The D. H. Chen Foundation Scholarship Award Dinner 2019 was held on September 20 at the Aberdeen Marina Club to celebrate the outstanding achievement of the new cohort of the Scholars. Around 140 guests including the Vice Chancellors, Presidents and senior representatives of the Scholarship’s partner universities, as well as mentors, trustees, Scholars and their families, and the Foundation’s NGO partners, gathered to share the joy in the evening.

Mr. Alan Chow, Chief Executive Officer of the Foundation, welcomed attending guests with his Opening Remarks. He first invited the audience to give a big round of applause to the Scholars’ parents as a token of thanks, then reminded the Scholars of the importance of the responsibility when it comes with privilege. He also urged the Scholars to follow the footsteps of the Foundation’s founder Dr. Din Hwa Chen, “Care for others as well as you would care for yourself”, in order to be compassionate leaders. Following the Remarks, Ms. Vivien Chen Wai Wai, Chairman of the Foundation, presented the well-earned recognitions to the 19 incoming Scholars of the 2019 cohort.

This year, we also celebrated the occasion with the first cohort of The D. H. Chen Foundation Scholar alumni. Ms. Cindy Chan and Mr. Chester Cheng, representatives of the Scholar alumni, expressed their gratitude in their Thank You Speeches to the Foundation, not only on various learning opportunities, but also strong support and helpful advice from their mentors and the Foundation office.

Design-major student Cindy shared her adventurous experience offered by the Scholarship program, that the exchange trip at Cambridge studying Economics enabled her to dream bigger. She also had a chance to serve the community through working with different charitable organizations.

Chester reminisced the joy when he got the phone call informing him being selected as The D. H. Chen Foundation Scholar, achieving one of his goals in the freshman year. He recalled how privileged and committed he was during university life to pursue his passion and therefore, they would be happy to share their valuable experiences with whichever cohort of the Scholars, at the same time to give back to society and to take responsibilities for the future of this city, the homeland they loved.

Ms. Jasmine Lau, co-founder and Executive Director of Philanthropy In Motion, shared her stories in her keynote speech “Building a Mission-driven Life”. She realized from her experience that “missions are not necessarily found but are built and cultivated through reflection and action”. Building missions required one to step out of the comfort zone with the willingness to be uncomfortable and to be stretched. She also quoted “Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm” by Winston Churchill to remind the Scholars of the importance to deal with failure. Failure helped one to grow and to be humble. For Jasmine, humility was not weakness. It allowed her to be a better leader.

Marching into the fourth year of the Scholarship, the Foundation continues to invest in Hong Kong’s brightest and socially committed young talents to be the shaper and leaders of our future with compassion. For details of The D. H. Chen Foundation Scholarship, please visit www.dhcfscholarship.com .