BweK’Lar Learning Centre
Date Established: 2004
- Enrolment 2021-2022: 96
- Grade Levels: KG2,G1,2,3,4,5,6
- Head Teacher: Saw Eh Kwee
- Students (Male): 50
- Students (Female): 46
- Total number of teachers: 9 (including Thai teacher)
BweK’lar Learning Centre was established in 2004 by Paw Pa and his wife Chris Paw. BweK’lar School is situated in the village of BweK’lar, about 15 kilometers south of Mae Sot.
Bwe K’Lar is located in a Thai-Karen village where the Thai school does not allow children of undocumented parents to attend. Children of Karen people displaced by poverty and fighting, live on the outskirt of the village and work in the fields on daily basis. One third of the students live in a boarding house, since they come from come from families who live inside Burma and sent their children across the border to find safety and an education. The school offers education up to grade 6. Afterwards the children who wish to continue to study try to find their way to a boarding house attached to a high school in Mae Sot, usually Hsa Thoo Lei School. As a former teacher in Hsa Thoo Lei school, Saw Eh Kwee came to teach in Bwe K’Lar in 2005 and has never left. He is very dedicated to his school, and he is trying hard to keep the standards high, even if funding for the school has been minimal.
A large, simple boarding house in bamboo with a tin roof is connected to the school and shelters the students whose parents are inside Burma or who work in other areas in Thailand. This year 31 children live in the boarding house. Two school teachers live together with the boarding children.