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Brooklyn Church Plant Starts After-School Ministry
BROOKLYN, NY (October 24, 2003) - It hasn't taken long for a new Covenant
congregation to make an impact on its neighborhood children in New York
City, thanks to unique after-school program sponsored by two businesses.
Brooklyn Covenant Ministries (BCM), under pastor Conway Boyce, began its
work on June 1 and started BCMquest to help provide ministries to his
area in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. This month, the two
ministries are hosting a pilot educational program for children in
grades 3-9 with help from the eSylvan tutoring program and 1 Economy, a
non-profit technology company.
Deborah Boyce, founder and executive director of BCMquestKids, the
children's service arm of BCMquest, discussed the tutoring program,
stating, "It is a multimedia-based tutorial that rewards in two ways -
verbal praise and reinforcement. Personal praise, encouragement and
reinforcement from teachers help promote a child's self-confidence and
motivation."
Students receive electronic tokens during each session to recognize
effort and achievement. Tokens are saved in a student's personal account
and they can redeem the tokens for prizes at the online sylvan Store,
which is supported by ToysRUs.com.
Conway Boyce, who grew up in Brooklyn, retired from AT&T last year after
serving as a sales director in its business markets division. He had
attended seminary in 1998, but didn't consider full-time ministry until
2000. He had served part-time as a pastor, working primarily in outreach
for a congregation in Brooklyn under pastor Darrell Griffin. He began
considering a church plant in his hometown in 2001 and chose the
Covenant after consulting with Griffin, now the senior pastor at Oakdale
Covenant Church in Chicago.
Along with their educational partnerships, the congregation has
collaborated with a local theater group, Salt and Pepper Mime Company,
and does outreach via youth programs. BCM youth have performed with the
company, having received training during the summer and fall at youth
workshops.
BCM has an average worship attendance of between 30 and 50 and has
ministered to 75 children via various programs. The church's motto is:
Education + Empowerment = Transformation and it seems to start with the
pastor's family. Conway's wife Deborah, who is trained in education and
worked as a schoolteacher, runs the youth and adult education programs
for BCM.
"We are committed to having a seamless ministry that deals not only to
bring people to Christ and becoming more Christ like, but also to help
them develop their gifts and serve others," said Rev. Boyce. "In
traditional models of church, you often have evangelism and service and
they're separate. We're trying to both at the same time."
For more about BCM and BCMquest, call Rev. Boyce at 917-224-4773 or
email him at Boyceedee@aol.com.
Copyright © 2008 The Evangelical Covenant Church. |
