The Badi Foundation’s Beijing Representative Office successfully held a dialogue and exchange meeting on “Developing Moral Capabilities in Rural Junior Youth for Advancing Community Development ” on the afternoon of January 30, 2013 in Beijing. 26 representatives from 14 collaborating Community Based Organizations implementing Junior Youth Moral Empowerment through English program attended the seminar. Also participating were the founders of Badi Foundation, Mr. Bijian Farid and Mrs. Sheedvash Farid, and some of the foundation’s collaborators from the government, non-profit organizations, academic fields and charitable organizations to share ideas, experiences and learning on the subject of promoting capacity building for grass-roots social organizations and other related subjects. Read more.

Guangdong Zhuhai Rui En Junior Youth Empowering Development Center, which is in collaboration with Badi Foundation, has officially registered as a private non-enterprise unit at the Civil Affairs Bureau of Zhuhai City. The Center carries out Junior Youth Moral Empowerment and English Education Program in Zhuhai area, learning how to accompany junior youth in the process of developing life-long spiritual qualities and healthy ways of thinking and behaving. The success of this registration is attributed to the newly published “Articles on Further Development and Regulation of the Management of Social Organizations in Guangdong Province”, which states that starting July 1, 2012, the previous supervising unit of the operations of social organizations will be changed to guiding unit, and social organizations can apply to the Civil Affairs Bureau directly for registration without first going through supervising unit for approval and then apply to registration managing departments. Up to now, seven organizations supported by Badi Foundation have officially registered as private non-enterprise unit.

Badi Foundation senior program officer Zhou Peng was invited by China Association for NGO Cooperation to conduct a training on program monitoring and evaluation at Chengdu “I You She” Community Cultural Development Centre on November 5, 2012. About 20 staff members and volunteers from the Centre attended the training. At the training, the participants discussed specific methods and skills for evaluation, and also examined the significance of the conceptual framework from which the question of evaluation is approached, asking questions such as what our attitudes should be towards the potential of members of our community, how to help participants be actively involved in evaluation and how to make sure that spiritual principles such as respect, equality and unity are reflected in evaluation. As a grassroots community organization that aims to promote the city’s community development, the Centre has gained rich experience in the past 2 years. In the training, the participants gained a basic understanding of some concepts and principles mentioned above for monitoring and evaluation, and are eager to apply them in their work in the next three months.

Badi Foundation chief representative Shareen Ahmed Farhad and senior program officer Zhou Peng officially initiated the preliminary research and evaluation of an institutional capacity building program at The Maple Women’s Psychological Counseling Center Beijing on November 7, 2012. Badi Foundation Beijing Representative Office has been involved in promoting the establishment and development of grassroots social organizations since 2005. We have found some basic methods to help build institutional capacity and gained some experience through actions and reflections in the past 7 years. In 2012, at the recommendation of China Association for NGO Cooperation, we tried to carry out some trainings and educational activities at The Maple Women’s Psychological Counseling Center Beijing to help build its capacity. The Maple Women’s Psychological Counseling Center is one of the first non-profit organizations that aimed to promote the equality of women and women’s psychological health in China. At the stage of preliminary research and evaluation, we have consulted with 13 staff members from the organization, including chairman of board of directors, executive director and the founder of the organization, about their experience and challenges. For the next stage, we are going to work out a training plan for the next step according to the needs of The Maple Center and share with them the experience and methods we have gained.

At the sixth Sino-Euro Civil Society Dialogue Convention held in Beijing Normal University Jingshi Building on 26 September 2012, Ms. Shareen Ahmed Farhad, the Chief Representative of Badi Foundation Beijing Representative Office, was invited by China Association for NGO Cooperation to give a talk on “NGO Institutional Capacity Building in Terms of Generating Social Influence”. Ms. Farhad shared the experience Badi Foundation has gained implementing institutional capacity building programs in China for the past 15 years, elaborating on the 7-core-capabilities-centered institutional capacity building programs implemented by Badi Foundation and the difficulties NGOs often face, and emphasizing on the importance of balanced material and spiritual development in the process of promoting harmonious communities. About 20 NGOs attended the session, and they all expressed great interest in Badi Foundation’s experience of raising individual and institutional ability to promote balanced developments in communities through education. Most of the participants in this year’s convention are working in the field of environment protection who, after listening to the talk, hoped that there could be more opportunities like this for Badi Foundation to share more of their experience in institutional capacity building.

