Han Ximin
SHENZHEN S eighth Project Care, an annual event, was launched across the city yesterday to help impoverished families and disadvantaged groups.
A total of 1,292 activities under the theme of Care, Gratitude and Reward will be developed in the coming three months by government agencies, communities and companies in the next three to four months to show care for less fortunate people.
The activities cover eight categories such as donations, disaster relief and charity activities such as voluntary teaching.
Before the launch ceremony, city Party chief Wang Rong and Mayor Xu Qin met with Cao Fujia, a singer who is invited to be the image publicist for Project Care, and Sun Ying, a volunteer who quit her job twice to teach Guizhou village children.
Cao was the singer of the Project Care theme song Thank You. Sun was awarded as one of China s top 100 excellent volunteers in December last year.
The city s Project Care Office has started recruiting volunteers to teach at primary schools in Hunan, Sichuan, Guizhou, Jiangxi and Guangdong provinces. For teaching one term, each volunteer will receive a teaching subsidy of 2,000 yuan (US$303). The deadline for recruitment is Feb. 18 and teaching will start in March. Intended applicants can fill in a form downloaded from www.szguanai.com or www.szhgong.com. Applications must be sent to the Project Care Office at Room 1301, Shangbao Building, 2 Shangbao Road, Futian District.
In the past five years, the organizer recruited 407 volunteers and voluntary teaching had covered 150 schools in 11 provinces, benefiting 50,000 pupils in villages.
Futian will launch a yearlong activity to offer free training in art for talented children from low-income families, while Luohu charity organizations will donate money and provide daily necessities for disabled people in the district. Nanshan District will offer free rehabilitation training for children with cerebral palsy and autism. Government agencies and social organizations will also organize a wide range of activities for disadvantaged groups.
Project Care was initiated in Shenzhen in 2003 and more than 10,000 activities had been developed in the past.
