By Zach Johnson | Director of Development
Summer Months
With school being on holiday during the summer months, the Bethel team conducts most of our domestic and international trainings in this period. Our goal is to directly teach both parents and caregivers of children with blind and visual impairments so they can not only have a direct impact on their own children, but be a resource in their communities from the provinces where they live.
Bethel's Annual International Conference
Bethel hosted our annual international conference in July. Mary Anne Roberto, a specialist in Cortical Vision Impairments (CVI) presented for two days to over 100 teachers, parents and orphanage workers on how to identify VCI and best practices. She also visited our Beijing and Zhengzhou centers and did assessments on Bethel's CVI children.
Family Preservation Training
At the end of July, Bethel hosted a 10 day training for parents of blind and visually impaired babies in Beijing. Part of our family preservation program, the goal of this 10 day intensive training was to give parents the tools they need to help their children grow into fun loving, healthy and independent children, and then adults. 10 families attended.
Outreach Training
In August, Luo Wenyin, an expert in visual impairments from Taiwan, came to Bethel's center in Beijing and also did a training for parents on CVI. All of the families were families who attended the international conference and were grateful to have more resources for their children.
Bethel Children
We have two new children in our Beijing center! We've warmly welcomed Titus and Harper. Harper is 13 and we are urgently trying to find him a family before it becomes too late for him to be adopted. Through the last quarter we have had three adoptions. Grace Timmy and Parker! We'll have two more in October. With the new school year starting on September 2nd, Bethel accepted 17 scholarship students into our classes.
New Satellite Center
Bethel will be opening a new center in collaboration with the Jing De Zhen CWI in Jiang Xi province for teenagers. There will be 10 children in the program, with various special needs. The teachers start training in October.
Expanding Zheng Zhou Project
We are also adding a third classroom to our Zheng Zhou program for teenagers. There will be about 10 children in the new classroom. Renovations were completed in September and we are currently in the process of hiring additional teachers for the project. We are excited to provide educational opportunities for children who are transitioning into adult life.
From everyone at Bethel, thank you for your continued support. Thank you believing in our children. It is with your support that we are able to reach the lives of this amazing but vulnerable population.
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By Zach Johnson | Director of Development
By Zach Johnson | Director of Development
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