Parents of a Talented Child from Kočani Organize Free Courses for Future Olympiad Competitors

Anita and Vasil Grchev founded the “Bright Minds” association to help talented children whose families cannot afford additional classes.

Motivated by their personal experience as parents of a talented child, Anita and Vasil Grchev from Kočani established the “Bright Minds” association. Their primary goal is to organize free advanced courses to prepare talented students in the natural sciences for international competitions.

Although the association has existed for only two months, its first informatics camp begins today at Hotel Brana Gradche near Kočani. Until Friday, the junior and senior informatics teams will undergo intensive preparation for upcoming international and world-level olympiads. The training is organized by the Macedonian Association of Informatics.

“The goal of Bright Minds is to support talented students and young people. As parents of a child who has participated in competitions from an early age and has a great passion for informatics and mathematics, we have always done everything we could to provide our son with additional educational opportunities outside school. These included various courses and competition preparation programs, both in Macedonia and abroad.

Knowing how much financial support is required, and seeing so many talented children who have the desire to learn and succeed but cannot afford these opportunities, we decided to establish an association to help and support young talents,” says Grcheva.

Anita Atanasova-Grchev

They connected with Viktor Simjanoski, a former talented student and mathematics competitor who achieved outstanding results and won numerous awards and medals in mathematics at national and international competitions. Together with him, they took the first steps toward achieving their goals.

“Viktor Simjanoski currently lives and works in the United States. He studied at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2011) and the University of Chicago (2013), and works as a Quantitative Researcher at Citadel.

He has a strong desire to help talented Macedonian mathematics students and has already been supporting them in various ways for several years. He is currently working on establishing a nonprofit organization in the United States to provide more effective support for talented Macedonian students,” she explains.

The main objective of “Bright Minds” is to organize courses, training programs, and competition preparation in informatics, mathematics, and other natural sciences. All these activities will be free of charge for students who wish to expand their knowledge. The association also plans to support other organizations and academic associations working in the same fields.

“There are many talented children in our country. Unfortunately, not every family can afford to pay for additional courses.

Our son Vladimir is in seventh grade, and we live in Kočani. Since he was in second grade, we have spent all these years attending various courses and private lessons in Skopje.

These required not only financial resources but also time and considerable effort, going from one place to another to find a suitable teacher. Our son showed exceptional talent from an early age, and thanks to the effort and financial resources we were able to invest, it all paid off,” Anita explains.

Today, Vladimir Grchev is the top informatics student of his generation and one of four members of the Junior Informatics Team representing Macedonia at international olympiads. Last year, he was the youngest participant in the history of the olympiad.

Vladimir Grchev

“Our goal is to provide children like our son with free courses based on a specially designed, more advanced curriculum, in cooperation with the Macedonian Association of Informatics, the Union of Mathematicians, the Society of Physicists, the Union of Chemists, and others.

We believe there are many children like him throughout the country,” says Grcheva.

The association already enjoys strong support from former successful Macedonian competitors who have won numerous medals at international and world-level competitions.

They are willing to help by offering advice, sharing their experiences and knowledge, and assisting with problem-solving in mathematics, informatics, and physics. These individuals can be found on the association's official website, brightmindsofmacedonia.com.

Anita and Vasil Grchev

“The association has existed for only two months, and during this period, we have managed to raise funds for our first project through donations and sponsorships.

For the camp beginning today, we received financial support from the Mayor of Kočani, Ljupcho Papazov, the Municipal Council, and several companies from Kočani, all of which have been publicly acknowledged on our website.

Our goal is to raise as much funding as possible through donations, sponsorships, and international funding sources,” says Grcheva.