FCC Orphanage Assistance Report, November
2005
To Raise the
Morning Sun
FCC Brightens
Lives in China’s Orphanages
In China it is often said, ‘Children are just like the morning sun,
rising up from the earth.’ But children
in an orphanage, especially those who are ill or have special needs, are as a
sun that cannot give out its light. The
Amity Grandmas, sponsored by FCC, are working hard to restore these children to
health and give them a sense of wellbeing so that they can give out their
light.
These words are from Amity’s August 2005
report to FCC on the Grandmas Projects we sponsor. The reports had more to
say:
A little girl growing up in a Zhejiang
province orphanage suffered from cerebral palsy. Mei Lin was
listless and had no reaction to anything. Amity Grandma, Zhou Xian, approached
her and began communicating with her every day. Grandma Zhou stimulated little Mei Lin with rehabilitation exercises and sang songs for
her. Gradually Mei
Lin could stand, and when Zhou Xian called her name, Mei
Lin would turn around to look for her special “Grandma” and smile. Now, Mei Lin is
learning to walk with confidence.
In another orphanage in Anhui province a
little boy named Wei Han could not walk or understand
what others said. The other children thought him strange because he could not
communicate with them and he often behaved in inappropriate ways. Two Amity Grandmas, Wen
Suhua and Wang Ju persisted
in communicating with Wei Han, taught him to play
with toys, and helped him learn to walk. After less than six months of training
and stimulation – and loving care – Wei Han can now
walk on his own, understand others, and play with other children.
Most of the Amity Grandmas have said that,
for them, to give is happier than to receive.
They are so pleased when the children they care for are doing well.
Wherever There is One Heart, There is Hope
From
Amity’s Semi-Annual Nursing Team Report, August 2005:
Usually children growing up in the orphanages, especially if they are
disabled, have difficulty expressing their feelings and their needs. They feel helpless and find it hard to trust
others. Often they withdraw and become
unsociable. Yet they want someone to understand them. They do not like their solitude or loneliness
but they need others to come into their hearts first. Take the child Han Xu. He suffered from congenital heart disease and his
growth was delayed. He was easily
frustrated. He could not sleep well and seemed to have no desire to play with
other children. A member of the intensive care nursing team sponsored by FCC,
Zhao Hua, perceived his problem and tried her best to
open him to others. While caring for
him, she encouraged him to play with other children. She taught him to laugh
and to overcome many of his difficulties. In talking about her work, Zhao Hua said, “I know how important love is for these
children. For them, love is the sun.”
Amity Grandmas and Nursing Teams in 2005
More Powerful
Influences, More Powerful Changes
Amity Grandmas and Intensive Care Nursing
Teams sponsored by FCC are making a real difference in the lives of hundreds of
children in China’s orphanages. The
Grandmas, retired women often with backgrounds as medical personnel or
educators, and the Nurses we sponsor provide nurturing care and medical
intervention for children in nineteen orphanages. The 101 Grandmas and 28 nurses FCC sponsors
care for infants, toddlers and special needs children. They provide necessary follow-up care for
children who have had surgery. They give
children with cleft lip and palate conditions the special feeding and
post-operative care they need. Intensive care nursing saves the lives and
improves the health of newly arrived babies and infants at risk. The many
children with orthopedic impairments receive stimulation and exercises that
enable greater strength and development. The Grandmas sing songs to the
children, play with them and read to them. Providing this level of care for
each child is generally impossible for the orphanage staff who
are responsible for so many children.
Most of all, the Amity Grandmas and nurses
give the children love. This is clearly
evident in the stories they tell in the semi-annual reports we receive from
Amity each year (such as the ones from which we have excerpted, above). The
loving care the children receive was obvious, too, to the FCC parents and Board
members who made site visits to FCC sponsored Amity projects this past year.
Witnessing FCC Funds at Work in Orphanages
FCC Members
and Parents Make Site Visits and Report
This past year FCC conducted site visits of
projects we sponsor in a number of different orphanages. FCC members working
closely with our Orphanage Assistance Program were accompanied by Wu An An, Amity’s Social Welfare
Division director and several of her staff. Jesse Combs, working hard to raise
money for the Hengyang orphanage, visited with his
family to see the children sponsored for schooling. An outgrowth of that visit is the new foster
care program established there this year.
FCC Board member Tim Stoenner, Priscilla Lincoln, a nurse with special
interest in early childhood intervention, and Anna Schmitz visited the
orphanage in Wuhan. They observed the nurses and
Grandmas at work, and had the opportunity to visit children in their foster
families and to meet children we sponsor for schooling. In June, Karen Jani
made a repeat site visit to Zhuzhou and reported on
programs there. The reports and
commentaries from these visits confirm the value and effectiveness of our
programs.
