15 years ago I made a choice that would steer the next chapters of my life. The decision to move to Lesotho and assist at a children’s home would be one that impacted my life for longer than I could have known. My family’s lives have been shaped and steered by our involvement in PCC, and we would like to take some time to share with you some big, exciting and challenging news about where PCC is, and where we see it going in the future.
I’d like to walk you through a brief history of PCC and then share with you our ideas and hopes for its future. As I write this, I realize that many of you have followed along and supported us at different points in this story. Some follow along because you have visited PCC. Some because you know us and support our work through MAF. Many of you we have never met but you support us, or the centre because you believe it is doing something good. We are grateful to each of you.
A Brief History
In December 2006 I resigned from my job as a flight instructor, and somehow found the nerve to tell my parents that as of May 2007, I would be living in the mountains of Lesotho, to help a lady named Jill with a children’s centre she was looking after.
(Right: My first few months in the mountains of Lesotho)
I arrived in 2007, and in 2008 with Jill, we moved to Pulane and in October 2008 opened the Pulane Children’s Centre (Right). The only reason for the quick summary is to get through the story faster, not to give the impression any of that was quick and easy.
I stayed on in Pulane until 2011, when I felt like my stint in Lesotho had come to an end, and I wanted to focus on flying again.
In 2013, Jill suffered a stroke, and in the years that passed, Emily and I often wrestled with the thought of where PCC would go in the future, once Jill retired. We wondered about that so often and so hard that in 2016 we realized we could be part of the answer.
And so after much thought and another job resignation, our family of 3 (Jane was 18 months old at the time), set off and moved back to PCC (Above).
Our focus from day one of taking over from Jill was to ensure PCC was set up for the future. A future that included less involvement from foreigners, and more management and leadership from Basotho.
In 2018, I was employed by MAF and we moved 5.5 hours away to the city. It was time to see if what we had been doing would work: Would the local staff at PCC run things well enough that we didn’t need to live there? The answer was a loud and confident YES!(Right: Our amazing management team, Ntate Hlompho, Me’ Esther and Ntate Labone)
In the last year, Emily and I have been wrestling and thinking about what the next steps are for PCC. We feel strongly that our goals have been met, as the local staff have grown and taken ownership of the centre so confidently. We are also aware that in certain areas we are reaching the limits of our skill set: neither of us are educated in childhood development, trauma counseling, or even management. There is a lot that PCC can still become, and we have seen for a while now that our limitations with time and skill that are stopping PCC moving forward. Lastly, we are aware that we cannot stay in Lesotho forever. In the next few years Jane will move into higher grades, and ultimately there will not be schooling opportunities for her in Lesotho. This is a reality all MAF families in Lesotho face and have to figure out, and our time to make that decision will come sooner than we realize. For our family, that will mean a move out of Lesotho in the next few years.
The Future
With all of that in mind, we spent the last year thinking about the best next step for PCC. After much time and consideration we have decided to begin the process of handing PCC over to new leadership.
Our main goals in this transition are:
- To have as little disruption on how PCC operates day to day.
- Take another step towards local leadership empowerment.
- Provide resources and support to PCC to keep improving.
In order to achieve this, we approached our long time friends and supporters from Liberty Church in Ireland to see if they would be interested in taking ownership of this responsibility. Liberty Church has been involved with PCC since 2015, and started their own children’s centre (under a project called One Day) in Butha Buthe in the north of Lesotho in 2018.
Rob Duff, one of the Pastors at Liberty Church, will be the point of connection between Liberty and PCC. Rob has been on the board of trustees for PCC/AFACTL since 2018. He and his family have visited Pulane regularly over the years becoming good friends with Jill, the staff, and kids (Rob and his family pictured above with Jill).
In addition to asking them to be the responsible overseers, we also created a new position on the ground in Lesotho called the Project Manager. This role is essentially a manager who oversees the day to day of PCC, the finances, the administration as well as sets the course for how PCC develops and improves in the future.
This person’s job is to support the staff at PCC and make sure they have what they need to do their jobs well. We interviewed and offered this job to an amazing person called Lineo (Pictured above with Me’ Esther).She is passionate about development projects that involve children and youth. She is also a natural leader and mentor and we are convinced she will work very well with our team at PCC to support them and help them achieve their goals. In fact, she has been a regular visitor to PCC since 2018, and has often been a resource for us with kids with challenging behavior or counseling needs.
Over the next few months we will be working hard to ensure that the Project Manager here in Lesotho knows how to run PCC well, and has a clear vision for where PCC is going. We will also be working with the Liberty Church team to make sure they understand what it means to direct PCC, to be ultimately accountable for it, and to provide the support and leadership that will continue to help PCC grow.
As our family still plans to be in Lesotho for some time to come, we will be helping PCC in more of a consultant position as this transition takes place and settles. The reality for us is that my work at MAF has increased as I have become the Director of Operations and the Chief Pilot, and it has not been sustainable for us to give PCC and MAF the full time and energy needed for each one to thrive. Right: Rob and Lineo at PCC
I would also like to address the recent passing of Jill Kinsey, the co-founder and previous Director of PCC. Jill passed away in June, but our decision to take these steps with PCC were in motion well before that. In fact, the last conversation I had with Jill was talking about how she felt about Liberty Church stepping in to assist us and ultimately take over.
She was happy about that idea, and had a lot of love for the leadership of Liberty Church and the work they do. So, despite the timing, we are not making this change because of Jill’s passing. Above: The board of trustees for the Centre in 2021. Our family, Jill, and Ntate Mojela, Ntate Sekeka and Me’ Martha.
Our hope through all of this is to clearly set up PCC for a bright future. We have loved playing a part in that, and are excited to see how PCC can continue to help the communities in the Pulane Valley for decades to come.
The timeline for this change begins now, and we will slowly take steps in handing over more and more. Our hope is that by January 2024, Liberty Church and Lineo will have received enough training and help from Emily and I that they are able to run things, with us available for input if needed. The next step would be that by the middle of next year, we would step away completely and allow them to do things without us looking over their shoulder.
Following that, our family plans to remain in Maseru for the foreseeable future and focus on our work with MAF (Right: I love my role as a pilot, Director of Operations and Chief Training Pilot here in Lesotho)
We hope that in this transition you will continue to support PCC. Part of what I want to get across in this message above is that PCC is not at an end, but it is still very much alive and well. We hope you will follow along as PCC continues to help vulnerable children in Lesotho grow into confident and healthy adults.