What I'll be doing next year (1)
As with any mission work, I’m preparing myself to be flexible in the types of work that I have to do next year. I know that even the best-constructed plans and expectations that LCI and I have for my year will change as God’s intentions are revealed.
That said, ongoing conversations with LCI have resulted in a rough sketch of my year next year. I will be living and working in a community of Juarez known as Carlos Chavira alongside David Kaufmann, Middlebury alumnus and full-time missionary in the community. This community is in the process of evolving from cardboard shacks to wooden houses to cinderblock homes. LCI’s ministry to the community is described in some detail below, focusing on helping the people of Juarez (and, in my case, Carlos Chavira) develop our community.
In terms of education, for instance, LCI provides English, GED, and computer classes through the programs described below, as well as business training. Athletic programs reach out to the community through soccer leagues, and weight-training allows us to develop friendships with some of the young men who are involved in gang activity.
What I'll be doing next year (2)
I will most likely spend time helping to develop the computer lab that was installed by Middlebury College students last February, obtaining Internet access to allow for the completion of GED programs and helping to develop computer education and computer-based English education curricula. I may help teach classes as well. I will be involved in helping as needed with any short-term groups that come down during my time in Juarez by providing transportation, logistical support, and hopefully also ministering to the groups by facilitating discussion about mission and God. Those groups will hopefully include a group from Middlebury College, about which I’m extremely excited.
David and I are both committed to involving ourselves as community members in Chavira as much as possible. We hope to undertake every project and participate in every aspect of our lives as partners with our neighbors. To that end, we will be living in Chavira and spending as much time as we can in Juarez. Trips to El Paso will be necessary for administrative meetings and for Bible study groups, as well as when needed to transport supplies, but we hope to minimize those as much as possible.
What I'll be doing next year (3)
In addition to my role in these types of community development projects, I hope to spend a significant amount of time working on LCI’s medical mission program. I will be engaging in discussions with LCI’s current medical team, Mexican health officials and medical personnel, and with doctors from the York area that have experience in international health care. I intend to travel to Louisville in November for a medical mission conference.
My goal is to gather these sources of knowledge and combine them with my own experience from Honduras, and research about health care in developing countries in general and Mexico specifically. We at LCI then intend to assemble as an administrative and medical team and discuss the objectives and growth of our medical mission program. I hope to be involved in implementing the programs that result from this discussion.
What I'll be doing next year (4)
Some of the topics that we’ve discussed so far include:
- Determining the areas of need for medical care in Juarez
- Learning how to effectively integrate short-term medical and surgical mission, long-term medical and surgical mission, Mexican health care, mobile health care, site-based health care, pharmaceutical needs and all of the other facets of medical mission
- Developing a program that has a significant training aspect: for aspiring health care workers, students, first-time medical missionaries, Mexican doctors, and others
I currently see my opportunity to serve with Life Challenge as a one-to-two-year commitment, as I hope to be attending medical school after that time. Because of this factor, part of my job will also be to prepare for someone to take my place, by finding financial support and developing materials to aid in the transition.