Our Mission

The Tekeyan Cultural Association (TCA) is a cultural and educational organization devoted to the progress and dissemination of Armenian literature, music, art and other fields of culture. It was founded in 1947 and named after the famous Armenian poet Vahan Tekeyan. A number of loosely affiliated associations and centers were eventually established in Armenia and a number of countries in North America, South America, the Middle East and Europe. The Tekeyan Cultural Association of the United States and Canada was founded in 1969 in Massachusetts and has its headquarters in Watertown.

In the US and Canada, the TCA is a non-profit tax-exempt organization with chapters in different parts of these two vast countries. In addition to its headquarters, it has three cultural centers, the TCA Beshgeturian Center in Altadena, California, the Tekeyan Cultural Center of Montreal, and the Tekeyan Center in New Jersey.  TCA supports drama groups such as the Mher Megerdchian Theatrical Group of Greater New York and the Azad Pem Theatrical Group of Pasadena, and a number of newspapers in the Armenian media, including the weekly English-language Armenian Mirror-Spectator and Armenian-language Baikar in Watertown. It publishes the trilingual Abaka in Montreal.

TCA publishes books, primarily of a literary nature, in Armenian and in English, and organizes lectures, exhibitions, symposia, concerts and other cultural events on Armenian topics. It runs a variety of educational programs and provides scholarships to college and graduate students.

TCA of the US and Canada does not restrict itself to local activities. It has served as a bridge uniting Armenians around the world with Armenia culturally, both in the Soviet period and today.

It supports education in Armenia and Artsakh in various ways. Perhaps the most successful of its programs is the Sponsor a Teacher project, which provides aid to teachers and workers at four schools it sponsors in Armenia and, until the 2020 Artsakh War led to its loss, one in Berdzor (in the Lachin corridor). All of these schools are named after Vahan Tekeyan. TCA has also financed renovations in these schools.

After the 2020 war and the loss of Berdzor, TCA provided assistance to teachers in five different village schools in Artsakh as part of the Sponsor a Teacher program until the loss of the remainder of Artsakh.

TCA has played a major role in the establishment of the Vahan Tekeyan School of Beirut and has continued to provide it with financial support, especially during the crises in Lebanon in recent years. In a separate fundraising effort, it raised money in support of the Hrant Dink School in Istanbul in 2021.

In addition to its support of educational institutions, during times of great need it has provided humanitarian aid to Armenia and beyond. It raised and contributed money for families of Armenian soldiers killed or wounded in the 2016 war, the Armenia Fund during the Artsakh War in 2020, and Syrian Armenians affected by war and the 2023 earthquake.