From the Organizing Committee of 2019 An Bang Villagers Abroad Conference

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FINAL ANNOUNCEMENT
Re: Dissolving the Organizing Committee

July 30, 2019

This announcement is addressed to:

• The Advisory Board of the An Bang Villagers Abroad Conference 2019
• All An Bang Villagers Abroad
• All Members of the Organizing Committee of the An Bang Villagers Abroad Conference 2019

With your trust, the Organizing Committee was formed to carry out the responsibility in organizing a large gathering event for all An Bang Villagers for the first time after more than 40 years living abroad.  Over the past year, we have contacted and connected with more than 120 members to serve in our committee. These members served in various roles and contributed in numerous ways in the organization and execution of the July 14, 2019 event, allowing it to take place smoothly.  Now that the event has been completed, we would like to announce that, effective immediately, the Organizing Committee is officially dissolved.

After the event, the Organizing Committee held a general conference meeting to debrief to discuss ongoing tasks. Below are the outputs of this meeting:

1.Finance 

• Total event revenue: $232,265
• Total  event expenditure: $231,388
• There are many unclaimed raffle tickets, which the Sponsor Subcommittee will handle as they come in.

2. An Bang Villagers Journal

• The Culture Subcommittee will assist the News and Information Subcommittee to complete the An Bang Villagers Journal, ưhich will be published before the coming Lunar New Year.  
• Funds for this activity are reserved and accounted for in the expenditure portion.
• Journal contents will include An Bang history, boat adventure stories, integration experiences, and impressions about the Conference.  
• This will be a cultural heritage for future generations, in both languages.  We ask that all of the An-Bangers, if possible, contribute to this journal. Please send your articles to  HoiNgoAnBang@gmail.com 

3. The Culture Subcommittee

• Due to the need to preserve and promote the An Bang culture, we invited the Culture Subcommittee to be continually active.
• The Culture Subcommittee will eventually change its name to act independently, according to its guidelines.  
• Mr. Loc K Nguyen has been appointed as the representative of this group.  He will consult with others and invite more members to form this group.

4. Lessons Learned After The Event

• We identified general strengths and weaknesses of the organizing committee with the hope to provide valuable lessons for a future organizing committee.
• In general, the strength was that the number of attendees exceeded our goal of 2,000 people (the actual turnout was around 4,000 people).
• Our weaknesses, however, were also related to this turnout. Because of the number of attendees doubled our target, we did not have an appropriate backup plan to promptly react to the situation. 

5. Our Communication Channel on Viber

• We decided to keep this communication channel active and will change its name to properly align with the purpose of connecting the An Bang villagers abroad, and thus creating a bridge of understanding and solidarity of the An Bang people.  

Ladies and gentlemen,

In the past year, the organizing committees have tried our best, within our limited ability, to organize the conference which you asked us to do through your votes.  It was a great honor for us to serve the An Bang Community. This task was never easy to accomplish, particularly because of the love and solidarity of all An Bang people and desire to meet the high standards and expectations of this community. We would like to express our sincere appreciation and utmost gratitude for your support.  We ask that you continue to do the same for a future organizing committees, if they are formed. We are very proud of this outcome and are overfilled with the love of An Bang people. We also apologize for any conflicts or discrepancies during the organizing process or at the event itself that did not meet your expectations.

We hope that the conference was a spark for future generations to discover more about their An Bang roots. Should our committee be proceeded by another in the future, we would be happy to share our experience with the future organizing committee. Once again, we would like to profusely express our great appreciation for the contributions from all the An Bang People.  Without your help, this event would not have happened. Let’s celebrate our accomplishments.

With this, we announce that the Organizing Committee of the An Bang Villagers Abroad Conference 2019 be officially dissolved.

Sincerely,

(Signed)

Dr. Long Le
Head of the Organizing Committee