Beth, our Executive Director as well as our COO, is committed to investing her life and talents in helping others become engaged and effective in strategic initiatives of compassion.
Beth began her professional training in nursing, having in particular a heart to care for special needs children, but she went on to choose a career path as an elementary school teacher. She served for 16 years as a second-grade teacher at The Christian Academy in Brookhaven, PA, the last 7 of those as Lead Teacher of the elementary school. Feeling a growing concern for the needs of children in Africa, Beth went on a fact-finding trip to North Africa in 2004, and a second one to West Africa in 2005. Seeing the plight of orphans, street children, and hundreds of abandoned or abused little ones, Beth’s heart of mercy led her to leave her teaching job and devote herself to try to do something about what she saw.
She lent her skills for one year to a compassion agency to help them develop a children’s program, but then believed that there was a need, along with Jan Bean, to develop a new agency of their own – Compassion Corps – whose primary focus would be to engage the hearts of others and unleash hope for the least loved. Beth works tirelessly to mobilize men, women, and children in North America to become active in service to the poor and suffering in some of Northern Africa’s most difficult places. Everyone who knows Beth knows that she puts her whole heart into everything she does, and colleagues call her a model of servant leadership. She is also an experienced and capable administrator, entrusted with the formidable oversight of the Compassion Corps short-term teams and financial accounts. But her real love is children.
Beth has developed curriculum that can be used to teach and inspire children here in North America to care for those who do not have food or schools or clothing or medical care…things that we may easily take for granted. She has also begun to write books about children in Africa to help bring their stories back to us that we might grow in understanding and compassion. She organizes short-term teams to mobilize many to help run camps for village children who do not have art or music or physical education – or perhaps may not have any schooling at all. She sets up and maintains Compassion Corps’ child sponsorship programs with African field partners to help pave the way for funding for the children’s pressing needs. And her passion to help the helpless has led her to facilitate specific partnerships with those who are doing work with elderly or disabled adults and with special needs children.
For the past five years, Beth has served as Executive Director of Compassion Corps, maintaining constant communication with overseas staff, providing management for dedicated volunteers and fundraising events, and overseeing the organization’s many-faceted programs in Africa. Her impact continues to be great in the lives of increasing numbers both in Africa and here at home.
Ms. Beth McMillen
Executive Director/COO, Compassion Corps
P.O. Box 103
Chester Heights, PA 19017
610-955-8052 (cell)
[email protected]
