home Plate. On April 18th, we are gathering a group of volunteers to drive out to the school to deliver the monetary and secondhand item donations. As part of our visit, we will engage the students and staff in an arts and crafts and recreational activity to be announced.

Please DM me @Danredford or email me at danredford10@gmail.com if you would like to join us. This activity is open to Spartans and non-Spartans alike!

#Spartanswill #GoGreen #MSUGlobalService

 

 

 

Big Ten Fourth of July Weekend Bash 2013

One of the most unexpected joys of my time in Beijing actually has its roots in something closer to home than you’d think. While I am always of a mind that Spartans everywhere are changing the world, I am equally inspired by the work I see every day being done by Big Ten Alumni here in Beijing.

Since early in 2012, the Big Ten Alumni Clubs of Beijing has emerged as a dynamic group of individuals that are lighting this city on fire. As I mentioned in a previous post, til now we have hosted the 1st and 2nd annual Big Ten alumni Mixers, both bringing in alumni from around this city.

Big Ten Bash with Spartan alum Charles Eveslage (right) and Purdue Alum Sylvia Liu (middle)
Big Ten Bash with Spartan alum Charles Eveslage (right) and Purdue Alum Sylvia Liu (middle)

This year we tried something different: The Big Ten Fourth of July Weekend Bash in Ritan Park. It is always amazing to me the different kinds of people that you meet that come from so many different backgrounds that show up when hosting these types of things. We even had one MSU alum that took a flight in from the city of Changchun, which is is somewhat like going from Georgia to Michigan, just to be at our party! #Spartanswill

We also had an endorsement from the Deputy Chief of Mission of the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, Dr. Robert Wang, for the event. Dr. Wang received his PhD from Iowa so is a fellow Big Tenner! Check out the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEn_WXz8RN4

It was a great success, with over 200 alumni from around Beijing coming out to celebrate this great occasion, including members of most of the Big Ten schools. And to be honest, I was impressed especially by the turnout from the University of Wisconsin…looks like there is another dynamic club in the making.

We’ve made some great progress for the Big Ten Conference here in China and the MSU Beijing Alumni Club looks forward to collaborating on future events and initiatives.

Spartans Unite at Alumni Clubs of Beijing Ball 2013

Since the beginning of 2012, I began taking an active role in the “Alumni Clubs of Beijing”(ACB). This group is a consortium of clubs representing over 60 universities, mostly in the United States but also including a few in the U.K. and China, that are organized here in Beijing. The mission of the group is to: “Provide a platform to strengthen and offer resources for Beijing’s university alumni clubs, such as sharing best practices and enabling cooperation for larger scale events. Together we can tackle the challenges that no one individual club is equipped to handle on its own.”

cropped-bj-alum-clubs-logo_clean_885

As the President of the MSU Beijing Alumni Club, I am not only responsible for organizing and hosting events to bring together Spartans here in Beijing. I want to make sure that MSU’s presence and the “banner of Sparty” is heard and felt throughout Beijing and China. I became involved in “ACB” because I saw it as an opportunity for the MSU club and for the university to make itself known in Beijing among others that share their passion for their university.

2nd Annual Big Ten Mixer, April 15, 2013

Moreover, it is also an enormous resource I can share with our club members that are looking for a job, a project, or anything to “get their feet wet” here. Beijing is indeed one of the world’s most important cities; it is also one of the largest, and thus easy to get lost. ACB is a tool that can be used to really take advantage of “six degrees of separation” to move more efficiently.

I am proud to say that among the crowd of universities involved, MSU has really been recognized as one of the most active, successful clubs. We have now co-hosted a first and second annual “Big Ten Pre-Alumni Ball” Mixer, in 2012 and 2013, respectively, each year bringing around 200 folks out for networking and fun.

This year, MSU once again participated in ACB’s signature event, the  2nd annual “Alumni Clubs of Beijing Ball.” As you can see from the picture, MSU was well represented by a group of top notch Spartans. We sure do look good, eh?

MSU Spartans at the 2013 Alumni Clubs of Beijing Ball – Kerry Hotel, Beijing, China

As my friend, Scott Westerman, Director of the MSU Alumni Association always likes to say, there are Spartans everywhere. Here in Beijing, we are uncovering a gold mine.