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The Beginning
A group of former students of Bong Education Center In Bong Mines, Liberia, decided to gather annually for a reunion, as many of them had not seen each other since they left the country. They met for the first time in 1996 in Staten Island, NY. It was decided at the 2002 reunion in Raleigh, North Carolina to create a non-profit organization to give back to their war-torn country. The Bong Education Center Alumni Association (BECAA) was founded in 2002 as a 501c3 non-profit organization and on April 14th, 2004, the organization was officially incorporated in the United States of America.
The organization’s initial initiative was the adopt a child, adopt a teacher program to meet the country’s demand. At the time, the government of Liberia was experiencing a teacher shortage and was unable to adequately staff schools. BECAA stepped in and provided resources to subsidize pay to increase the number of teachers and improve the student to teacher ratio.
The adopt a child program supported student tuition and provided funding for 9-12 grade students’ national exam fee, an exam required for students to graduate from high school in West Africa. During this time, BECAA also consistently upgraded the educational facility at the Bong Mines Central High School.
The Future
Inspired to create even greater impact in Bong Mines, in 2016, BECAA decided to launch a resource center to benefit students from ALL the schools in the community.
The Resource center opened its doors in February 2018 with a director, several tutorial teachers, a computer instructor, and many excited students. The center features a computer lab where students can learn basic computer literacy skills and do research for their assignments. It also offers tutorial classes for subjects like Math, Science, Language Arts, and Social Studies. We also have a well-stocked library and recently hired a Librarian to join the resource center’s team. We’re proud to share that since the resource center’s inception in 2018, attendees’ national exam grades have significantly improved.
As we look to the future, The executive committee has incorporated the organization in Liberia and is in the process of acquiring a significant amount of land to build a new educational center. The vision for this center is to offer the quality of education BECAA members benefited from while attending Bong Education Center, but with a 21st century twist.
