The Belgian American Educational Foundation (BAEF) is an educational charity. It supports the exchange of university students, scientists and scholars between the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

and

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to ...

. The foundation fosters the higher education of deserving Belgians and Americans through its exchange-fellowship program. Since 1977, Dr.

Emile Boulpaep Emile Louis Boulpaep (born 15 September 1938) is a Belgian physiologist and since 1977 President of the Belgian American Educational Foundation. He is a member of the board of the Francqui Foundation. Education He studied medicine at the Katholiek ...

is the president of the BAEF.

History

During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...

, from October 1914,

Herbert Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover (August 10, 1874 – October 20, 1964) was an American politician who served as the 31st president of the United States from 1929 to 1933 and a member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, holding o ...

organized the Committee for Relief in Belgium (USA) and the ''Commission for Relief in Belgium'' (Belgium). After the war, the University Foundation, and on 9 January 1920, the B.A.E.F., were founded with the budget remaining in the hands of the commission after five years of relief work. The ''Belgian American Educational Foundation'' became the heir of the Commission for Relief in Belgium. After World War I, the BAEF invested in land and buildings for the Université libre de Bruxelles (Solbosch campus) and also for rebuilding the library of the Catholic University of Leuven. In 1925, the BAEF founded the ''Hoover Foundation for the Development of the University of Brussels'' and the ''Hoover Foundation for the Development of the University of Leuven''. The BAEF started providing scholarships for students study abroad. Today, the Hoover Foundation is still divided into two entities: one is still dedicated to the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB) and

Vrije Universiteit Brussel The Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) () is a Dutch and English-speaking research university located in Brussels, Belgium.The Vrije Universiteit Brussel is one of the five universities officially recognised by the Flemish government. listof all ...

(VUB) in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

and the second and biggest one is dedicated to the development of the

University of Louvain A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase ''universitas magistrorum et scholarium'', which ...

(UCLouvain) primarily in

Louvain-la-Neuve Louvain-la-Neuve (, French for ''New Leuven''; wa, Li Noû Lovén) is a planned town in the municipality of Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, Wallonia, Belgium, situated 30 km southeast of Brussels, in the province of Walloon Brabant. The town w ...

and Brussels, and the

KU Leuven KU Leuven (or Katholieke Universiteit Leuven) is a Catholic research university in the city of Leuven, Belgium. It conducts teaching, research, and services in computer science, engineering, natural sciences, theology, humanities, medicine, l ...

Leuven Leuven (, ) or Louvain (, , ; german: link=no, Löwen ) is the capital and largest City status in Belgium, city of the Provinces of Belgium, province of Flemish Brabant in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is located about east of Brussels. Th ...

Notable alumni

Georges Lemaître Georges Henri Joseph Édouard Lemaître ( ; ; 17 July 1894 – 20 June 1966) was a Belgian Catholic priest, theoretical physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and professor of physics at the Catholic University of Louvain. He was the first to th ...

* Karel Bossart * Lotte Brand Philip * Eva Brems *

Albert Claude Albert Claude (; 24 August 1899 – 22 May 1983) was a Belgian- American cell biologist and medical doctor who shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1974 with Christian de Duve and George Emil Palade. His elementary education star ...

Alexander De Croo Alexander De Croo (born 3 November 1975) is a Belgian politician and businessman who has served as the prime minister of Belgium since October 2020. De Croo was born in Vilvoorde, Flemish Brabant, and studied business engineering at the Vrije ...

Gaston Eyskens Gaston François Marie, viscount Eyskens (1 April 1905 – 3 January 1988) was a Christian democratic politician and prime minister of Belgium. He was also an economist and member of the Belgian Christian Social Party (CVP-PSC). He served th ...

* Mark Eyskens *

Corneille Heymans Corneille Jean François Heymans (28 March 1892 – 18 July 1968) was a Belgian physiologist. He studied at the Jesuit College of Saint Barbara and then at Ghent University, where he obtained a doctor's degree in 1920. Heymans won the Nobel Pr ...

* Jean Charles Snoy et d'Oppuers * Denis Wirtz *

Pierre Wigny Pierre Wigny (18 April 1905 in Liège – 21 September 1986 in Brussels) was a Belgian politician of the Christian Social Party (french: Parti Social Chrétien, PSC). He was a lawyer and a member of the Chamber of Representatives from 1949 to ...

References

External links

Belgian American Educational Foundation

{{Authority control Foundations based in Belgium Academic transfer Education finance Student financial aid Scholarships Belgium–United States relations

History

Notable alumni

See also

References

External links