Project Name:     Building Education  Support System for Teachers (BESST)
Location:     Balkh Province (18 districts)
Duration:      Two years   
Start Date:     September 2007
End Date:     March 2009  
Beneficiaries: 12 740 teachers   
Funded by:     USAID-CAII/Ministry of Education(MoE)     
Project Goal: Building the capacity of school teachers, principles and head masters in Balk Province

Project Objectives:
1- To familiarize the school teachers and head masters with new teaching methodologies for quality improvement
2- To increase the management capacity of principles and headmasters for better school management.
3- To support teachers, Development in their subject area

Major Activities:
After the expertise gained through the implementation of accelerated learning project for children who did not have access to schools in 2003-2006, AWEC was selected to implementation of a nationwide teacher’s education program as a part of local consortium. The BESST project, aiming at increasing capacities of formal school teachers is implemented in Balkh and currently is the largest AWEC project.
A team of 360 employees were hired and during the last four months of 2007,were trained to start teacher training and Management training  for principle and headmasters.  principles and headmasters. To oversee the project ,AWEC established  an office in Mazar-e-Sharif ,The project provides teachers with Accelerated Learning tools for improving their pedagogical skills and work methodology.

the total number of teachers involved in the project in Balkh province of December 2008 was 10434.The project is being extended to Paktya province as well.