Poverty Alleviation by the China Social Entrepreneur Foundation

　　【Overview】 In 2011, China Social Entrepreneur Foundation was titled as “2001-2010 Advanced Collective for National Poverty Alleviation and Development” by the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation and Development (LGOP); The YouChange Mianzhu Poverty Alleviation Volunteer Station was titled as Advanced Collective (2001-2010) for National Poverty Alleviation and Development; Executive Vice President of YouChange and the President of YouChange University Tang Min was titled as Advanced Individual (2001-2010) for National Poverty Alleviation and Development. Meanwhile, China Social Entrepreneur Foundation ranked first in China Charity Foundation Transparent Index list of the “China Charity Transparent Report 2011” released by the Ministry of Civil Affairs, and ranked second in the Chinese version of “2011 List of China Charity Foundations” of the "Forbes".

　　【Action Plan of YouChange Poverty Alleviation Volunteers】In order to implement the “Action Plan of YouChange Poverty Alleviation Volunteers”, China Social Entrepreneur Foundation (YouChange) promoted the establishment of YouChange Volunteer Stations across the country, especially in poverty-stricken areas. Composed of professional volunteers and logistics volunteers, based on self-management and operation, YouChange Volunteer Stations mainly mobilize, coordinate and organize the volunteers to directly participate in the anti-poverty work in poor areas and is a place for volunteers to study, live and work.

　　In 2011, the volunteer support center provided strong support for the construction and management of the YouChange Volunteer Stations, invited bids for 18 micro-projects of YouChange youth, provided the volunteers with the YouChange - Tsinghua rural community building training, YouChange – Bazhong new public service personnel training, Shenzhen social work training, independent micro financing aid for young people’s independent practice, etc.

　　As of the end of 2011, YouChange had set up 58 volunteer stations in 13 provinces and municipalities in China, namely Sichuan, Shaanxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Hebei, Inner Mongolia, Yunnan, Guangxi, Qinghai, Hubei, Chongqing, Jilin and Beijing. The stations have 103 long-term volunteers, more than 500 project volunteers and more than 2600 short-term activity volunteers, and have provided volunteer services for more than 150,000 hours.

　　Among them, Inner Mongolia Hohhot Volunteer Station has, through setting up city, county and township-level volunteer stations, established an effective volunteer support system and coordination mechanism to actively explore the establishment of new models for poverty alleviation by science and technology; Guilin Volunteer Station build a cross-border cooperation platform relying on the high-quality teaching and alumni resources of Guangxi Normal University to vigorously promote the development of Evergreen Yoshinori Project in Guangxi; Chongqing Qianjiang Volunteer Station has grown into the first multi-functional volunteer community service center of YouChange with regional node status as a social service platform based on YouChange’s resources and brand advantages.

　　【Evergreen Yoshinori Project】Initiated by YouChange, the Evergreen Yoshinori Project is an elderly volunteer service project that organizes urban excellent retired teachers to support the enhancement of education management and teaching level of the schools in impoverished regions relying on its partner NGOs and units in various regions. The project is designed to establish a platform for the exchange of teaching resources between urban and rural areas to enhance the management level of the recipient schools and the teaching quality of teachers, improve the students' learning ability and overall quality, and thus explore the establishment of an elderly volunteer service system and mechanism in China. Through mobilizing retired teachers to serve rural areas, it aims to help the schools in poor areas share the excellent teaching resources of urban areas and narrow the gap between urban and rural areas in education. As of December 2011, the Evergreen Yoshinori Project had been implemented for nearly two years in Nanning and Guilin of Guangxi, Kunming and Lijiang of Yunnan Province, Luanping of Hebei, Helin County of Inner Mongolia and Anshan of Liaoning, etc. The program is generally praised by the Counselor's Office of the State Council, the Ministry of Education and other relevant institutions and society.

　　In 2011, Evergreen Yoshinori Project had a total of nine teaching support centers in China and 428 volunteers, including 142 volunteers working in the centers. The project provided about 40,488 hours of services for more than 50 poverty-stricken schools, directly benefiting 2500 teachers and indirectly benefiting 30,000 students. It achieved good actual results and has a far-reaching impact on society.

