【Shine】University students step into the breach to help medics' kids

    Subtitles byWang Xinzhou and Andy Boreham.

    East ChinaUniversity of Science and Technology are tutoring children of families affectedby the coronavirus outbreak.

    Students ofShanghai universities are helping with the studies of children in familiesaffected by the coronavirus, such as those of doctors and community workers.

    At East ChinaUniversity of Science and Technology, a program called “Huali Dream” hasgathered more than 500 student volunteers to provide more than 3,000 hours ofhelp for 1,000 kids around the country.     They provided tutorship on coresubjects including math and English, and also special courses, such as computerprogramming, singing and painting.

    According to theuniversity, 83 percent of the students have prior volunteering experience. Allreceived some training before beginning work. The university volunteerassociation surveyed the children to pair them up with suitable volunteers.

    Zhang Yiran, amajor in artistic design and media, has been tutoring second grader Gui Yushanfrom Yunnan Province. Gui loves singing with her dad, but he is on the frontline as a community volunteer. He signed up for the singing class for hisdaughter to make up for his absence during the special time.

    Zhu Weiyi, amajor in information science, teaches programming. He begins with games andexplains the programming behind them, helping students to design games bythemselves.

    The universityeven found a student taking classes with an IP address in the US. A motheridentified as Kate is a Chinese-American and her first-grader son's school isclosed. She found out about the program on WeChat and registered her son for amath class and a painting class.

    The mother ofWang Yushuai and Wang Yuxuan works in a hospital. Now He Feifan from theuniversity is their PE teacher and monitor having them do exercises at home. Healso told the boys that their mother is doing a great, meaningful job and toldthem do housework for her.

    Li Qiang, fromthe university’s business school, was admitted into the university via aprogram for rural students. He and other schoolmates in the program have teamedup with a primary school in Xundian County of Yunnan Province.

    At East ChinaNormal University, 328 future teachers have been tutoring more than 290students in Shanghai for 7,000 hours since February 18.

    Tang Jialu, oneof the volunteers, said: "As a future teacher, I felt greatly honored tobe able to help those on the front line."

    "Thank youso much for joining our medical staff in fighting the epidemic by giving us generoussupport and care," Ruijin Hospital wrote in a letter to thank theuniversity.

    At FudanUniversity, a team of 300 volunteers is helping children of medical staffworking in Shanghai and Hubei Province. Among them, 161 are medical students.They are divided into two groups, one for preschool PE education and anotherhelping with homework for primary and secondary school students.

    “I saw a childon TV, who is about 4 or 5 years old, calling 'daddy' when he saw his father onTV,” said Liu Shuyi from Fudan’s school of social development and publicpolicies. “It touched me. So when I discovered our university has a program tohelp these kids, I signed it up immediately.”

    “I’m grateful toAn Ran from Fudan for teaching my child,” said the wife of a doctor. “She isloving and faithful and I believe she will be a good doctor in the future.”

    An, a major inclinical medicine, said: “I was nervous on the first day, but the family wasvery friendly and we picked up on the classes very quickly. I’m happy to beable to offer a little help to them.”