Category: School Year 2012-13 - Bayon English Academy

Bayon English Academy

Thank You to Petroleum Pipe Company

6/10/2013

All the BEA staff and students are so very grateful to Andrew Martin and Julian Tyacke from Petroleum Pipe Company (PCC). Their very generous donation pays for ALL of our October operating costs!!! Thank you so much for believing in our mission to provide the very best to our Cambodian kids so that we can empower them through language courses, job counseling workshops and teacher-training programs. In just three years, over half of our BEA kids have been able to find work in the tourist industry with salaries over double the national average. This allows them to save for their university students and to support their families. Thank you so much for your support!!!

Candid Shots from BEA's 2012-13 Certificate Ceremony

21/9/2013

Hi everyone,

For the past three years, I have been the "official" BEA photography for all of our milestones. For each and every one of these, I have failed miserably at trying to get a set of "formal" graduation photos of Shally, my NGO partner and our school's managing director, with the BEA kids. Since Shally had to smile and pose with sixty of the BEA kids who got certificates for all their hard work during the 2012-13 school year, it eventually got too exhausting and then chaos broke out...as usual. Indeed, I have hundreds of "nice" shots, but these are the ones that make me laugh out loud and really show that what we do is much more than just language education. Nobody ever believes that all of our students come from extreme and moderate poverty. It's amazing what just one year with BEA and "Teacher Shally" can do for these kids.

The Bayon English Academy (BEA) is an accredited NGO school that provides underprivileged youth with quality English language education with professional teachers in a safe, clean environment in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Ready for Graduation!

20/9/2013

We're all set for the big day! Shally picked up our certificates signed and stamped from the Ministry of Education while Nicole wrapped up all the gifts for the top students. The BEA kids will be thrilled to get their certificates at our graduation ceremony this afternoon for the 2012-13 school year!!!

The Bayon English Academy (BEA) is an accredited NGO school that provides underprivileged youth with quality English language education with professional teachers in a safe, clean environment in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Certificates are done!

30/8/2013

The BEA directors have finally finished printing and signing the 2012-13 school year certificates. Tomorrow, they'll be given to the Minister of Education for his signature as well. The BEA kids will then have a small graduation ceremony once registration for 2013-14 finishes after this weekend! The BEA English language course certificates are actually equivalent to those issued at the high school level in Cambodia!

The Bayon English Academy (BEA) is an accredited NGO school that provides underprivileged youth with quality English language education with professional teachers in a safe, clean environment in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Kralahn Market Fire and BEA Updates

7/7/2013

Kralahn market, the lifeline for many villagers in Trapeang Sess, including some of the families of BEA students, burnt to the ground last night. Early yesterday morning around 1:00am, a fire started in the western part of the market. Although a few villagers nearby tried to call for help, the market security guards, all seven of them and relatives of the market owner, were nowhere to be seen and have still not shown up anywhere in the village. Due to strong winds, the fire spread rapidly and burnt down over 200 stalls in less than an hour.

The majority of these stall owners have had to pay an initial investment of $3750 US to the market owner for a 2x2 meter plot of land. Most of this money has been borrowed from banks. All of this is now lost, as well as any collateral they offered for these loans, such as small plots of land and livestock. Although these market sellers pay the market owner insurance, about $7.50 each month, the owner is refusing to pay for any of their losses. The police have also threatened to arrest any of the market stall renters if they decided to protest over the next few weeks.

This is such a terrible tragedy for all of us in Trapeang Sess village. This market is the heart of our village. It's where our students go grocery shopping with their mothers in the morning; it's where they buy their clothes and school uniforms; and it's where they go to get their hair cut or get a bowl of noodles for lunch. Everything is in the village market; it's a lifeline for everyone. Shally, BEA’s managing director, was there this afternoon to help his mother go through her own Khmer noodle stall, which was also severely damaged. Like many others, she now has no place to set up and sell her noodles to make ends meet. At the moment, we don’t know how many BEA families have been affected by this tragedy, but we’ll know more once the students are back in class tomorrow.

