Blessing Hands: Clack Mountain Festival

Saturday, June 13, 2009

Is There Life After Graduation?

Is There Life After Graduation?

Thanks to our family of sponsors, students are graduating and many will go to college. I want to tell you the story of Liang Guangyun who received a Blessing Hands college scholarship this year. There are many success stories but this one is his.

I have a special love of physics.

Liang Quanyun's words caught the eye of a physicist reading his scholarship essay last year.

When it comes to my dreams, I always said I wanted to be a scientist. I have a special love of physics. I think I will take up physics classes, and I want to make some contribution to society.
The college tuition expense is beyond my family's ability. There are two people studying in school, my little sister and I. My little sister is one year younger than me, and she is going to be a senior three student, which means spending a great deal of money. What is worse, my family can't afford any more for there are few incomes in our family. Besides, my father has a disease. As money is lacking, it cannot be cured. In a word, my family is short of money.

Poverty is a constant presence with our Blessing Hands students. They come from rural families without much land, resources, and sometimes health care. Because the physicist was touched by his dream, Liang got his scholarship and went to Nanchang University last fall.

I got a letter recently from Liang Quanyun describing his first year of college. He is studying computers, when he really wanted to study physics. College students in China don't always get to major in their first choice of subjects. It depends on the college that accepts them and what courses they have open. He is glad to be studying, however, and willing to suffer for the education he so desires.

As to free time, so much work fills it. Quantities of things need to be learned. When it comes to the challenge, study is the first. As the professor gives lectures too fast to follow, most of my lessons I learn by myself. Though I have the ability to learn, it will spend mountains of time. Meanwhile I need to do two or three part-time jobs to earn my living costs, which takes almost 40 hours per month. Time is beyond of my ability. In order to do it well.
I have to get up at 6:10, and then not go to bed until 23:10 (11:10 p.m.). There are so many competitions in college, such as physics competition, math competition, and web design. I have applied for the math competition, which will be held next semester. In order to perform it well, in summer vacation, I will do some preparation. On the other hand, I need to study computers, and get through the state secondary examination of computers.

Liang's sponsor has already decided to sponsor him again next year. With his hard work, he is sure to succeed. All of our students are studying very hard. We hope that their sponsors will renew their sponsorships too. Three sponsors have already committed to renew their scholarship help. We hope you will also.

Send us an e-mail to blessinghands@gmail.com if you are willing to sponsor your college student a second year. Of course there are always new graduating high school students who need first year scholarships. Some of you might support one of them in the fall.

Students Graduating

Yu Yanying wrote recently. " I have finished senior high school with your help. Thank you very much. Wish you all the best."

Yanying will be applying for a Blessing Hands $500 scholarship for college soon. We will feature her in the summer after we have rated all the scholarship applications, essays, and test scores. We will tell her story later.

Every June Chinese middle school kids and high school students graduate into a new life. They have just finished very difficult tests that will place them in high schools or qualify them for college. Those that don't score high enough on the tests will go to vocational school or work.

I think these tests are similar to the tests the emperors gave once a year to select civil servants. The honor of families hangs on these tests as well as the future of the students. Without a good test score, the students will not go to a good high school or college, but with an education they can reach back and help their families. Our tuition program is a great poverty reduction program.

All of China holds its breath during these three day tests nationwide. Traffic is routed away and even helicopters are not allowed to fly near the testing centers. Parents are as stressed out as the students and teachers in the days before the tests when pretests are given daily to prepare them. Internet blackouts are enforced in schools to keep students from being distracted from their studies.

Now the tests are over and I am hearing from the students again. They are finally free of studies but still full of hope until the test scores come back and lives are ruined or lifted. Their letters can make me cry - just knowing that we have made a difference in their lives, and they have made it through high school finally after all their struggles.

Read more about the Chinese Obsession with the national test at this New York Times Link.

Join Our Mailing List!

NEW WAY TO GIVE MONTHLY

Someone has been sending us regular anonymous $10 contributions through "Just Give". We sure thank you. For your convenience we have researched a way for you to give through your bank automatically. It gives us the whole amount without any service charge withheld, and it is easy to set up a regular contribution through your bank. We have a form that you can download or print right from your browser. Just mail it to us along with a void check from your account. The form is located at this address.

I have used automatic bank deposits to support a child in Haiti for many years. It sure has been convenient for me. I don't have to remember to send a check, and I don't pay for a stamp every month. I recommend this method of giving to you.

Festival Results

The Clack Mountain Festival was very good.
We sold 17 student paintings and made some
new friends for our kids. One new sponsor
signed up to support a student.

In This Issue

Sponsor a Child

Photos of Primary Students Needing Sponsors

Children's Book

Valued Volunteers

China Trip

Clack Mt. Festival

Sponsor Haung. Liyuan

You can help her care about her future.

$30 a year will help her have school supplies.
Click below to become her special sponsor.

Visit Our Photo Page

You can see the Primary students without sponsors
at this link. Just e-mail
us which child you would like to sponsor.

Click to donate $30 to any Primary student.

Follow-up Links

Website of Blessing Hands

Photopages

Blog

Featured Article

Which country's students study the most according to a recent survey of world students?

Sponsor
Middle School Student.s

Zhang Lin

Go to this page to see Middle school students who need sponsors. Choose one and e-mail us for details.

