Mission Statement
Our mission has been to educate immigrant populations in the Greater Boston area with the knowledge that education will promote a healthy, vibrant, and flourishing community. The Gilbert Albert Community Center is aware of the sociolinguistic barriers that affect local immigrant populations and threaten to damage individual and communal relationships, as well as cross-cultural development, and seeks to overcome these barriers through ESL courses, workforce training programs, health awareness workshops, and counseling services. The Gilbert Albert Community Center supports local immigrant communities by providing services that will increase cultural awareness and facilitate acculturation and integration.
History
In 2005, Nicole Albert met a Haitian woman on the streets of Boston who could not cash her check because she spoke no English and was not literate in Haitian Creole. Following this chance encounter, Mrs. Nicole spent months teaching her to read and write in Haitian Creole and began introducing English phrases in her kitchen. As the woman attended her lessons, she brought friends over and more people knocked on Nicole’s door to get help with basic tasks—signing their names on a check, reading mail letters, and paying bills. Nicole realized the need in her community and saw the potential to help more immigrants by creating a space dedicated to providing quality lessons in survival English. To this end, she founded the Gilbert Albert Community Center (GACC) in 2007 to educate and assist local immigrant populations in accessing the resources necessary to fully engage in their communities, and to achieve their educational, professional and personal goals. Today GACC delivers the most crucial services educationally and socially to the immigrant populations of Greater Boston.