In 2005, Kris Amundson, Joanne Newton and Anne Reed started La Beca with the dream of helping young women in Central and South America achieve their educational dreams. Since the founding of the organization, additional leaders have joined the board and expanded our impact to more scholars in more countries.

La BECA has awarded well over $800,000 since we started in 2005. We began with 7 scholars in 2 countries and currently support over 40 scholars in 4 countries – Bolivia, El Salvador, Honduras, and Panama.

Your contribution changes lives. Your contributions change lives. We come to know our scholars personally and we know the dollars La BECA provides to fund their education are the very last dollars available.  Without these funds, these young women would not have access to education and the trajectory of their lives would be dramatically different.  We make a commitment to our scholars to stick with them throughout their education.  Once a young woman becomes a la BECA scholar, we commit to funding their education–from primary school to secondary to university and beyond–so long as they work hard and commit to their own educational goals. We are so very proud of our graduates working and leading in their countries and proud of our current scholars and their perseverance and hard work.

La Beca means scholarship in Spanish, and our organization raises and distributes funds for this purpose. La Beca works with organizations in Central America, South America, and the Caribbean, to provide women in those countries scholarships so those women have access a quality education. La Beca with sponsoring organizations to distribute scholarships and ensure continued academic success for La Beca scholars.

The IRS recognizes la BECA as a 501(c)3 organization