Middle School students need $70 a year or $35 a semester to help pay for their food.

Yangshuo High School students without sponsors are featured in this link.

Yi Xianhui needs a sponsor. $160 a year will pay his tuition to high school.

$80 a semester will help a Qinzhou high school student continue in school.

$100 contributed to the general fund will help students without sponsors.

Twittering With News

Good News

So much has happened lately that I can barely keep up, which you can tell from my lack of newsletters. I want to share with you some results of our May activities and some exciting things to serve you on the horizon.

20 new sponsors have selected kids to support this spring!

$61 came from the Pizza Hut promotion - thanks to all of you who ordered pizza with our fund raising vouchers.

$778 came in from sales at our Yangshuo Art Show at the Rowan County Arts Center. More came from other special events where we featured only
the children's art.

Jan Lewis raised support for two of our girls again this year. She loves to run as a fund raiser. She hopes to raise $500 for a college scholarship this fall. Maybe some of you would like to have fund raising runs.

Besides Facebook's Causes, Blessing Hands is now onTwitter, a social network that is popular. Twitter me as @bdcutts. Followers are welcomed.

We have received a Salesforce grant that will allow us to use their services for free. The list price of this donation is $15,000 a year. Salesforce is a cloud application (using no software locally on a computer) that will let us store information on the internet where it will never be lost. It will also give better service to you donors and sponsors when we get it figured out. Now we have to alert sponsors with an e-mail when they need to give to their special students. With Salesforce the system should be automatic. There is a learning curve so be patient.

So far 25 graduating students have sent in essays to apply for $500 college scholarships. We expect at least 25 more.

Thanks,

Betty Cutts

New Book Finished

Daring to Dream

This is the title and cover of our new children's book.

The painting is by a student at Yangshuo Experimental Primary school named Liang Jingying and the painting's title isPeace will be Spread All Over the World.

I love the doves they are holding and the bright red sun. Only a farm kid would know that doves have pink eyes.

When I saw the unique paintings the Yangshuo students sent for our auction, I thought they cried out to be featured in a book. I didn't want to see them leave when they were sold one by one. I could keep them in a book I thought.

Then I met Maggie Decker, an education teacher at Morehead State University. Dr. Decker had a whole class who were writing their own books, and she encouraged me to join them. She has a loving heart and is writing her own book about China.

With Maggie's help and encouragement, a prepackaged children's book kit, and the media center at the library, a book was born. So far there are only three copies, but someday I might put it on Amazon Books and let everyone have a chance to read or download it.

I want the kids in Yangshuo to see it first. After all it features their pictures, letters, and paintings. It is only 22 pages, but Maggie says I have another book in me, and I can do it next semester too.

Valued Volunteers

Lilly Wu (吴虹), shown at the right,
and Debbie Wang (王芳), visiting scholars at our local Morehead State University, have gone back to Nanning, China.

They did so much to help us while they were here. All the scholars have, but Lilly and Debbie have helped us for 9 months tirelessly. They have done translation, helped with planning, given advice, manned display tables, served tea, helped with the auction sales, edited our new children's book, and invited me to classes to talk about Blessing Hands.

Debbie Wang is here shown with our postcards made from children's paintings.

Without their help, I would never know my mistakes in Chinese culture. They have always patiently taught me and opened doors for our students. I will look forward to seeing them in China this summer.

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I especially want to thank Lilly Liu Raodong (刘绕冬), one of our scholarship students majoring in managing records.

She has begun to enter our information forms in a program that will help us manage all of our information better. She has saved me hours of work and done it much better than I ever could have since I don't know Chinese.

Lilly is in her third year of college and will intern soon. It is such a pleasure to see our students start to give back to Blessing Hands, fulfilling what we modeled for them.

Coming to China in July

Abby Oney is coming to China.

Abby is a college student majoring in Biology at Morehead State University. This will be her first trip overseas. She has helped

with two "Pick Me" campaigns and is excited to be going to China with me on July 15th.

We plan to meet some supporters in Hong Kong and pick up things for the schools. Crossroads Charity there will give us requested items to carry into China in our suitcases. I will ask for digital cameras and small computers that the kids might be able to use for e-mailing their sponsors and pen pals.

Right now it looks like we will be arriving in Guilin on the 18th and staying there a day or two before going to Yangshuo.

Doris Wells is also traveling with me this time. Doris
i

s meeting her sponsored student and wants to know the kids she has been seeing as she worked on pen pal cards. She volunteers with us, when she has time. She is a good friend, grandmother of five, and a devoted wife.

Most of all we will be interviewing new scholarship students, who hope to find sponsors for their first year of college in the fall of 2009. We already have 25 application on file. We will also visit schools and take a lot of pictures to share with you.

Bamboo, one of our scholarship students who is majoring in media, has offered to make a movie with us in China.

We will be in Nanning from the evening of the 24th until the 26th and in Qinzhou from the 27th until the afternoon of the 30th. We hope to see many visiting scholars in Nanning. We fly out of Hong Kong on the 31st.

If you are a Blessing Hands college scholarship student and have time to have a meal with me while I am in your area, contact me at this e-mail or your

Blessing Hands administrator. I hope to have dinners with you in Nanning and Guilin and perhaps Qinzhou and Yangshuo.

You all come to the
Clack Mountain Festival!