Kirsten Bech in Memoriam

This year’s IB Cap Ceremony at Grenaa Gymnasium saw the first recipients of a new grant

At the recent celebration of this years graduating IB-students a new grant was handed out for the first time. It is called Kirsten Bech in Memoriam and is in honour of this IB World School’s first coordinator.

Back in 2001 a very spirited, strong willed, politically skilled and very internationally minded teacher became a driving force of a group of staff members at Grenaa Gymnasium who wanted to develop a truly international learning atmosphere anchored in the core values of the International Baccalaureate Diploma programme, Head of School Helene Bendorff Kristensen said introducing the new grant, and continued:

– Kirsten became our first IB Coordinator and she worked tirelessly and at all levels to enable us to start our first Diploma class in 2003. The implementation and development of this education here at Grenaa Gymnasium became her life´s work.

Read more about the Cap Ceremony 2021

Seeing the person in the student

Helene Bendorff Kristensen further characterized Kirsten Bech as a woman of principle and with a strong social engagement, enforcing that the Diploma Programme should be available to all young people, whatever their background is.

She always put the person in front of her before the cold statistics and was always keen to improve what we do, so that our students could achieve good results. We honour her influence and spirit in our daily work.

Kirsten Bech retired in April 2015 and has now sadly passed away, but her family has decided to support the IB students of this school with a generous yearly grant.

Her husband Erik Bjørn was present at this first occasion and hopefully he will many times in the future when Kirsten Bechs memory will be honoured at the festive occasion that the cap ceremony is.

The first recipients of Kirsten Bech in Memoriam were Caroline Kehlet and Francesca Kaori Maffini who each in their way represent the will to get through the difficult pandemic and make the best of their circumstances. Two students who have not given up on life, or their studies, and their will to learn, and have shown exemplary perseverance in times of difficulty.