Unfinished Business
Li Yefu, 83, a retired doctor of traditional Chinese medicine, treats a patient with cervical spondylosis in Hefei, Anhui Province. He has been providing medical service since his retirement in 2000 Xie Ximing, a 73-year-old Beijing resident, describes his life over the past 13 years as “busy” and “happy” since he retired from Beijing Beier Machine Tool Works Co. Ltd., a state-owned enterprise. But the machine tool engineer recalls he was not in such jovial spirits when the curtain came down on his working life back in 2005.
“I suddenly did not know what I would do,” recalled the old man, who had worked for the enterprise for 38 years. “I did not want to stay idle at home, or just sing or dance in parks like many others. I thought it was a waste of my professional knowledge.”
He started to look for new jobs in his area. But because of his specific skill set as an engineer, opportunities were scarce. After being idle for several months, one of his friends asked why he didn’t make use of his computer skills. Xie had, in fact, become adept at operating and repairing computers in the early 2000s.
“At that time, there were not so many people around me who were proficient in computer operation,” said Xie, who then took the initiative and found a job in a vocational school as a computer instructor working two days a week.
“They did not pay me much, but I didn’t care. At least, I knew I was still useful and enjoyed the work,” he added.
After four years at the school, Xie found a position as a consultant in a private machine tool factory, where he stayed for six years before taking time out to travel with a senior travel club.
“I must keep myself working or doing something so as to stay away from diseases that often develop among old people, such as Alzheimer and Parkinson,” he said.
Evergreen education
Xie is one of the millions of retirees with professional knowledge who hope to continue to work after retirement. In China, professionals usually retire at the age of 60. But experts believe that professionals in their 60s are valuable as they are experienced and still energetic. In fact, in the past years, local governments across China have taken measures to encourage retired professionals to contribute their expertise. These measures include initiatives like the Evergreen Tree Program in Chengdu, southwest China’s Sichuan Province and a program in Tonghua in the northeastern province of Jilin, where retired people are organized to help rural development, among many others.
In early August, Chengdu Education Bureau will start its ninth round of recruitment of retired teachers to help improve education quality in underdeveloped rural areas. The program, called the Evergreen Tree Program, started in 2010 and aims to attract high-quality retired teachers to rural schools and education authorities.
“Results from the past eight years show that the program has achieved the results we expected. On the one hand, it helped the primary and middle schools in underdeveloped rural areas improve their education quality; on the other hand, it provided a good platform where these experienced teachers could continue to demonstrate their capacity,” Lai Ping, Director of Teacher Management Section of Chengdu Education Talents Service Center, an institution directly under Chengdu Educational Bureau, told ChinAfrica.
According to Lai, the program uses retirees who have worked as school teachers for at least 20 years throughout China. These teachers work in two categories in rural areas: working as education instructors and teacher supervisors. Education instructors work in county-level education bureaus with the responsibilities of planning education development of the whole county, helping improve the quality of school education and doing education R&D, while teacher supervisors work in various rural schools, focusing on young teachers by directing their daily work. “These teachers have rich experience in teaching, and we hope their experience can help rural education development,” said Lai.
Information from the official website of Evergreen Tree Program shows that education instructors and teaching supervisors can earn 5,200 yuan ($826) and 4,600 yuan ($730) a month respectively, about the same level as the average salary of teachers in Chengdu. In addition, their benefits include insurance and accommodation. The fund is provided by Chengdu Municipal Government.
The program is applauded not only by the benefiting schools and education authorities, but also the recruited teachers themselves. “This is a very good platform for us to use our knowledge and expertise,” said Liu Rong, a 65-year-old man who worked as an English teacher for nearly 40 years before retirement. With the Evergreen Tree Program, he has worked as a teacher supervisor in a middle school in Dayi County, Chengdu City, for three years.
“Our program really attracted a lot of good retired teachers with strong ability like Liu, who has greatly helped the education development in Chengdu,” said Lai, adding that more than 400 retired teachers have so far provided services via the program.
Silver doctors
Yu Taihong in No.10 Middle School of Kunming City, Yunnan Province. The 74-year-old teacher retired in 2000 and was recruited as a teacher in the same school that year. She has been working for the school ever since Besides government-assisted platforms, many professional retirees also organize themselves to provide professional services to local communities.
Luo Guiqin, 83, a retired doctor in Longyan City in southeast China’s Fujian Province, has been providing volunteer medical services in remote mountainous villages for 19 years. He indicated that he would continue to do so as long as his health permitted.
Luo had worked as a doctor for 40 years before his retirement in 1999. Like Xie, he didn’t want to stay idle and often provided free medical services to his neighbors. But a trip to a friend in the mountainous village of Shangjin in Jinsha Town 19 years ago sparked the idea to use his expertise to help more people.
“Owing to the backward transportation conditions, the villagers could not access good medical services or medicines. Actually, there are a lot of such villages in Longyan,” said Luo. “This trip inspired me, and I think I can play a bigger role in these places.” He decided to organize a medical team to provide volunteer medical services to these villagers.
When he talked about his idea with other retired doctors, he received positive responses, and many retired doctors indicated they would like to join. Soon, they established the Silver Hair Volunteer Medical Service Team with 10 members.
Coordinated by Luo, the Association of Senior Scientists and Technologists of Yongding District, Longyan City, funds the volunteer services. In the past 19 years, Luo’s team has provided services for 63,000 patients in 130 villages, giving out free medicines worth 180,000 yuan ($28,571). The team now has 12 members.
After two years relaxing, Xie has decided to work again this year. “I was told that in some European countries, there are some clubs that organize retired people to provide volunteer services for various communities, such as home appliance repairing,” said Xie. “Maybe I will ask some of my old colleagues to launch such a club so as to better use our expertise.”
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