In Bill Somerville's Philanthropic Venture Foundation Newsletter, Chao Foundation is acknowledged for our work in China.  Bill will be the keynote speaker at the conference on philanthropy at Beijing Normal University organized by Yigongyi Center and Chao Foundation.

Several American foundations are showing interest in China and giving for particular programs, such as developing cleaner burning of coal (David & Lucile Packard Foundation), or paying the cost of every child in one province who has heart defects and needs surgery (Ping and Amy Chao Foundation). These foundations are also interested in the development of organized philanthropy in China. To read more of the newsletter, please click here.

As we prepare for our upcoming conference in Beijing this October, we are pleased to announce that we have finalized an event space! We also already have approximately 19 NGOs that have confirmed their attendance.

Our primary event will take place on October 15th and will involve various small groups that will have discussions facilitated by key members of our staff. These discussions will help answer questions NGOs have about our program and introduce them to our services, with the goal of increasing the number NGO applicants to become strategic partners of our program. Once they have been accepted as partners, they will be able to enjoy access to all of our free services, from our financial accounting and transparency training, to our SMS and online technology platforms, expert advice hotline and consulting. Perhaps most importantly for their organizations, they will enjoy fundraising benefits through our donations platforms like the one mentioned in last week's blog.

We are continuing to finalize the schedule and guest list for the event, but now that we have a space, we can finally work more concretely on some of those pieces. We look forward to sharing more updates with everyone soon! 

We are so excited to finally show some of the results of our partnership with The School Fund! Now you can see and sponsor children from some of our major programs directly online through The School Fund's platform! Although The School Fund was known for its work in Africa previously, our partnership has allowed them to extend their reach to East Asia, beginning with China.

We have started with 6 of our children on their site and are beyond thrilled to see that two of them have already been fully funded. However, we still have four children in need, who could really use your help to pay for school supplies, tuition and uniforms. Read about Lina, Fangdi, Zhongshe and Congxia here, then donate and spread the word! Even if you've already funded a child, check back periodically as we'll be updating the site with new children and new stories regularly.

We have a lot going on but nothing official to report this week. Instead, we'd like to take this weekly post to introduce one of our partner programs, Rural China Education Foundation (RCEF). Their goals are simple:

1. To help rural Chinese students to achieve reading, writing, and math standards for their grade-level.
2. To improve Chinese students' collaboration and communication skills.
3. To raise Chinese students' awareness of issues in their surrounding environment.

RCEF's program is delivered through two subjects which are part of the government-mandated curriculum: Integrated Practice class and Reading class. Both are non-tested subjects and as relatively new introductions to the elementary school curriculum in China, they do not have set textbooks or teaching methods. Thus, they afford the opportunity for educational innovators to develop a curriculum design framework that teachers can use to tailor the content of these subjects to their local situations.

Program staff train and supports teachers in two rural elementary schools in Yongji, Shanxi Province to design, implement, and document teaching for these two subjects. The purpose of this model is to produce replicable frameworks that can be used to train and support more rural educators in China to successfully deliver this kind of curriculum in the future.

Some formerly trusted organizations such as Greg Mortenson's Central Asia Institute have recently come under scrutiny. However, the Chao Foundation's partners conform to rigorous reporting standards, which we enforce personally. For example, you can see last year's annual report here. To learn more about RCEF, please visit their website. To donate, simply contact us at [email protected], or donate online.

The Chao Foundation is highly dedicated to promoting a spirit of philanthropy among the next generation of Asians. However, it is equally committed to this goal at home. It was for this reason that East Villagers was launched several years ago. East Villagers lets users share their projects and support others in an online community dedicated to information exchange between Asia-related nonprofits. Now, East Villagers has just started recruiting its Service Scholars for the 2011-2012 school year. If you or someone you know is interested in a paid opportunity with benefits ranging from learning about careers in the social sector to raising awareness for global issues, gaining leadership experience, and directing projects, please apply! You can learn more about the program and its opportunities through our new Service Scholars website. Or, just email us at [email protected]. We'd welcome hearing from you!