2018年CRI BN Vocational School's fundraising gala held in Beijing

 

The BN vocational school is a chain institution that has a reputation for helping¹ educate children from poor backgrounds. In China, it is the first tuition-free, non-profit charitable vocational school for senior secondary level education in China. 

Since its establishment, this brand of schools has established campuses in various cities across the country. Recently they held a special fundraising gala staged in Beijing, with participants coming from China and Africa.

CRI's Shen Ting has more.

Sixteen-year-old Zeng Xingping (曾幸平) joined the BN Vocational School in late 2017.

"When I first entered this school, everything felt new that I even became afraid of this new environment. I immediately started feeling homesick. I even attempted to drop out of school. But after getting to know some of my teachers and other classmates, I gradually felt more and more comfortable."

Like many of his peers, Zeng is from a poor family that lives in a small village in Weiyuan County of Gansu Province. His father is unable to support the family due to severe cirrhosis of liver- a condition he has had for a long time. Even though the local county government subsidizes his father's medical bills; it's still not enough to help pull his family out of poverty. And just like his favourite quote "Knowledge can change fate", Zeng understands that it's through education that he can help change his family's lifestyle. Thanks to BN school, he is able to get just that; a good education.

Today，Zeng and his classmates are performing at the schools gala in Beijing. 

Huangfu Jing (皇甫静), principal of the Zhengzhou BN vocational school, is thrilled by the progress of the kids.

"We have a teacher and 19 students who will perform at this evening gala. They will be performing and dancing to the song 'Searching for Plum Blossoms in Snow'. Looking back in August when these students first entered our school，there are big changes in their personality. They even look different from what they looked like upon their arrival. They have become more open-minded, self-confident and are a lot more active."

Joyce Xu Juan is a member of the BN Vocational School Council. She often helps the school organize a number of fundraising activities like this one-by mobilizing resources in the art and culture industry to support the school's development programs.

"We've employed professional teachers to guide in their shows tonight. In fact, we attach importance to rebuilding these children's personalities² through the arts. In their school, there are choir³ and reading clubs, where they can go and do their favorite activities."

Since the first BN Vocational School was launched in 2005 in Beijing, a chain of schools in the same management format⁴ with the same guiding principle have been set up in several other Chinese cities.

The Zhengzhou BN vocational school is among the many founded in 2010.

Huangfu Jing says that her school aims at providing students from poverty-stricken families with pre-employment trainings to ensure that they become highly skilled at various jobs.

Currently the Zhengzhou school, which has a total of 85 students, is more focused on yielding kindergarten teachers and electricians.

"The enrollment⁵ mainly targets 16 to 18-year-old junior school graduates. Their academic performance and learning ability is very weak. Due to the impact of poverty on educational outcomes for these children, they feel inferior, ashamed and so they turn out to be mostly introverted. My school intends to gradually bring a little sunshine into their hearts and make them more open-minded."

As a student, Zeng is concentrating on acquiring a skill in cooking halal based recipes. He acknowledges that being at his school is a lot more than learning technical skills. He talks about his performance today.

"I'm thankful for being given such a valuable opportunity to be on the stage. My parents are very proud of me. During the rehearsals⁶, I took some pictures and sent to them. My mom used to be fond of square dance. I think I'm realizing her dream. Unfortunately my parents will never have an opportunity like this."

On stage, Zeng Xingping danced in a fun, interesting, and creative way alongside his schoolmates. There were also guest performers in this dance: they are from Angola.

Diao Wen, also a member of the BN Vocational School Council, details on these special guests.

"The Angolan students would give a dance show, named "Cleaning". They come from the BN Vocational School in Angola. It offers lessons on masonry⁷, electrical wiring of buildings and machinery⁸ operation and also services, in a hope that local students would obtain their ideal job upon graduation. In addition to the Angolan schoolmaster, the school also hires local Angolan teachers. The Angolan replica⁹ has adapted our principle and approaches in school management."

The BN Vocational School in Angola was set up in 2014 with the help of the CITIC Construction Company.

The Chinese construction company is willing to help more than just invest in the local infrastructure¹⁰. That's how the first overseas BN vocational school was established.

Diao Wen thinks, though arranging their students to perform at the gala is an unprecedented¹¹ experience in the school's history, it's the best way to make donors¹² understand how the underprivileged youth are helped to improve their lifestyle.

"Our donors who attended this evening gala were pleasantly surprised to see positive changes in these students who initially¹³ were struggling at the bottom of society and living in poverty. But today, seeing that they can perform on a professional theatre stage like this, as well as their progress in their English language ability, the donors can get direct feedback to evaluate how their donations have been helpful for the youngsters."

Wang Jiajun (王佳俊) is a chef now working in a five-star hotel in Dalian, a city in northeast China. Wang has lived on the donations from all sides of the society since his father died when he was just eight.

In 2014, Wang Jiajun graduated from the BN Vocational School in Dalian. He was granted an honorary title for the best-performed vocational school student in 2015 by China's Ministry¹⁴ of Education. He talks about his relationship with the school after his graduation.

"At school, I could clearly feel the concern of warm-hearted donors. The school made me feels at home. I hold clear the help I received from my teachers, who were all very careful to impart knowledge to each student. Upon my graduation, I donated all my salary as an intern¹⁵ in the first month to my mother school. What this school gave me is a lot more than what I could ever repay."

