Jodi Lane
Jodi Lane |
From Architect to Advocate
Building self-sustaining solutions in Kenya.
When Austin, Texas-based architecture student Jodi Lane met Joram Githumbi in 1998, he convinced her to travel to his homeland, Kenya, to help design a school for children orphaned by the AIDS crisis. From Texas to Kenya is a journey of almost 10,000 miles, but that turned out to be small compared to the personal journey it inspired in Jodi.
At first, Githumbi had enlisted Jodi and her fellow grad students at the University of Texas simply as architects, to design and oversee the construction of sustainable schools and dormitories in Kenya under the auspices of a program called the “Kenya
Project.” Moved by the people of Kenya, however, Jodi soon became more personally committed to the project, taking on a role as a board member of the organization Githumbi created and stepping up even as sources of income for the project were precariously scant.
But it was when her mentor and friend Githumbi succumbed to cancer that Jodi really stepped up, taking his place in some respects, and transforming herself from a concerned architect into an organizer and professional advocate for the project.
Out of her participation in a Landmark leadership program that focuses on community initiatives and projects, Jodi saw that she had the wherewithal to step up to the plate to make a profound difference for AIDS orphans in Kenya and to carry on Githumbi’s work. As her project, Jodi created the first “Art+Life+Kenya” fundraiser in Austin with the intention of raising enough money to purchase property in Kenya for a school and orphanage. At the event, which brought together artists and architects from the Austin area, a donor came forth with a loan for $300,000 — enough money to buy property for the school. The Providence Children’s Home in Kenya, Lane says, soon became a reality for 20 “beautiful, unique, little girls, who are now safe and singing away in the home we built them.” The Children’s Home continues growing and plans are to house many, many more.
Jodi’s journey didn’t end with the success of the Children’s Home, though. Through another program she initiated, “Messages in a Bottle,” she is working to craft a worldwide network of people willing to financially support a new kind of school in Kenya: one that is academically rigorous and will eventually be self-sustaining.
Along with Githumbi and the people of Kenya, Jodi credits her participation in Landmark programs with helping her realize the power of community in getting things done. Several of Jodi’s Landmark colleagues have joined the Board of Directors for the Providence Children’s Home in Kenya and are dedicated to other projects, including “Messages in a Bottle.” “The community we have here in Austin (and beyond) is truly inspiring because we are all a community of people drawn to make a difference out there in our world,” she says.
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