Mary Hammer

With a mascot bearing a painted black nose, a head-to-toe bear costume and a smile, the Los Angeles community project known as the “Beary Educational Community” has become a popular organization of about 100 people who’s mission is to elevate the proficiency rates for those under five years of age, and their parents.

The year-old project that moves on wheels offers a hands-on learning experience in proficiency, reading and writing, which are targeted to families in a lower socio-economic level.

The Beary Educational project is just one of 100 learning groups within the South Bay Center for Counseling (SBCC), a private non-profit mental health agency offering social service assistance to local families. In addition to working in L.A. neighborhoods, there is a network of committees in each of the eight service planning areas throughout the Los Angeles County.  

Established in 1973, the SBCC is an incorporated organization that caters to L.A. residents with different needs, regardless of economic status.
For the past 30 years, it has been offering a variety of services including: education/training for mental health professionals, child abuse treatment, counseling, school-based support programs, community engagement activities, and extensive community outreach.

“My son Miguel is 7 years old, and is very motivated in participating as a bear or bear helper,” Gaby Leyva, an SBCC member said. “It empowers him at that young age he is learning about the importance of doing great things for the community.”

The characters act in front of both school and childcare facilities, and engage children with reading activities, singing and dancing, games, art projects, culture sharing, parent workshops and even sign language instruction.

“The Bears’ various educational activities promote school readiness, parent-child communication and an understanding of many different methods of learning; the activities also help children learn about themselves and their families, which ultimately aids in more confidence in their future classrooms,” according to the SBCC organization’s website.

“The purpose of these activities is to make learning fun for kids, explore literacy in a holistic way, promote and support the idea that parents are their children's first and life long teachers and to encourage pre-reading and early literacy skills,” Kelly Hopkins, one of the bears said. “Multiple learning styles and the inclusion of people with disabilities was a core value of the planning group… bear families include single parent bear families in our community, a foster and adoptive, multi-racial bear family as well as a bear family with two fathers.”

Volunteers and staff work side by side as equal partners “in a revolutionary way” to approach program design and implementation is what ultimately created the Beary Educational Community, according to Hopkins.  

She believes that the ideas and creativity of a “100 people” working together and voting on the best of their ideas was the reason such a great project was created. “No agency could ever develop this on its own,” said Hopkins.

The amount of passion and dedication both volunteers and staff members incorporate together has made the project a success, and is the reason Hopkins believes an organization could not have done it alone. Both volunteers and staff members came up with the “beary” good idea to make learning fun at all ages.

The program offers various activities for participants to choose from, which can be requested by L.A. schools, organizations and community events. The planning group decided to create an “early literacy kit” that is available for each involved child to take home to their family, in order to further learn literacy together at home.

The program has traveled to 17 sites around L.A. County, in various schools and childcare facilities; some events have been so popular that they have included more than 1,000 participants.  

Each performance includes an original song and dance created by group members; some bears have solo performances, while other bears perform together. Songs are performed in both English and Spanish.

“In January 2011 we trained 125 volunteers to be Bears and Bear Helpers for the project in a 3 all-day trainings that focused on early childhood development and education, the theatricality of being a bear character and the 13 specific activities that the volunteers would be doing in the community,” Hopkins said.  

“It was a wonderful experience watching people from all walks of life working together motivated by their passion for improving the quality of life for all families in LA County,” Hopkins said.

The program allows community members to participate and join in on the fun even if they were not part of the original planning process.

“I personally think that this project is something unique and a great way to promote literacy, I love participating, dressing as a bear and bringing different learning opportunities to the children in our communities” Leyva said. “This project is very unique and special, I love being part of it and it gives great joy to see children learning and having fun at the same time.”