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| Photo courtesy Dr. Frederick Crook |
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The children attending the Da Zhuang He Primary School in the Shaanxi province of China pose for a picture outside their school in the spring of 2004 along with their teachers and Dr. Frederick Crook.
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The Da Zhuang He village in China’s Shaanxi province is finally seeing a rise in the education of its children, and students from BYU-Idaho are taking part.
The likelihood of rural Chinese children, especially girls, attending school is very low.
Dr. Frederick W. Crook, U.S. agricultural economist for China and former mission president for the Taiwan Taipei Mission, has created the China Rural Education Fund. CREF provides a means of supporting education in rural China.
BYU-I students, like Katie Lloyd, a sophomore from Menan, Idaho, feel the importance of offering education to rural Chinese children. “I think as members of the Church, we have a responsibility to help educate these children. They are the future of the work in China. I like to think of it as pre-missionary missionary work,” Lloyd said.
CREF helps poor rural families by sending their children to school.
In rural areas of China, many children are not able to attend school because of the high cost: $40 per year.This may not seem like much, but compared to the average income of a rural Chinese family, $125 per year, it is a hefty sum.
“At present, the most effective way to support the students in rural China is to donate $40 per student,” Dr. Crook said.
CREF has concentrated its efforts in the small village of Da Zhuang He in Gan Quan County of Shaanxi province. There the monetary system consists of trading fruits, vegetables and livestock as opposed to paper money. But in order to send a child to school, families must pay in cash.
This remote area, like much of rural China, receives little government funding for education and most families can’t afford the school fees.
Dr. Crook has developed a Web site, www.thecref.org, to inform people of the CREF mission. BYU-I students are becoming more and more involved in that mission.
Lloyd has given her time in helping the CREF Web site become more functional for future users.
“The CREF Web site will help the process of donating become easier,” Lloyd said. “It will become more efficient and direct.”
Randy Beard, senior server administrator in the Information Technology Department at BYU-I, is also using his expertise to develop the CREF Web site.
“I like CREF because it gives me the opportunity to help educate Chinese children that can’t attend school due to poverty. Hopefully these children will become educated and be the future leaders of their nation,” Beard said.
The Web site also pictures children who have benefited from the CREF program.
“I reap the benefits from the efforts donors make by seeing the new sparkle in the eyes of these beautiful children … there is hope, a chance to learn to read and an opportunity to participate in school activities,” Dr. Crook said.
Donations to CREF are tax-deductible and can be sent to The CREF, C/O John Yoder, 10556 Assembly Drive, Fairfax, VA 22030 or can be donated online at www.thecref.org.
