The Lord quietly uses Paraclete associates to do extraordinary things. I recently spoke with Julie Field about her amazing work in Ethiopia, Africa.
Both of Julie’s grandfathers were preachers and her parents PKs (preacher kids). Mom and Dad sang in church and Mom played piano and organ, so Julie grew up with the hymns of faith. When Julie was 9 her dad died and gratefully heaven became an even greater reality.
Julie earned a bachelor’s degree in fashion merchandizing and began a 25-year career in retail management. She also became a single mother. When her son was 2, she started spending her vacations with missionaries in Poland and the Philippines.
In 1990, when she was 36, she began a 15-year Christian therapy program to deal with childhood issues. The program healed, redeemed and discipled her. She learned how to “know what was truth and what was not, what of her past was legalism and what was life experience.” This helped her to repair and reconstruct a damaged view of God.
Julie became part of a singles group. After a time, women started asking Julie to disciple them. She replied, “This is my life. I’m in a ton of pain and I’m in a difficult place. But if you’ll take me how I am, I’ll teach you some of the basics.” She started them with the names of God and went on from there.
Some of the group members went to the singles director and said, “We want you to consider Julie speaking on Tuesdays.” She did her first session on relationships of grace which she drew from the therapy that had changed her life. That group stayed together for six years and is where God honed her speaking gift.
Then her life took some unexpected turns.
Her son, Jeff, left for 4 years at the Coast Guard Academy on a full scholarship.
At work in the year 2000, she tripped over an incorrectly placed planter and injured her neck, knee, and shoulder. She spent the next 2 years of life on a couch while undergoing cervical fusion and knee surgeries. The fellowship of her singles’ group helped her through that difficult period.
Her mom married for the third time after her second husband passed away. Her new stepfather was more like her own father and encouraged her mom to believe what Julie said about earlier abuse. That helped heal the family.
Julie could no longer handle the physical labor a retail position demanded, so they prayed about her next steps. Then, her mother and new stepfather felt led to pay for Julie to attend Fuller Theological Seminary. She graduated in 2005 with a master’s degree in Intercultural Studies with a leadership concentration. From there, she became the singles pastor at Saint Andrews Presbyterian Church in Newport Beach.
Her church also became part of the Finishing the Task ministry and adopted a people group in Ethiopia. The leader of the church’s effort contacted Julie and said, “You’ve got the education and management experience from your retail career and leadership in the hurricane Katrina relief effort. I’ll pay your way if you come to Ethiopia with us.” So, Julie went to Ethiopia in 2006 and worked with translators on a three-year project to put the Jesus Film into local languages.
In 2010, Julie and Patti (a woman the Lord brought to work with Julie) began several years of women’s conferences in northern Ethiopia. After a while, local pastors would sit in the back of the meetings and listen. Then church leaders invited Julie and Patti to speak at men’s conferences. Men’s conferences traditionally focused on leadership, not on relationships, but Julie and Patti talked about redemption and forgiveness.
The man who originally invited Julie to Ethiopia occasionally came back to Ethiopia from the US during the Jesus Film translation project. Then, he brought his wife and daughter, Ansley, with him for the premiere showing of the completed film. While there, Julie and Ansley visited local schools. They found 80 to 100 kids crowded into a single classroom with neither books nor supplies. In Ethiopia, cultural norms impede girls from asking questions in class, so they become discouraged. They learned that only about 3% of Ethiopian girls even finish high school. Many drop out of school are married at 14 and pregnant at 15.
Ansley returned to Ethiopia in 2009 with books for the classrooms, but asked, “What else can we do?” Limited funds prevented them from forming a school for girls. So, in 2011, they started a Saturday tutoring program called Pink Girl (Power In Knowledge) with 15 girls and an idea.
Julie accepted the role of Executive Director, then recruited teachers to offer academic counseling in math, physics, biology, chemistry, economics, history, geography, along with spoken and written English.
Then they learned of research revealing how life skills (also called social emotional learning, or SEL) affected academic skills. So, they developed curriculum and hired qualified female coaches that taught twelve life skills twice a month that include: self-esteem, assertiveness, coping with stress, decision-making, friendship formation, coping with emotions, conflict resolution, and self-awareness.
Initially, Julie wanted to hire only women teachers. But the pool of qualified candidates was too small. After praying with a friend, the Lord revealed they should include vetted men teachers who would become examples of respect and safety for the girls. The girls learned what respect looked like and how to discern disrespect.
The Pink Girl program brings 7th to 12th grade girls in for six to seven hours of small classes (usually less than 20 girls) every Saturday to cover the six academic subjects covered in public school during the week, and then twice a month for life skills training. They conduct the academic classes in English and the life skill sessions in their heart language, Amharic.
The Ethiopian education system starts pre-college exams in the 7th grade, all in English. The schools teach the boys English but send the girls home to work instead. Pink Girl responded by offering a one-week summer camp every year to improve the girls’ English skills. The camp staff developed games to encourage the girls to practice. For example, they play a raffle-style game. Every time a girl speaks English to a staff member, she receives a raffle ticket. The girls also form teams for various competitions in dramas, songs, and skills. The winners earn more tickets. The tickets can be redeemed on the last Friday of camp for pens, notebooks, underwear, lotion, and other things.
Today, PinK Girl operates three campuses for 420 students, 25 teachers, and 10 administrative staff. All Pink Girl students pass their pre-university exams, then continue on to earn college and university degrees. Two hundred and five are currently in college, 185 have graduated, and 70% are working in their chosen fields. The Pink Girl program has confirmed that intentional life skill training leads to positive academic outcomes by becoming the most successful girls education program in Ethiopia.
PinK Girl exists to empower marginalized young women in Northern Ethiopia through dynamic social and emotional learning strategies that engage rich experiences of belonging and connectedness through the investment of Life Skills Coaches across critical developmental stages prior to college alongside effective academic support.
Julie continues to serve as Executive Director. She spends two to three months twice a year in Ethiopia, followed by four months in the USA. Her lateral team management style enables each staff member to add his or her their voice in developing and running th Pink Girl programs. This freed Julie to set vision and mentor the lead team. She, like all Paraclete associates, raises 100% of her own support.