The staff members of Badi Foundation were invited by Dr. He Jianyu of Tsinghua University NGO Research Institute to exchange experience and learning on “The Development of Non-profit Organizations in China”. Dr. He is dedicated to the study of the relationship between state and society, and civil society and NPO policy. During the three-hour session, Dr. He shared with Badi Foundation staff the evolution of NPO development in China and how NPOs can play a bigger role in the process of China’s development. In the meanwhile, he also made some pertinent comments on the challenges that Badi Foundation has encountered implementing institutional capacity building programs at the grassroots. He also felt that nurturing and developing grassroots social organizations on the ground level is an innovative and sustainable approach to development and was willing to contribute to the work of the foundation. Badi Foundation will continue to maintain regular dialogue with the academic world in the future to explore strategies and approaches for promoting rural community development.

From August 1 – 10, 2012 a member of the “Social Poverty Alleviation Innovation Case Study” expert group from the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation visited two community-based organizations (CBOs) collaborating with the Badi Foundation in Lijiang City as well as a program group in Yingjiang County of Dehong Prefecture, Yunnan Province.  On behalf of the expert group, Professor He Jianyu from Tsinghua University’s Research Center on Non-Profit Organizations, accompanied by Badi Foundation Senior Program Officer Mr. Zhou Peng, met with staff of the CBOs and program group as well as project participants, to conduct research and gather information that will be used in connection with a report issued by the State Council Leading Group Office of Poverty Alleviation entitled “Collected Case Studies of Social Poverty Alleviation Innovation”. The “Collected Case Studies of Social Poverty Alleviation Innovation” report seeks to explore the experiences of organizations and social resources outside of the governmental system that have effectively participated in poverty alleviation efforts, as well as to publish and promote these experiences so that they may be called upon for future use.  Professor He Jianyu is one of the members of the expert group participating in the collection of relevant case studies, and has carried out an in-depth investigation and interviews related to the Badi Foundation’s past seven years of experience supporting community-based organizations at the grassroots of society.  The Institutional Capacity Building program of the Badi Foundation is one of the 14 cases selected to include in the study.

On July 5th, Badi Foundation Senior Program Director Zhou Peng was invited by China Association for NGO Cooperation to hold a training on the theme of Monitoring and Evaluating NPO Programs for the staff of Beijing On Action International Cultural Development Center. Drawing on the experiences Badi Foundation has gained from collaborating with NPOs to implement programs in China, Zhou Peng guided the participants to reexamine the concept, approach and attitude of evaluation under an entirely new conceptual framework and principle. The participants were inspired by some of the new concepts introduced in the training and would like to try to apply what they’ve learned in their future work. As one of the main activities in China Association for NGO Cooperation’s NGO capacity building and development program, it aims to raise the organization capacity of three Chinese grass-roots level NPOs by offering them targeted guidance through the three stages of preliminary evaluation, training for needs and evaluation at the end. Beijing On Action International Cultural Development Center is among the three grass-roots level NPOs mentioned above, and it is currently working mainly in Beijing and Suzhou to carry out migrant workers-related programs and activities.

In July 2012, two of the community-based organizations the Badi Foundation is supporting in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region were able to officially register with the support of government sponsors–one under its local Civil Affairs Bureau, and one under its local Water Resources Bureau. Both of these organizations are implementing the Environmental Action Program and Community Development Program , which are dedicated to releasing the potential of local people to advance the development of their own communities, and official registration is a positive indicator of the government’s recognition of the effectiveness of the Environmental Action Program. In the last 3 years, 7 community-based organizations the Badi Foundation is supporting have been able to obtain official registration.