Reflecting on My Experience in a Charitable Organization: A Confession from a Social Worker with Humble Background.
Author Bio: Ah Shu, a charity worker with many years of expertise in rural education. She is dedicated to support community education practices and family mutual aid collaboration for migrant female workers.
I’ve worked in rural education for many years and later transitioned from the educational system to serve in a charitable (Gongyi) organization. I’ve observed and reflected upon both the educational and non-profit systems extensively. I’ve always wondered: Why can’t those who claim to be working on top-level strategies within these systems truly understand the grassroots workers and the realities they face? With a belief in ‘mutual visibility across layers’, in 2022, I collaborated with the artist Jing and volunteers from various backgrounds to initiate a pilot educational base in Guangzhou’s urban villages, targeting migrant worker families. What follows are the blind spots I’ve observed in Chinese non-profit organizations’ approach to educational work, based on my practical experience at the non-profit institution under the name ‘S’.
Structural Issues in Chinese Charitable Organizations
At a training session for the K community project, I met N. The S Foundation I was working for at the time supported this community initiative.
N was held in high regard by the board of directors, having participated in numerous training sessions and organized many charity events. This was my basic understanding of N.
On the day of the event, I arrived on time. Walking into the activity room, I found it spacious. Boxes of snacks were stacked inside, and on the table lay several forms titled, “G Community ‘Together with LEGO: Imaginative Parent-Child Creation’ Sign-in Sheet.” Beside it, there was a list of nine types of snacks and a collection form for a LEGO toy. Stacks of unopened white plastic boxes were placed against the wall. On the right wall, there were two large promotional sections. Their headlines read: “Party Leadership in Social Work” and “Organization Leadership, Thought Leadership, Service Leadership.”
N and her partner T entered. While I was exchanging greetings with them, a teenage boy and girl entered silently and sat down. T informed me that the boy was her eldest son and the girl was another middle school student.
Although the activity was initially scheduled to start at nine o’clock, it wasn’t until half-past nine that eight parents, accompanying over a dozen children, trickled into the activity room. The parents’ ages varied, ranging from young adults to the elderly. The male student wore a yellow vest with the word “volunteer” printed on it, while the female student began taking photos with her phone. That’s when I realized that these two students were there as volunteers.
As the activity began, N divided the eight families into two groups. She then initiated a competition between the groups: a child and a parent from each family would stand side by side, placing a LEGO block on their adjacent arms. The duo would then walk forward quickly...
“What’s your intention? Are you dissatisfied with me? What’s the meaning behind all the questions you asked during the event?”
...N, T, and the two student volunteers distributed the white plastic boxes... The sound of LEGO pieces cascading onto the white tables filled the room.
I stood up and began inquiring from each parent: ‘Are both of your child’s parents in Guangzhou? What work do you do? How many times have you brought your child to participate in activities like this?’
Out of the eight families, parents from seven of the families had at least one member working as a public servant...
As the event neared its conclusion, N organized everyone for a group photo... I asked the two departing middle school students to join us for the discussion.
“Is this what we mean by promoting educational equality? Are these the seeds for building a civic society?”
After realizing I couldn’t make headway within the educational group, I wrote a letter to the head of the foundation:
Why Critical Thinking Matters
As the S Foundation, which positions itself as a hub of public welfare in the Pearl River Delta region...
Why should we base general education courses on critical thinking? Those served by public welfare are vulnerable groups...
Critical thinking, as a basic yet ordinary tool, teaches people to differentiate between facts and opinions, to instinctively reason...
Leaving Signifies a New Beginning
Four months later, I parted ways with the S Foundation. Their community education group continued its projects without me, and I was branded...
What’s even more concerning is that this gap is filled with a kind of lyrical, dreamlike language and emotional pattern...
In our new project, we’ve completely abandoned the mainstream approach of categorizing people by age, education, economic status, and so on...
“Only by fostering free connections between independent individuals can we break free from the maddening, intelligence-stifling cages of the present.”