Keeping Our Promise
What FCC Orphanage
Assistance Funds Accomplished in 2005
Thanks to another successful Annual Appeal,
the FCC National Appeal, and other fundraising efforts, both large and small,
throughout the year, FCC Orphanage Assistance was able to sustain its support
for the many projects we sponsor in China’s orphanages, and expand or begin
several new projects, keeping our promise not to forget the children growing up
in China’s orphanages.
As of October 1, we had raised and
distributed to China $231,825 to support the projects we sponsor in 30
orphanages in partnership with the Amity Foundation. Close to half of that – $115,000 – goes
toward a very successful foster care program that has grown over the years to
include more than 300 children from 18 orphanages who were able to leave the
confines of the orphanage to experience the loving care of foster
families. This year new foster care
programs were begun in Hengyang, Changsha,
and Pingnan, and the programs in Suzhou
and Nantong were expanded.
One third of the funds we raised and
distributed – $76,000 – go to support the wonderful care provided by the nurses
and Grandmas. Another 17 percent,
$39,000 this year, pays the annual school fees for close to 400 children to
attend schools in the community expanding their worlds and opening new
horizons. Some of the older children who
have been sponsored by FCC over the years are attending college, nursing and
vocational schools.
In addition to the Annual Appeal and the FCC
National Appeal, funds for these programs were contributed by the further
efforts of FCC regional groups and chapters throughout the country and by
friends who chose to hold their own fundraising events and make appeals on our
behalf. FCC children participated in the
second annual FCC Kids Read-a-thon raising money for the fall school fees. FCC families requested gifts to FCC in lieu
of donations for birthday parties. Families sent in christening, naming day,
welcome home, and adoption anniversary gifts. Memorial gifts were received in
memory of members of the extended FCC community. We are especially grateful to the AXA
Foundation for a generous $10,000 grant in memory of its president, our dear
friend Kate (Kay) Carlson, and for a number of AXA Matching Gifts for donations
in her memory.
Looking Ahead to 2006
For the past
ten years, FCC families and friends have been offering hope to children living
in Chinese orphanages. Let us continue to build on this program of love and
assistance.
Many of the babies and children who have
benefited from the programs FCC sponsors have found their way to loving
families. Some have come home to permanent homes in the United States and
elsewhere. Still others have been
adopted in China or will continue to live with caring foster families. But,
many never will. Their only hope is that the care they receive while growing up
in the orphanage will be nurturing enough to allow them to thrive. With
dedicated caregivers like the Amity Grandmas and nurses, the opportunity to go
to school, and our continued support, that hope may be realized.
FCC Orphanage Assistance will soon be
launching its 10th Annual Appeal in support of children in China’s
orphanages. Through this appeal we hope to both maintain and build upon the
programs and services we’ve developed over the past ten years. Our programs
have been successful so far because of the wonderful generosity of the FCC
community. We trust your support will
continue and grow so that many more children in need will have hope.
To make a
contribution to FCC Orphanage Assistance Programs, send your check to:
FCC Orphanage
Assistance, P.O. Box 237065 Ansonia Station, NY NY
10023.
Donations can
also be made by credit card at our secure website: www.fccny.org
What Our Site Visits Have to Tell Us
There were
infants who were quite ill and some who were dying when they were brought to
the orphanage. The nurses took turns
looking after the sick infants, day and night, saving their lives.
— Amity’s Semi-Annual Nursing Team Report, August 2005
On our visit
we saw newborn twins in incubators being cared for by our nurses. The director told us that without the
intensive and special nursing care they received from our nursing team these
premature infants might not have survived because of the severity of their
condition when they were brought to the orphanage.
—
Wuhan Site visit report, Wu An
An and FCC parent Anna Schmitz, April 2005
The Grandmas
in Zhuzhou have really made a difference. Children who were barely functioning when I
visited before [in 2002] were singing, dancing, having
a great time. The Grandmas have set up a
clean bright play area with lots of toys for the children
— Karen Jani,
FCC member from Nazareth, PA, site visit to Zhuzhou,
June 2005
Wu An An [of the Amity Foundation] is an enormously talented
social worker who has established trusting relationships with the orphanage
administrators at the Children’s Welfare Institute and has a solid
understanding of the needs of the children. She also understands the importance
of supporting the caregivers of the children – whether they be
nurses and grandmas in the orphanage or the foster parents in the
community. It is these caregivers that
ensure the type of individualized care that is so critical to very young
children.
— Priscilla Lincoln, FCC
parent with a doctorate in nursing and specializing
in infant mental health and early intervention, site visit to Wuhan, June 2005
