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Alumni Focus - Camryn Biebert ('17)

Bierbert, Camryn 2017 on swing in Equador.
Biebert, Camryn 2017
Camryn Biebert ('17)

Camryn Biebert (‘17) is a world traveler currently using her Spanish skills to spread the gospel through Academia Cristo. She shares how SCLA prepared her for mission work abroad and next year in Wisconsin.

What does St. Croix mean to you?

For me, St. Croix means that I got to go to a school every day that felt like one big family. I gained some life-long friends that share the same faith as me and therefore, are able to encourage me in that. Going to a small school was a big blessing because I got to know so many different people and be a part of a lot of really cool things. A unique aspect of St. Croix is how many international students there are. Getting to know these students really opened my mind to different perspectives and helped me learn about the cultures they came from, which I think played a huge part in why I now have such an interest in getting to know and understand people from different cultures better and teaching high-schoolers about it as well. 

Did any specific SCLA teachers make a positive impact on you?

Miss Fredrich definitely made the biggest impact on me. She made sure that all of her students knew we could always go to her for anything- help with math or just to talk. She showed me how important a teacher can be in the life of teenagers. I think that getting to see the relationships she built with her students is what really pushed me to also want to become a high school teacher.

Can you explain your mission work in Quito, Ecuador as a missionaries’ assistant for Academia Cristo?  

Academia Cristo has a really cool mission. The whole goal is to train the students who are learning from the missionaries to go and start their own church group. By doing this all online, we don't need to have a missionary in every Latin American country leading a church, but we still have church groups being planted in many Spanish-speaking countries. Before a student is ready to start leading their own group, they will have gone through the whole self-study app through Academia Cristo, then through all of the basic Bible classes online with a missionary, and will then be in the next stage of online classes more focused on the multiplication process of sharing God's Word. They are also given a "consejero" (advisor) that assists them in starting this process and meets with them monthly to help them with their goals. Just in the short time Academia Cristo has been around, 500,000 people have downloaded the app to start learning, over 400 people have begun the live courses, and we have 12 new church groups started up by students. 

My job is basically to help with tasks that free up the missionaries who are serving in Latin America, so that they can focus more on the mission work at hand. Almost all of my work is online, doing the different projects I'm given. Throughout the year so far, I've helped organize a Sunday School curriculum for our groups, worked through our YouTube and website pages looking for ways to better it, and have been a teacher's assistant for some of the online classes. Right now I'm working on completing 200 surveys in the parks nearby to help get Academia Cristo's name out there and gather more information about how we can better reach those who haven't heard of us yet.

What are your plans this summer after you return from Ecuador?

When I return to the States in May, I will be eligible for a call to teach Spanish. Because my fiancé currently serves as a dorm supervisor and religion teacher at Luther Prep, I will be limited to a 60 minute drive from Watertown, Wisconsin. We will see what God has in store for me! Then in early July, I will be getting married and moving into the dorms at Luther Prep. 

Anything else you want to share?  

One of the really cool things about my job right now is how flexible it is, so I'm able to do a lot of traveling and seeing the amazing world God has made. I get to live in the mountains, and within 4 hours I can get to the Amazon rainforest or the beach. When my sister, Brea, came to visit over Thanksgiving, we went to Machu Picchu, and in March I'm looking forward to going to the Galapagos with Natalie Wendland when she comes to Ecuador!