Report from the Directors 2020-21
During the journey of fighting against the COVID 19, the SJC Alumni Association has been trying hard to maintain our alumni network while observing the social distancing rules as required by the HK government. We tried to be innovative and organised online events through technology aid including live broadcasting and zoom facility. Below set out a brief summary of events we held in the past year: –
1. Aquila Kitchen (May – June 2020)
We conducted a series of three live shows on cooking and sharing with a handful of invited guests and alumni, at home of our SJCAA chairman or CheeseBB, one of the Aquila Business Network supported by the SJCAA, for different cuisines. Invited guests include Dr. Eric Chong, Rev Paul Tong and other alumni. The live events attracted a total of over 4,300 views from our members through live stream and subsequent recorded video on Facebook. The most viewed video even received more than two thousand views so far.
2. SJCAA Online Channel (Sep – Dec 2020)
A series of interviews of Rev Paul Tong with three different alumni (Mr. Vincent Chiu, Mr. Barry Sam and Mr. Lesley Chan) on three different topics or themes were conducted and published in Facebook between the period of Sep to Dec 2020. Each interview received, on average, more than a thousand views on Facebook through the SJCAA Alumni page.
3. Welcome Party of new Members (Oct 2020)
About 50 current students and directors of SJCAA joined the welcome party organized by the Alumni Association in person connected through zoom meetings. Students were separated into 4 small groups located at different locations of the College. After a welcoming speech by the Master, the welcome party was then conducted via zoom meetings to connect the different groups.
4. Interview and LICHE talks (Sep – Dec 2020)
We interviewed Ms. Eliza Chang (10F alumnus), being the first Hong Kong female successfully swam across the English Channel, which was live broadcasted on Facebook in Sep 2020. 660 views were registered in the live broadcast video.
As part of the LICHE Talks, we invited two alumni to present talks to the SJC family:
– Mr. Jason Yip (1/F alumnus), a TED Talk speaker shared with us, via zoom meeting, his career with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). About 14 alumni joined the talk online in Nov 2020.
– Mr. Daniel So (6/F alumnus), strategist form CMB International gave our alumni a live talk via zoom meeting on the outlook of the HK Stock market in 2021. About 50 alumni joined the talk online in Dec 2020.
5. Mentorship (Oct 2020 – May 2021)
50 alumni and undergraduates joined the kick off of the 2020 SJCAA mentorship program via zoom on 12 October 2020. 11 groups of different disciplines were created, each with 4 to 7 mentors and mentees. Each group has a group leader who coordinated and set up WhatsApp group to keep the momentum of between the mentors and mentees. A new FB Private group and Instagram account were also set up to further facilitate the sharing of good ideas and experience of the program.
6. Summer internship (May – Aug 2021)
A total of 55 students have applied for summer internship this year. As the job market is still very sluggish due to the Covid 19 and the slow economy, finding summer internship for our current students was a great challenge. In addition, as many applicants this year were overseas students, the language barrier has further complicated the match-making process.
SJCAA engineered the alumni network to match internship opportunities for the students. As a result, 18 job offers from the alumni network have been secured, of which 14 applicants were successfully hired. Some of the students withdrawn from the scheme as they have found their internship somewhere else.
7. Revamp of www.sjcaa.org.hk web site (Mar 2021)
The alumni web site was created in 2003 (18 years ago). As the technology on which the web site was written became obsolete, the web site was very unstable and getting more difficult to find suitable hosting service. A revamp exercise (based on WordPress) has been carried out since the end of 2020 and it was completed in Mar 2021.
The new web site is now mobile phone friendly and is more easily to be maintained. In addition, the 2000 plus database of all our members was successfully migrated to the new platform without losing a single contact information.
8. Photography competition (Jan and Feb 2021)
Two photography competitions were held successfully online via Facebook posting. The two themes were “RELAX” and “HOPE” which were specially selected in the worst time of the COVID 19 period. More than 70 entries for the 2 competitions were collected. The winners were then being interviewed via zoom meeting and published in the Facebook. Again more than 1000 viewers were received by these videos.
9. Online Gaming Competition – FIFA (Apr-May 2021)
In order to respond to the Gaming culture of the younger generation, the 1st SJCAA Inter-floor FIFA Online Gaming Competition was held during the period of April to May 2021. FIFA is an online soccer game which is very popular among the younger alumni as well as the current student’s community.
A total of 22 alumni and current students enrolled to the competitions. A total of 21 competitions were played online among these 22 players. The semi-finals and the final were even live broadcasted in Facebook so all members could watch the game online.
Finally, 2 alumni and 2 current students got into the semi-finals. The winner was a current student Suyash Lohia from 5/F; and the runner-up was also a current Issac McGirr from 1/F.
10. Online AGM – (June 2020 and 2021)
Finally, needless to say that our AGM held last year and to be held this year was provided and will be provided respectively with zoom facility for our members to join online.
Report by Vincent Chiu 18 June 2021
