About Overseas Chinese Students Association

History of OCSA
　

OCSA was officially founded on Friday, November 6, 1964 although there were Chinese students on campus as early as the late 50's. Dr. Michael Wu who graduated in 1964 writes:

"As far as I know the first Hong Kong students who attended UNB dated back to 1955. The first group of Hong Kong students who obtained Bachelor Degrees in 1960 were Arthur Ho, Tam Wing-Ming and Edmund Li. Mr. Benny Lam was the first Hong Kong student to obtain a Master degree in 1962, and Dr. Wong Chiu Ming was the first Hong Kong student to receive a Ph. D. in Chemistry in 1964."

The following letter in the OCSA files concerns the founding of the Association and requests students to attend the inaugural meeting to approve a constitution. It reads as follows:

November 2, 1964

Dear fellow students,

The establishment of a Chinese student association was proposed many years ago by some enthusiastic parties and no work on this has been done ever since.This year the total number of Chinese in UNB and St. Thomas is so high that an association for the Chinese students is urgently required not only for the purposeof communication with each other but also for the purposes of our own welfare, benefit, mutual understanding and encouragement towards our studies. A discussion for the foundation of such an association will be held in the Auditorium of the Chemistry building, at 7:30 p.m., Friday November 6, 1964.A copy of the proposed constitution is herewith attached for your scrutiny. Please do your best to attend the meeting.
　

C. M. Wong

At that meeting the Constitution was approved and the first Executive elected with Mr. Tony Yen as the President. The Constitution approved then is the same with several changes as that which is still in use now. One major change made in early 1965 was to open OCSA membership to all students at UNB and STU rather than just to Chinese students, so that the Association could be affiliated to the SRC. During the first year there were 40 members. The earliest membership list in the OCSA files dates from 1966 and at that time there were 65 members of whom about half were graduate students.The activities proposed for the first year were not unlike those we still have. There was to be a Christmas Party, a China Night, held around the Chinese New Year with "band music, floor show , door prizes, games and refreshments" a Farewell Party and the following year a reception for the new members. Sports events were also proposed: table tennis, basketball, tennis, badminton, swimming, chess and bridge.

Over the years OCSA has always been an extremely active association organizing all sorts of events for its members and the university community. The China Nights and the Chinese New Year banquets and shows are those which have been mostwidely noticed on campus. However, many changes have occurred over the years. The biggest change was due to the huge increase in the number of Chinese students studying at UNB. From 40 in 1964 the number had grown to about 175 by the mid 70's and partly because of this other associations were created: the Malaysian Students Society, the Chinese Cultural Association of New Brunswick, and the Fredericton Chinese Christian Fellowship.

In 1984 students from the People's Republic of China founded the Chinese Graduate Students Association and in 1989 the Singapore Student Association was founded. Whilst in its early days OCSA was the only Chinese organization in Fredericton which all Chinese joined, young and old, students and professors, irrespective of nationality, it has become one association among many. However, it is still an organization which welcomes all Chinese students and others interested in Chinese culture, and it is not oriented to any particular country. There has nevertheless been a change in composition of the members based on country of origin. When the association was founded, about half the members came from Taiwan. Today, there are few Taiwan students on campus and most OCSA members come from Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore. Many students are members of several associations, and OCSA has cooperated at various time with most, if not all, of the other associations.OCSA has always shown a large number of movies. In the past they were usually 16mm Taiwan and Mainland Chinese films, and were in Mandarin. Even 35mm movies were projected occasionally. Both feature films and documentaries were shown. Now, most of the movies are from Hong Kong and in Cantonese and are on video tape, but they are still projected in an auditorium to large audiences.

A new development for OCSA was the opening of the Chinese radio programme on CHSR in the 1985-86 academic year. The first Director and organiser of the programme was Fred Tsang. In the OCSA minutes of October 6, 1985 he states " A Radio Program is newly formed by the sub committee of OCSA. It is an independent interest group and its operations and activities will be financially supported by OCSA. Our purposes are not only to provide more services and entertainment , but also foster better understanding and communication between each of us. We much appreciate your support and help." For 10 years now, OCSA has been broadcasting two to three hours of programmes in Cantonese, mainly news, music, discussion, interviews and drama. For most of the time the broadcasts have gone out on Sunday mornings. They are of great interest to the members and the local Chinese community, and have provided an invaluable training to our members in broadcasting.

RECENT DEVELOPMENTS

One of the biggest changes to affect the association was brought about by the new information technology. The first mailings of information to our members by e-mail took place in 1995 to 1996, and our first web site was set up by Silvester To in September 1995. Due to these developments, it has become extremely easy to keep in touch both with our members on campus and the alumni.

HARVEST TIME

We have inevitably lost contact with many of our members. However, a few could be mentioned:

Professor Meng, Department of Forestry and Environmental Management, was a student at UNB before OCSA was formed.

Professor Richard Lee (retired) , Department of Mathematics, arrived at UNB in 1964 and was an active members for many years.

Dr. K. T. Kan, Department of Civil Engineering, was OCSA's Secretary in 1966.

Professor K. C. Lin, of the same Department, was also very activeas a student in OCSA.

Professor Larry Shyu (retired), Department of History, who arrived at UNB in 1968, helped the Association in many ways in the early 70's and later became the first President of theChinese Cultural Association of New Brunswick.

Dr. Michael Wu, who graduated in 1964 (ME), is our mostillustrious alumnus. He is the Director of the Wing Lung Bank inHong Kong and in 1982 helped found the University of NewBrunswick Alumni Association of Hong Kong and was its firstPresident. He was awarded an Honourary Doctorate by UNB inMay 1989 and the UNB Conference Centre bears his name.

Philip Wong, OCSA's Vice-President in 1977-78, is a wellknown Hong Kong businessman and in 1992 was the recipient of the coveted Ten Outstanding Young Persons Award in Hong Kong for his business and community service. The following year he wasappointed by the Governor of Hong Kong to the ExecutiveCommittee of the Hong Kong Polytechnic.


To keep in touch with former members in Hong Kong please contact the UNB/STU Hong Kong Alumni Association:
　

Mr. Henry Chong,
GPO Box 222,
Central District,
Hong Kong
Tel: 2525-1151 (office)
Fax: 2512-2794
E-mail : [email]vertec@netvigator.com[/email]



Former members are also encouraged to leave their names and addresses in our guest book (see the index on our home page).

History written by Anthony C. Lister (OCSA Advisor)October, 1998

Please send any comments, suggestions, or addition information to Prof. Anthony Lister