​Children for Change Cambodia

In 2008, NBC Dateline broadcast a bombshell report of Vietnamese children being trafficked into sex slavery in Cambodia.  Aid to Children without Parents, Inc. (ACWP) immediately launched a program called Saving Children in Crisis to support a Vietnamese Catholic nun in Svay Pak, Cambodia, the epicenter of the sex trade, to build a school and shelter for the remaining unaffected children.

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George Reed, a physician from Canada along with his Vietnamese fiancée, Tiên, also moved in to establish a health service in Sen Sok slum on the outskirt of Phnom Penh.  Facing resistance from the government, they turned it into an afterschool program for the children. Their program, named Action to End Exploitation (AEE),  abruptly ended operation in 2012 due to unfavorable local government's action.  The children were locked out of their safe shelter and their volunteer teachers from overseas were left stranded.

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To save the program that was responsible for educating and sheltering over 100 at-risk youth, Cultural Quest Foundation worked with the remaining AEE volunteers to create a new Board of Directors, lead by Hazell Cockle from England, and the current manager Kung Thảo Thy, a Cambodian of Vietnamese descent, who was trained by ACWP.  They renamed  the program Children for Change Cambodia (CCC).  A group of San Jose high school students stepped up to help and raised the initial fund to restart the school with the help of ACWP.  In the following four years,  GIVE and CQF raised money in the U.S., and served as the fiscal agent for CCC to continue.   

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Eventually, the Cambodian government cleared Sen Sok slum to make way for new development, and dispersed the CCC students along with their families to other areas.  The need for CCC was no more, and the project was closed in 2016, after which the students were moved to an individual sponsorship program.  Although we did not get to see the CCC students reach their goal of completing their education, CQF and GIVE planted a seed of love that we could never forget.  It was a truly a one-of-a-kind love that is shared by youth from across the continents.  In those few years, these idealistic youth kept hope alive and friendship to prosper against the backdrop of apathy.