Members of the TEXIN Caring Volunteer Team (left to right): Yimeng Zou, Bessy Huang, Chris Liu, Gary Wu, Eldon Ding, Shannon Luo and Ting Zhao. Not pictured: Sera Hu, Jenny Sun, Ryan Wang and Julia Zhu. The team won a 2012 TI Founders Community Service Award for their efforts to connect with children in their community who have autism.

The members of TI's TEXIN Caring Volunteer Team in Shanghai care about children in their community who have autism, and they have taken the lead to demonstrate that.

Last year, as part of TI's 25th anniversary celebration events in mainland China, TEXIN members formed a volunteer team to help this special group of children.

The team's 11 members have organized two caring volunteer activities that reached out to 35 children with autism. Team members connected with the children through the Internet and brought them to China Fortune Tower, where TI's Shanghai office is located, for a recent event that all TI Shanghai employees and their children were invited to be part of as well.

Small efforts matter
During the visit, volunteers and the children played interactive games that were designed by TEXIN team members themselves.

"We had fun in the activity," said one of the children. The children's parents were very appreciative and said they hoped more activities like this will be held in the future.

TEXIN team volunteers also benefited from this interactive experience. They said the event made them more familiar with autism and gave them the opportunity to contribute to the community they live in.

All of the volunteers considered this event to be very meaningful and plan to participate in another session in the near future.