According to Xu Juan, Wang Jiajun is just but one of the many success stories that the school has produced. There are also others with similar stories that attended the gala.

"Alongside the gala, they have a schoolmates' party, having invited the very first group of graduates who left school a dozen years ago. Some of them have grown up into senior managers at their companies. I even heard that there is a girl who became a business partner of a famous accounting¹⁶ firm. It's beyond anyone's imagination that a vocational school changed the destiny of these students and even their families."

The BN Vocational School is subsidized by the Project Hope of the China Youth Development Foundation and the Project Hope's Vocational Education Fund. It has campuses located in a total of nine Chinese cities, namely Beijing, Chengdu, Dalian, Sanya, Wuhan, Yinchuan, Zhengzhou, Lijiang and Meizhou.

The school is leading the way in poverty alleviation¹⁷ efforts in China.

Through schools like this one- education is helping raise the life of underprivileged and boosting their creativity levels. Therefore the school's administration hopes that they can make a difference in many other people's lives.

For CRI, I'm Shen Ting.

1 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

2 personalities   

n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• There seemed to be a degree of personalities in her remarks.她话里有些人身攻击的成分。
• Personalities are not in good taste in general conversation.在一般的谈话中诽谤他人是不高尚的。

3 choir   

n.唱诗班，唱诗班的席位，合唱团，舞蹈团；v.合唱

参考例句：

• The choir sang the words out with great vigor.合唱团以极大的热情唱出了歌词。
• The church choir is singing tonight.今晚教堂歌唱队要唱诗。

4 format   

n.设计，版式；[计算机]格式，DOS命令:格式化(磁盘)，用于空盘或使用过的磁盘建立新空盘来存储数据；v.使格式化，设计，安排

参考例句：

• Please format this floppy disc.请将这张软盘格式化。
• The format of the figure is very tasteful.该图表的格式很雅致。

5 enrollment   

n.注册或登记的人数；登记

参考例句：

• You will be given a reading list at enrollment.注册时你会收到一份阅读书目。
• I just got the enrollment notice from Fudan University.我刚刚接到复旦大学的入学通知书。

6 rehearsals   

n.练习( rehearsal的名词复数 )；排练；复述；重复

参考例句：

• The earlier protests had just been dress rehearsals for full-scale revolution. 早期的抗议仅仅是大革命开始前的预演。
• She worked like a demon all through rehearsals. 她每次排演时始终精力过人。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 masonry   

n.砖土建筑；砖石

参考例句：

• Masonry is a careful skill.砖石工艺是一种精心的技艺。
• The masonry of the old building began to crumble.旧楼房的砖石结构开始崩落。

8 machinery   

n.(总称)机械，机器；机构

参考例句：

• Has the machinery been put up ready for the broadcast?广播器材安装完毕了吗？
• Machinery ought to be well maintained all the time.机器应该随时注意维护。

9 replica   

n.复制品

参考例句：

• The original conservatory has been rebuilt in replica.温室已按原样重建。
• The young artist made a replica of the famous painting.这位年轻的画家临摹了这幅著名的作品。

10 infrastructure   

n.下部构造，下部组织，基础结构，基础设施

参考例句：

• We should step up the development of infrastructure for research.加强科学基础设施建设。
• We should strengthen cultural infrastructure and boost various types of popular culture.加强文化基础设施建设，发展各类群众文化。

11 unprecedented   

adj.无前例的，新奇的

参考例句：

• The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
• A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。

12 donors   

n.捐赠者( donor的名词复数 )；献血者；捐血者；器官捐献者

参考例句：

• Please email us to be removed from our active list of blood donors. 假如你想把自己的名字从献血联系人名单中删去，请给我们发电子邮件。
• About half this amount comes from individual donors and bequests. 这笔钱大约有一半来自个人捐赠及遗赠。 来自《简明英汉词典》

13 initially   

adv.最初，开始

参考例句：

• The ban was initially opposed by the US.这一禁令首先遭到美国的反对。
• Feathers initially developed from insect scales.羽毛最初由昆虫的翅瓣演化而来。

14 ministry   

n.(政府的)部；牧师

参考例句：

• They sent a deputation to the ministry to complain.他们派了一个代表团到部里投诉。
• We probed the Air Ministry statements.我们调查了空军部的记录。

15 intern   

v.拘禁，软禁；n.实习生

参考例句：

• I worked as an intern in that firm last summer.去年夏天我在那家商行实习。
• The intern bandaged the cut as the nurse looked on.这位实习生在护士的照看下给病人包扎伤口。

16 accounting   

n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表

参考例句：

• A job fell vacant in the accounting department.财会部出现了一个空缺。
• There's an accounting error in this entry.这笔账目里有差错。

17 alleviation   

n. 减轻，缓和，解痛物

参考例句：

• These were the circumstances and the hopes which gradually brought alleviation to Sir Thomas's pain. 这些情况及其希望逐渐缓解了托马斯爵士的痛苦。
• The cost reduction achieved in this way will benefit patients and the society in burden alleviation. 集中招标采购降低的采购成本要让利于患者，减轻社会负担。 来自英汉 - 翻译样例 - 口语