　　On May 14, the “2011 Seminar on Evergreen Yoshinori Project” jointly sponsored by the Department of Education of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and YouChange was convened in Nanning of Guangxi.

　　On July 11, the “First High-level Seminar on Evergreen Yoshinori Project in 2011” was opened in Guangxi Normal University and 25 people attended the event. From September 19 to 21, the Counselor's Office of the State Council organized a delegation of six persons to carry out field research on the implementation of the Evergreen Yoshinori Project in Guangxi and visited the teaching support centers in Bama, Mashan and Tiandong, providing a reference for the design of the development plan for the aging society and aged people’s public welfare establishments.

　　【Catastrophe Relief Fund】In 2011, jointly with joint China Earthquake Emergency Search and Rescue Center, YouChange initiated the "Catastrophe Relief Fund" and gradually made it a disaster prevention advocacy fund instead of just providing post-disaster relief and reconstruction support. The Catastrophe Relief Fund has set up cooperative relationship with five domestic leading regional hub institutions and directly or indirectly cooperated or held trainings with more than 150 applied NGOs in disaster response. The YouChange grassroots civil disaster response network (practice in communities) has been basically set up. The Catastrophe Relief Fund has came to agreement on cooperation successively with the emergency rescue team of the State Seismological Bureau, the Disaster Reduction Center of the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the National School of Administration, Right to Play, Mercy Corps International, Southwestern University of Finance and Economics, National Taiwan University, Beijing Normal University and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and established a complete process system for disaster management, research and advocacy.

　　In March, YouChange Advanced Training Course on Disaster Management was officially launched. Nearly 20 industry leaders from 15 domestic institutions participated in the four-session seminar; On May 11, YouChange signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation with the earthquake emergency rescue center of the State Seismological Bureau, which is the first MOU signed between government department and public interest organizations; In October, YouChange launched the disaster reduction and prevention training course R&D project; in December, in cooperation with CSR Asia, Microsoft, PricewaterhouseCoopers, etc, it basically set up the business support platform for disaster response. By then, a Golden Triangle integrating the practice, research and advocacy of disaster response project (community safety) was completely established.

　　YouChange Foundation directly invested nearly 2 million in 2011 and encouraged the investment of nearly ten million Yuan of social resources to provide support for thousands of people in Qinghai, Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou. In the whole year, the Foundation launched disaster emergency response plan for three times, involving Yingjiang earthquake, Wangmo floods and Bazhong floods. In the post-Yushu Earthquake reconstruction of Qinghai Province, jointly with the women of Shaanxi Province, YouChange supported more than 20 local NGOs of Qinghai Province to promote the post-disaster reconstruction through capacity building and micro project assistance.

　　【Handicraft Cultural Fund】 Established by YouChange, it is the first domestic fund to protect, innovate and apply the traditional handicraft culture. It is set up to provide financial aid for and participate in the nonprofit cultural projects and activities in line with the fund concept as well as the inheritance and protection of the intangible cultural heritage through collecting quality resources of various channels and raising social funds, aiming to improve the cultural conditions of poverty-stricken regions of China and promote the innovation and development of urban and rural communities.

　　YouChange cooperated with many institutions and enterprises concerned about the preservation and protection of ethnic culture and heritage to create Yi brand. Yi is a certified brand for the handicraft in line with the concept of “production protection” and “active inheritance” under the “Handicraft Cultural Heritage Plan”. Through supporting the rational development and production of intangible cultural heritage of remote areas, it will gradually open up handicraft production, design and sales channels for poor rural areas to effectively improve the quality, value-added and influence of cultural products.

　　In 2011, Youcheng organized the "Design for China" - a handicraft design contest in China to provide a society-oriented open design and program collection platform for the protection, inheritance and innovation of China’s intangible cultural heritage, aiming to promote non-material cultural heritage into the modern society and city life and guide the young’s public and social resources to concern, accept and participate in the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage. In July, a seminar on the cultural poverty alleviation program of the “Handicraft Cultural Heritage” was convened. The project team and the relevant researchers, practitioners and advocates as well as the cross-border partners exchanged views on the challenge for the inheritance of non-material cultural heritage, protection of intangible cultural heritage, contemporary social inclusion and the interdisciplinary collaboration of social forces. In 2011, YouChange developed three Public Service Announcements, namely the “new model for cultural poverty alleviation” – an elaboration project from- the perspective of entire culture protection, “Stories of Bo” – a project on cultural heritage from the perspective of a Miao girl, and the “Design for China” – a summer camp handicraft activity.