As usual, tragedy also strikes at the worst possible time. Our landlord surprised us a few weeks ago when he said he would not renew our lease despite many promises that he would just a month ago. Fortunately, we just signed our contract this morning for a new building just down the street. However, the deposit has completely emptied our bank account. In addition to the start-up expenses for the 2013-14 school year, we now need to figure out a way to help the BEA students affected by the market fire. It is most likely that their families will no longer be able to afford their public school fees, and will have to drop out of school and find work. Despite these challenges, we still hope for the best, and will be in our new building for the start of the new school year this September.

The Bayon English Academy (BEA) is an accredited NGO school that provides underprivileged youth with quality English language education with professional teachers in a safe, clean environment in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Kralahn Market Fire Photo Gallery

Happy Birthday Sreynet

3/6/2013

The BEA directors would like to wish Sreynet, our fabulous librarian and research assistant, a very happy birthday! We can't believe how quickly three years has passed since you first started studying and working at BEA! Here's a little trip down memory lane of all your smiles and hard work at BEA! We are so proud of you each and every day!

Happy Khmer New Year

14/4/2013

International Women's Day

9/3/2013

International Women's Day
Since 2010, BEA has helped its girls developing into confident young women with fluent English skills. This language ability has given them increased economic opportunities in the tourist sector in Siem Reap. Many of our young women have increased their incomes by over 50%, and this has allowed them to save for university and to help their families.

BEA has modern facilities, professional teachers and sound teaching methods, and because of this, our girls feel better about themselves, which is the first step in helping them build their confidence. We provide all of this for free to the most underprivileged because we believe through providing the best to our kids, we can empower them to improve their own lives over the long-term rather than just for tomorrow.

The Bayon English Academy (BEA) is an accredited NGO school that provides underprivileged youth with quality English language education with professional teachers in a safe, clean environment in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Merry Christmas!

25/12/2012

The BEA staff and kids would like to wish everyone a very joyful holiday season! It's been another exciting year, especially with the addition of a new teacher and BEA's first teacher-training program!

A million thanks to those who have supported us through the many ups and downs of 2012 to give the BEA kids the best possible language education and the chance of a better future.

BEA's First Teacher Training Program

14/8/2012

BEA's very first teacher training will be starting on August 20 and run for almost two weeks. This will be an intensive program in which the trainees will receive 20 hours of classroom instruction on teaching methodology and classroom practices. In addition, trainees will also complete a 15-hour teaching practicum. This means that they will have to prepare their own lessons and teach in front of a group of BEA students, observe lessons of other trainee's, and participate in group feedback sessions about their lessons. It's definitely going to be a very busy two weeks for both the trainees and myself. Since we don't have a lot of time before the start of our 2012-13 school year, I've decided to focus on methods used for teaching speaking skills in an ESL/EFL classroom. When I come back to Cambodia in January, I'll run another training program with a focus on the other skills.

As for the trainees, we'll have four of our own students from the advanced course participating in the program. Rithea, our new teacher, will be one of them, and we'll also have Los, Dany and Sarith, who had applied for the teaching position back in July. This training program will prepare them with teaching skills so that they can work at BEA or at another local school in the future. In Rithea's case, her training will be more extensive since she'll be working at BEA. Over the course of the first semester, she'll learn how to set-up, run and evaluate each of BEA's language programs with help from Shally, BEA's head teacher. Rithea will also participate in BEA's online teacher-training program, which will focus on lesson plan design, revision and reflection.

Later on today, I'll be meeting with all the trainees to go through our training schedule for next week, and of course, to assign homework for our first session. I'm looking forward to working with this group of talented BEA students! I know they'll make me proud as usual!

If you're interesting in what we'll be covering during BEA's first teacher-training program, you can take a look at our schedule below. We're hoping that this will be the first of many training programs at BEA!

Back to the books...

The Bayon English Academy (BEA) is an accredited NGO school that provides underprivileged youth with quality English language education in a safe, clean environment in Siem Reap, Cambodia.