The giving of one’s time to help others without tangible or monetary gains may be a relatively new and growing concept for Chinese, but is a common way Westerners give back to their communities. And with the New Year, getting involved in your community may be a great way to achieve that New Year’s resolution of spending less time at the bar and more time doing something worthwhile. Whether it is through hosting events to fundraise, working with a NGO or non-profit or just offering language courses to underprivileged students, there are many ways in which guests in China are giving their money, resources, and, most important, time to give back to the country that has welcomed them.

One volunteer in China, Julia Gusten, a founder of a sponsorship association in Nanjing, says about public service “the whole attitude is changing.” And foreigners are happy, even honored to give back to their host country. “Sometimes locals don’t understand that we, as guests here, are happy and to give back,” adds Julia. She helped establish the Pfrang Association in 2000, an association that sponsors the schooling of underprivileged students in northern Jiangsu. It is through the association’s various events that they are able to sponsor students, with its two biggest events being the Pfrang Gala, held every spring, and the Pfrang Sports Day, held every fall. She has seen the association grow from its beginnings nine years ago to sponsoring 151 students in the 2009-2010 school year. The association has even begun branching out into offering other needs for the rural communities with this year’s solar heater project in Lianyungang. She says she’s happy to see that the attitude towards foreigners giving back to their communities and to the country is changing, but there is still a long ways to go.

While some are sponsoring students’ education, others are hoping to be more “hands on.” After a few years of teaching English for various schools, Canadian friends Brent Smith and Landon Veregin decided they wanted to combine their skills and start their own language and culture center and programs. They have one catch – their organization, Coast English, will offer these programs to underprivileged students. Having both spent over 4 years in Nanjing and China, they have experienced more of the “real China” and the need for all students, not just those who can afford it, to have English language and culture education from native speakers.

“A lot of Westerners come for a year or two and experience China for its ‘culture’” Brent says. “Well real life is culture and the reality is there is still a high need to provide proper English training to those less fortunate.” The pair have begun to market Coast English to local organizations that will be able to help in their endeavor. So far the response has been positive, and with a growing interest they’re hopeful that the programs will be warmly received. “There’s a high need to offer programs like this to underprivileged students, and we want to fill that need.”

There are others whose arrival in China was already volunteer oriented. For recent college graduate Deborah Wang, she came to China as a part of a volunteer program called Volunteers in Asia, or VIA. In addition to her teaching post at a local university, with Deborah’s post through VIA she spends much of her time with the Amity Foundation. Her main function is working on translations and polishing English-written documents. “It’s not the traditional kind volunteer work you think of as going out and picking up trash or spending time with the elderly,” she says. But being one of only a few native English speakers working in the office, she’s confident that the services she offers may be even more beneficial. “It’s gratifying knowing that I’m making their work more professional and in the long-run giving them more contacts overseas.”

Whether it is as simple as providing assistance to a local charity or starting their own, foreigners in China are discovering new ways to give back in their communities. And while it may seem difficult to find ways to be more involved within a community, especially when they don’t speak the same language, as Deborah says “There’s many needs and opportunities to help are becoming more and more available.”

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