　　【Eaglet Plan】 Initiated by YouChange, the Eaglet Plan is committed to developing cross-border leadership talents interested in public welfare. Through one year of grassroots practice, participatory teaching and companionship growth, the program strives to develop the public spirit, a sense of social responsibility, leadership and grass-roots experience of the new generation of young people in awareness, knowledge and capability, aiming to stimulate their enthusiasm for “learning from the people, serving the people and opening eyes to the whole world based on grassroots work”.

　　As volunteers, in cooperation with LGOP and the fifth poverty relief project of the World Bank, the trainees participated in the village-level mutual funds, community-driven development (CDD) and the legal volunteer project of poverty-stricken areas. In the future, they’ll also be involved in NGOs and overseas volunteer projects. A tutor is arranged for each participant and all the tutors are warm-hearted elites from all circles of society (such as entrepreneurs, public leaders, government officials and academics). The training contents include lectures, case studies, speeches of relevant representatives, NGO experience sharing and team work, highlighting participatory and heuristic teaching with the purpose of broadening participants’ horizons, breaking their thinking set and establishing their concepts on relevant issues, supplemented by knowledge and skills training. The courses include traditional culture and values, political and economic foundation, national education, leadership and professional skills. The YouChange New Public Welfare University (preparatory group) set up the employment instruction center to provide support for the trainees’ employment.

　　From February to April 2011, it conducted publicity and online recruitment in 7 domestic universities through advocacy among the university students. On August 1, the Eaglet Plan was launched and 13 media reported about it. From August 1 to 28, trainings were held in China Agricultural University and Tsinghua University in Beijing for four weeks. From September to December, the Eaglet Plan’s volunteers carried out field research in the project areas for three months.

　　【Founders’ Coffee】 Initiated by YouChange, the "Founders’ Coffee" is a social entrepreneurship enlightenment course designed to develop talented young people with social entrepreneurship, guide college students to understand society and develop their ability to find and solve social problems. Through building the university union and conducting cross-border coordination of social resources, the program has become a formal credit course of many domestic universities and colleges.

　　Since October 2011, this program has provided seven brilliant social entrepreneurship enlightenment courses of 23 hours for 1602 teachers and students of 11 universities (including: Peking University, Renmin University of China, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing Foreign Studies University, Capital University of Economics and Business, Wuhan University, Xiangtan University, Hefei College of Anhui, Guangxi Normal University, Guangxi College of Finance and Economics and Liuzhou Teachers’ College) of seven cities and was supported by 76 volunteers, who provided a total of 4116 hours of volunteer services for the preparation of the program.

　　【Hong Kong Youth Rural Services】This program is designed to recruit the youth of Hong Kong to serve rural communities of Mainland China. Through course learning, social research, exchange visits, practice service and action research, the young people will provide short-term services for rural areas of Mainland China, introduce advanced information, ideas and methods to provide possible solutions for community development and introduce more external resources. Meanwhile, it will help the youth of Hong Kong have a deeper understanding of China’s situation, history, culture and people’s livelihood and gradually grow into service practitioners and leaders. The purpose is to deepen the understanding of the Hong Kong youth on national conditions, achieve personal life experience and develop their new public spirit to better serve urban and rural communities and promote community construction in Mainland China.

　　In 2011, 30 HK students provided services for Inner Mongolia for eight days. Through the activity, they had a deeper understanding of China's national conditions, geography, culture, customs and people’s livelihood, enhanced the sense of national identity and the sense of social responsibility, achieved personal growth and created the value of life. Through drawing Community Green Map, the Hong Kong Youth brought state-of-the-art information and ideas to local community and introduced more information and ideas for the development of local community. Among them, the simple toilet building and road hardening proposals were adopted and implemented by the local government. In 2011, it also trained nine mainland university students to serve as volunteers and established the network community for the youth of Mainland and Hong Kong to deepen the understanding and establish the friendship of the youth between the two regions through the services and exchanges of the volunteers, aiming to promote the integration of the ideas and culture of Hong Kong and Mainland China.

