wfn.org | Church program helps dropouts find hope and go to college

["Taiwan Church News" <enews@pctpress.org>]

>      Taiwan Church News

>3045 Edition

>July 5~July 11, 2010

Church program helps dropouts find hope and go to college

>Reported by Chen Wei-chien

>Written by Lydia Ma

Chu-Tang Presbyterian Church’s Sunflower Education Program  held its 8th 
convocation on

June 30, 2010. It included a lot of choral and instrumental  performances and 
skits that warmed

the hearts of parents and guests because each performance was a  testimony of 
the

>transformation in these youth’s lives.

Several local officials and school principals attended this  ceremony, gave 
words of

encouragement, and handed out prizes and diplomas to graduating  students. 
Changhua

District Judge Chien Yan-tzu was invited to hand out scholarships  to 
outstanding students.

Sunflower Education Program is run by Chu-Tang Presbyterian Church  with a 
vision to help

dropout students resume their studies. To this end, the program  offers many 
individualized

courses and counseling services catered to every student’s  particular 
circumstance and need.

Chu-Tang Church began this program in 2003 and has so far admitted  130 
students living in

Changhua area in the past few years, with 51 of them staying long  enough to 
graduate from

the program. Of those graduating students, 51% go on to find  employment and 
49% move on

>to pursue further studies at regular schools.

There are currently 18 students in the program and most of them  are either 
raised by single

parents or grandparents. Five students are graduating from the  school this 
year and they’ve all

been accepted to a college after scoring well enough in entrance  exams.

According to Chu-Tang Presbyterian Church’s pastor, Rev.  Chuang Hsiao-shen, 
these teens

are smart and it shouldn’t be too hard for them to score well  enough in 
entrance examinations

>and be accepted to a school.

Chuang believes what his church needs to do is simply encourage  these youth to 
persevere

and help them secure food and lodging once they enter college  because so many 
of them

come from broken families that cannot support them.

He added that not every church is called to start a program for  school 
dropouts, but he

encouraged every church to consider starting afterschool programs  that’d 
combine “One-

leads-One movement” and tutoring to help struggling kids in  the community and 
get them to

church. To this end, young Christians can be trained to reach out  to 
classmates from troubled or poor families.

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