Lindsay Tuggle
Staff Writer
As a child, Shelly Ngo first understood the power of words on people’s perception while reading E.B. White’s children’s book “Charlotte’s Web.” If a spider could spin words into her web and convince people that a pig, “destined for bacon,” was “fantastic,” then Ngo herself could have the same impact someday.
The director of Publications and Informational Resources for World Vision, Ngo has taken the skills that she gained while a journalism student at Pepperdine to communicate the needs of the world to the public, and they go far beyond saving the life one ill-fated piece of pork.
While growing up, Ngo learned the value of hard work from her parents, immigrants from Hong Kong and Singapore. Each came to the United States with a few dollars in their pockets and worked their way through college. Her father graduated from Pepperdine in 1966 and became a successful financial planner, which allowed for him to give his children things that he had never had. Though she is Chinese, she has lived her entire life in Southern California, causing her relatives to dub her “banana-yellow on the outside and white on the inside.”
When Ngo attended Pepperdine, she said she was in awe of the way that many of her fellow classmates were at school on scholarships and were barely making ends meet. Ngo said she was also shaped by the professors who surrounded her who “loved Christ, excelled in their fields and cared deeply about their students.”
Ngo said the people of Pepperdine put her world in perspective, along with what she called the “refrain” of her entire undergraduate career: “a life of service.”
“We were there to prepare ourselves to serve, in classrooms, in boardrooms, in whatever corner of the world we ended up in,” Ngo said. “The message was that we were to prepare our minds to serve humanity.”
Graduating in 1993 with degrees in journalism and political science, Ngo went on to work for World Vision, believing that she would probably only be with the non-profit company for a few months.
World Vision is a Christian relief and development organization, similar to the American Red Cross and Habitat for Humanity, that helps children and communities worldwide. It is based in Tacoma, Wash., and Ngo lives in nearby Federal Way. With offices in nearly 100 countries, World Vision provides services for impoverished communities, including building schools, operating medical clinics, immunizing children and responding to major disasters, such as the recent tsunami in southeast Asia.
“In Isaiah, it says that the kind of fasting that the Lord desires is to loosen the chains of injustice and to set the oppressed free,” Ngo said. “That’s the work that World Vision does.”
Twelve years after starting with the company, Ngo said she continues to do her part in making the world a better place as the director of the publication, internet content, and information resource divisions of World Vision. She works as the liaison to all the field communicators around the world.
As the head of all communication outlets, Ngo’s position is critical to the organization. World Vision depends on donations from all over the world and the public is made aware of the group through the media outlets that she oversees. Ngo uses her journalism background to develop communication strategies and messages to spread knowledge of World Vision.
Ngo said that she thinks her cultural background that some may consider an obstacle has aided her in her career in ways that she never thought possible.
“I travel to Asia to train communicators, and I’m able to develop a quick rapport with people, likely because I look like them and know a bit about the culture and mindset,” Ngo said. “On the other hand, if I were to walk into a boardroom, I’m a short little Asian woman who isn’t going to instantly command attention.”
Ngo believes that her work at World Vision allows her to see how her faith needs to be intertwined with those who suffer in the world, and that one’s everyday choices concerning money should not be excluded from their profession of Christianity.
“I come into work and encounter stories of children who have died because of a lack of immunizations or access to clean water or because of malnutrition,” Ngo said. “When you look at those stories, you can’t pretend that the choices we make about how we spend our money here in the States are independent from our faith.”
Ultimately, Ngo said her day-to-day service at World Vision has helped her to constantly keep a sense of what really matters in her life. With a husband and four young children, a seven-year-old, twin three-year-olds and a year-and-a-half-old baby, she said she realizes that her time away from her family should be spent doing something that is important and makes a difference, as she was once inspired to do as a Pepperdine student. Her job at World Vision allows her to do just that.
“After having my babies, I can’t imagine being a mother somewhere in the world and watching my child die because I had no access to the medicines that would have saved my child’s life,” Ngo said.
“It’d be hard to get up in the morning and think, ‘Hmm, today I’m going to go in and give it my all to increase shareholder profits!’” Ngo said. “After getting to be part of something that really makes a difference, I’m not sure where I would go next. The mission is hard to beat.”
02-10-2005
