On 3rd May 2017, PBG hosted its inaugural Beneficiary Appreciation Dinner. We were pleased to have many of our beneficiaries and distinguished guests present. They included Mr. Gregory Vijayendran, President of the Law Society and our Guest of Hnour, Professor Eleanor Wong, Vice-Dean of the NUS Faculty of Law and Mr Lim Tanguy, President of the Pro Bono Services Office. We were able to celebrate the relationship we have had with our long-standing partners and what all the projects have achieved this year.

We would like to thank our faculty advisor, Professor Helena Whalen-Bridge who has been a big part of PBG’s growth over the past 11 years. She has been intricately involved in PBG every step of the way since our inception in 2005 and has helped our ideas blossom into new projects. Professor Whalen-Bridge reminded us of the hard work that goes into each Pro Bono opportunity, which is what makes each and every project valuable.

We would also like to thank the NUS Pro Bono Office and Prof Lim for the continued support and for helping our Project Directors with the administrative work of clocking hours for all the students.

During the night, we heard from our previous president, Mr Hairul Siddeeq who thanked our individual partners who dedicated their time to changing the lives of individuals and have made an incredible impact on the community.

We had the pleasure to hear from Mr Vijayendran, our guest of honour who reminded us that despite our busy schedules, we can always choose to find them time to do Pro Bono. Mr Vijayendran spoke about how Pro Bono breaks barriers between people and makes us all equally capable of making a difference in society. He encouraged us to be better listeners in order to understand what needs to be changed around us. He called for us to never stop participating in Pro Bono and to actively continue this work for the upcoming year.

Following that, our incoming president, Mr Jonathan Tan shared with our partners PBG’s two main pillars of correspondence and continuity. The incoming EXCO team is committed to ensure the needs and the drive of our projects are well aligned in order to create purposeful engagements between our students and our beneficiaries. They also hope that the partnerships that have been forged will grow and strengthen from year to year. He ended his speech by once again thanking our beneficiaries for their continued support.

Lastly, we thanked our outgoing EXCO team and invited the new EXCO to take up their new positions. We wish all the best to the incoming EXCO Team 17/18 for the academic year ahead and we are sure they will do a great job. May they continue to involve and to inspire those around them!

The end of this event marked the start of PBG’s fundraising Month in May. We have in the past received generous donations from alumni toward pro bono activities, so we streamlined the processes for donations to increase transparency and accountability.

Our partners, NUS Giving have organised a giving link that allows you to donate to further PBG’s work http://tinyurl.com/pbgiving. The money will go toward the vision of PBG, to Inform, to involve and inspire. While a small portion of it will be devoted to our broad objectives of raising awareness of the need for pro bono among our peers, and to ignite a fire for good works, we hope to give the bulk of the money donated to benefit our beneficiaries directly. Your money will go towards supporting legal awareness initiatives, sponsoring resources for legal research, and forging deeper relationships between PBG and the community.

We hope that if it is within your means, you will be able to put a little bit of money aside in May to donate to PBG.

Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this journey!