An Experience Once in a Lifetime - Yannick Lo

This is my first time participating in such a meaningful community service.  Throughout the journey, I engaged in different tasks including visiting students in remote rural villages, conducting interviews with them and distributing scholarships.  The most impressive experience I had during the trip was the visit to individual students' homes.  We got driven by local officials to several traditional villages around Yongshun in Hunan.  According to my teammates' previous experience, infrastructure such as roads and bridges in Yongshun have been drastically improved by the Central Government in recent years.  Therefore, it took us just under an hour to get to some villages, as compared to the three or more hours' bumpy drive in the past.  Knowing that road access has been improved significantly, I am happy to see how that helps improve families' lives in these villages, as villagers can now reach the downtown area of Yongshun easily for trade, school and work.

When we arrived at the first student's home, he and his aunt welcomed us with the warmest greetings.  In the first instance, what we saw was a traditional timber house which looked primitive and dilapidated.  They had basic settings in their house, simple and rough.  We started our interview with the student by sitting in their little courtyard in front of their house.  He told us during the interview that he got admitted to one of the top three universities that he had applied for.  We all shared his joy because this was his dream come true, having the opportunity to pursue tertiary education in the subject that he liked.  He thanked the WCEFA for giving him such a great opportunity by supporting his tuition fee.  Now he could continue with his study and eventually go into one of his favorite universities.  His aunt also thanked us with tears for being generous and kind to their family.

The aim of these visits is to examine and verify needy students' living conditions, financial situation and academic performance, in order to explore the possibility of subsidising their school fees.  They have to perform well in their academics, basically reaching to the top 10% in their classes.  The objective of the WCEFA is to subsidise talented teenagers from poor families to complete their tertiary education, so that they may then help their families out of poverty.  I could see that the organisation is not just trying to donate money to the poor, but to encourage they themselves to upgrade their educational levels for more choices in life, rather than just being farmers and doing low-paid jobs.