　　This program has come to agreement on cooperation for three to five years with Hong Kong Polytechnic University and is now applying for HK government’s matching funds to enhance the influence of Mainland’s public welfare organizations and enterprises in Hong Kong and promote the communications between HK schools and relevant institutions.

　　【Industry support project】 From October to November, 2011, the “Youcheng New Public Community Practice Workshop” was held respectively in Shaanxi, Qinghai, Guizhou, Yunnan and Sichuan. Through a participatory approach, it held talks with five partner organizers and 137 community organizations to understand the present situation of grassroots communities and social organizations’ work experience and challenges and had a more profound understanding of community consensus and community action. In September 2011, the YouChange University (preparatory group) and Beijing Huizeren Consulting Service Center jointly initiated the “Seminar on Leadership Development for the New Public Welfare Establishments of YouChange University” to develop courses and establish training mechanisms for on-the-job public welfare organizations’ leaders based on their actions. Through one year’s training, it aims to improve the comprehensive ability of the leaders of the public service and jointly promote the development of China's public welfare. From May 27 to August 11, 2011, YouChange and the Department of Sociology of Tsinghua University jointly held the “Training on Rural Community Constructors of YouChange University”. This program is designed to train a group of professional “rural community constructors” with strong organization and mobilization ability and keen awareness of social issues who are willing to devote themselves to rural community construction and explore the establishment of the all-round new structure of social management based on the grassroots harmony with community people service as the core participated by grassroots community organizations, covering all community management and community activities. From May 3, 2011 to 30, based on the needs of YouChange Volunteer Stations for knowledge popularization, the Foundation, the Disabled Social Work Services Center of Shenzhen and the Friends of the Disabled invited the tutors of Department of Social Work of the Chinese University of Hong Kong to serve as lecturers of the training. Based on the successful experience of Hong Kong social workers and the on-site training and practice of the Friends of the Disabled, it held a training course on social work knowledge for the workers of the volunteer stations. In cooperation with Shanghai Green-wing Social Work Service Center, from August 19 to 26, 2011, it held the YouChange’s Bazhong New Public Service Talent Training Course in Bazhong City of Sichuan Province.

　　【YouChange Poverty Alleviation Scientific Research Award】 The “YouChange Poverty Alleviation Scientific Research Award” was set up by LGOP, participated by the Expert Advisory Committee of the State Council Leading Group of Poverty Alleviation and Development and organized by China Social Entrepreneur Foundation. It is designed to guide and encourage the theory and application researchers in the field of poverty reduction to actively explore solutions to new problems in building a socialist harmonious society and achieving common prosperity in the current poverty alleviation work and strive to launch innovative and popular theory an application results. The first conference on “YouChange Poverty Alleviation Scientific Research Award” was held in the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing on the morning of October 17, 2011. Hui Liangyu, Member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, Vice Premier of the State Council and the Head of the State Council Leading Group of Poverty Alleviation and Development attended the event and awarded the winners. Deputy Head of the State Council Leading Group of Poverty Alleviation and Development and Director-General of LGOP Fan Xiaojian presided over the meeting and announced the decision of LGOP on the “YouChange Poverty Alleviation Scientific Research Award”. On the event, four experts from three institutions who achieved outstanding results in the theory and application research in the field of poverty reduction since the launching of the poverty alleviation and development work of the state in May 1986 were awarded.

　　【Theoretical study】On June 28, 2011, in cooperation with China Research Center for Comparative Politics and Economics of Central Compilation and Translation Bureau and Social Sciences Academic Press, the Foundation held the conference on the publication of the “'YouChang' Social Innovation and Social Enterprises' Renditions” and social innovation. The “Renditions” systematically introduces the practice of social enterprise and social innovation theory of foreign countries, especially the western develop countries to actively promote the study of social innovation theory with Chinese characteristics.

　　On July 27, the book "Social Management Innovation in Disaster Response" was issued on the closing ceremony of the High-level Seminar of YouChange University on Disaster Response. This book introduces in detail how YouChang and other NGOs coped with the 5.12 Wenchuan Earthquake in 2008, focusing on the exploration and practice of the establishment of the social resource coordination platform for post-disaster reconstruction in Mianzhu City.