The Review 2015

39 Seeding the Future – Impact ‘ Glocal’ Solution in Vietnam A cross-discipl inary project in Vietnam has not only provided much-needed help to a local community, but a valuable learning experience for Social Sciences and Engineering students. The Glocal Solutions project was a joint eight-week programme initiated by both faculties to construct a sanitation facility at a secondary school in rural Vietnam and conduct a needs analysis of two local communes on the topics of malnutrition among children under five, child injury prevention, water sanitation and early childhood development. The students worked under the local project management office of World Vision Vietnam. Ms Jessie Chow of the Faculty of Social Sciences, who oversaw the project with Dr Ryan Wong in the Department of Civil Engineering, outlined the benefits to the local community. “The construction directly improved the sanitary situation of the local secondary school, and the healthy water and sanitation habits and behaviour improved the quality of life of the local students. The needs analysis provided World Vision Vietnam with information for launching new projects and gaining funding for new initiatives,” she said. The benefits also ran deep for the HKU students, who worked in teams of four with a translator and had to figure out how to communicate across cultures and deal with constraints such as lack of electricity. Kenji Ho Chun-yin, a Year 4 Bachelor of Social Sciences student, and Marcus Yang Zi-yuan, a Year 3 Bachelor of Engineering student, said they were taken aback by the low safety awareness among construction workers and the primitive state of the school’s sanitation facility when they arrived. But what had the biggest impact on them was the realisation that while they were there to help the local people, they could not do so without the local people’s help. “Our experiences helped to diminish our egos. Before departure we thought we were going to help people, but when we arrived, we discovered the story was completely the opposite. Most of the time they had to take care of us because of the many communication barriers and cultural differences. It showed us the truth about doing developmental work,” Kenji said. Added Marcus: “We are students from a world-famous university. However, without the help from local people, we could achieve nothing with our service project.” Domestic Workers Get Many Helping Hands Hong Kong has more than 300,000 foreign domestic workers, who are not eligible for permanent residency and face a host of legal, workplace, social and other issues related to their situation. HKU academics and students across several faculties have been actively trying to improve their circumstances through several initiatives launched in 2014–15: • The Domestic Workers’ Roundtable, organised by the Centre for Comparative and Public Law and the Hong Kong Public Interest Law and Advocacy Society in April 2015, brought together multiple stakeholder groups to discuss critical issues affecting domestic workers. Participants included representatives from the workers’ countries of origin, NGOs, groups representing domestic workers, employers and labour rights, academics, law firms, and the private sector. Their sessions were wide-ranging, covering such topics as financial abuse by placement agencies, access to justice and legal enforcement in Hong Kong. The longer-term aim is to establish multi-sector and inter-departmental and inter-governmental working groups to enhance the protection of domestic workers. • The year- long Domest ic Workers Empowerment Project organised by the Centre of Development and Resources for Students involved students in advocating and promoting cultural understanding, inclusion and respect for domestic workers, and equipped students with new knowledge and skills. Sixteen events were organised for more than 5,500 domestic workers, involving more than 100 students. The project culminated in a concert in June that was attended by more than 800 people, including HKU students, alumni, domestic workers, employers, staff, consular representatives and other interested groups. • The social enterprise, Fair Employment Agency, was co-founded by Mr David Bishop of the School of Business to help domestic workers find employment without having to pay the high fees charged to them by agencies. Business students have also been closely involved in setting up and running the enterprise, providing important learning opportunities for them. • The Faculty of Dentistry carried out a three-year knowledge exchange project to improve dental health among the 140,000 or so Indonesian domestic helpers, with encouragement from the Indonesian Consul-General. The helpers have been shown how to care not only for their own oral health, but also that of the children and elderly people they often care for. • The Faculty of Medicine’s Emergency Medicine Unit (EMU) organised several activities during the year for domestic helpers, including a book in English and Tagalog on handling acute medical conditions at home and a hands-on session with Year 4 medical students on CPR and choking management skills. The EMU is also in contact with the government about developing a scheme to equip domestic workers with emergency management skills – which could make the difference between life and death for their charges. The Review 2015