PolyU President Prof. Tong (in the middle) receives a souvenir from principals of affected schools
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) hosted a Forum on "School Recovery after the 512 Wenchuan earthquake" on 28 September on the university campus to deepen the understanding of the general public of the difficulties and challenges faced by principals and students of the quake-affected schools in Sichuan.
Jointly organized by Sichuan Post-disaster Reconstruction Support and Research Centre, PolyU's Department of Applied Social Sciences and The Mindset, a charitable institution in Hong Kong, the Forum was opened by Prof. Timothy W. Tong, PolyU President, and Prof. Angelina Yuen, PolyU Associate Vice President and Head of the Department of Applied Social Sciences.
During the Forum, principals of Wenchuan Yin-xiu Primary School, Wenchuan Shui-mo Secondary School, Mianzhu Han-wang Primary School and Mianzhu Xing-long Primary School shared the traumatic experience, and the timely and most-needed support they received in re-opening their schools in the temporary housing areas as well as in the new permanent campus. Students from the four schools opted to express their feelings and innermost emotions by singing songs to the audience.
PolyU is dedicated to providing support to the victims of the 512 earthquake in Sichuan. Shortly after the disaster, the University promptly launched a campus-wide fund-raising campaign and teamed up with a number of local professional bodies to support relief work in the quake-hit region. The subsequent establishment of the "Sichuan Post-disaster Reconstruction Support and Research Centre", which is jointly run by PolyU and Sichuan University, has pooled together inter-disciplinary expertise of the two universities to render support to Sichuan in the areas of rehabilitation and health services, psychological counselling, community re-building, construction and engineering technologies, and economic reconstruction.
The Department of Applied Social Sciences has actively devoted its service to quake-stricken students and parents after the 512 disaster. Their services include the establishment of Social Work Stations in the schools and temporary housing areas in view of providing community support and counselling services to those families which suffered from trauma and grief arising from loss of family members and physical injuries. The Department also organized a series of "Training-the-Trainers" programmes for the front-line relief workers. In addition, it has launched different projects to help local social workers and government officials to gain better understanding of the theories and practical knowledge, as well as skills to support post-disaster recovery initiatives. Two projects namely "Sichuan School Social Work Project" and "Wellness Enhancement Project" have been organized to provide further support to the students and children as well as medical practitioners in Sichuan.
