On 29th April to 1st May, 2013, Ms. Chia Yin Pan, staff representative of Eden Social Welfare Foundation at the annual InterAction Forum, headed for Washington D.C. to attend a three-day event presided over by the American Voluntary International Action. With nearly 1,000 attendees representing hundreds of organizations from all over the world, this year’s InterAction Forum features a wide variety of workshops and tracks on issues critical to the development of common solutions to the challenges faced by the world’s marginalized and impoverished communities.

Photo caption: Mr. Zhong Lin Ma (right), Deputy Director-general of Department of International Information Services, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of China (Taiwan) and Ms. Chia Yin Pan, Eden's representative at 2013 InterAction Forum in Washington D.C.

With her full participation throughout the course of the event, Ms. Pan, also a professional music therapist at Eden’s early intervention center in southern Taiwan, stated after the forum that she was particularly impressed with the avid discussion that took place during one of the event’s workshop, titled “A Match Made in Heaven? Bringing closer academics and practitioners for greater impact.” In response to the resonating message of the workshop which promotes the establishment of research and development teams within field agencies for more efficient use of resources and better service delivery, Ms. Pan comments that the implementation of similar design in the field of early intervention for children with disabilities will be very much appreciated among practitioners and service users both.

Based in Washington D.C., InterAction is the country’s biggest exchange platform for NGOs. Its annual forum is attended by thousands of governmental agencies both in the U.S. and abroad as well as major NGOs around the globe.