Despite the stormy weather on November 3, 400 people attended the ACCESS (American Chinese Christian Educational & Social Services, Inc.) 15th anniversary celebration at Empire Garden Restaurant. The banquet opened with a prayer by Rev. James Tan, who founded the Boston Chinese Evangelical Church in 1961. Later in the evening, City Councilor Sam Yoon greeted the audience and prayed for the City of Boston and, in particular, Chinatown. Two awards were given. The Innovative Partnership Award was given to the Chinese Bible Church of Greater Boston in Lexington, in recognition of their initiative in starting the Summerbridge Program and the Adult Computer Literacy Class for ACCESS this past summer. The Friends of ACCESS Award was given to Mr. and Mrs. David Wong, owners of Empire Garden Restaurant, for their long time generous support of and dedication to the Chinatown community. Mr. Wong presented ACCESS with a $3,000 check at the award ceremony. An eight-minute video was shown to dinner guests to illustrate what ACCESS means to staff, board members, volunteers, and students in the adult English classes and Children’s After-School Program. The highlight of the evening was the announcement that the silent auction of over 200 donated items raised $18,000 to fund ACCESS’ various programs.

This successful event was the handiwork of the Planning Committee: Joann Yung (Celebration Chair), Jackie Wang (Auction Chair), Jocelyn Chen, Kiki Cooper, Erin Shyamji, and Mei Kee Wong (Executive Director). Many volunteers and the ACCESS staff also contributed countless hours to the dinner and auction.

Chinese version (requires PDF viewer)

Rev. James Tan saying grace before dinner

City Councilor Sam Yoon praying for the city of Boston and for Chinatown

Mr. David Wong, owner of Empire Garden Restaurant, giving a check to ACCESS board chair Cliff Chuang and Executive Director Mei Kee Wong.

Innovative Partnership Award presented to the Chinese Bible Church of Greater Boston in Lexington

Friends of ACCESS Award presented to Mr. David Wong

If you can donate any of the following, please contact ACCESS ()

Immediate Needs

• An LCD projector (used one in working order is fine)

• A portable flannel board for telling Bible Stories

Ongoing Needs

• School supplies such as dry erase markers, glue sticks
• Gift Cards to Staples and/or OfficeMax for stationery and office supplies
• Gift Cards to COSTCO, or STOP & SHOP to help purchase healthy snacks and ingredients for cooking classes
• Gift Card to Michaels to help with the purchase of craft supplies
• Gift Card to Target to help purchase enrichment supplies
• Gift Card to CBD to buy Bible and other spiritual resources

You can find a list of our volunteer opportunities at Christian Volunteering in the box below:

Administrative Support
We need volunteers who can regularly or occasionally help with data entry, bookkeeping, grant writing, graphic design, translation, or Chinese word processing. Contact

Technology Support
We need volunteers to do technology planning, network and website maintenance. Contact Connie Yeh at

Family Life Education
We need volunteers to convert audiocassettes & VHS to CDs and DVDs (to be done at home), help clients fill out forms or translate documents (at ACCESS), provide child care in occasional evening meetings (at ACCESS) Contact