January 20, 2003

JODI HENDERSON plays basketball with students at Maralal High School in Kenya last summer (above) and lkids around with children at one of three orphanages the Wayland students visited.

Wayland grad to student teach in Kenya
___By Teresa Young
___Wayland Baptist University
___PLAINVIEW--Student teaching will take an international twist this spring for a recent graduate of Wayland Baptist University.
___Jodi Henderson of Lubbock, a December 2002 science graduate, will spend the next few months in Nairobi, Kenya, to complete her student teaching requirements at Rosslyn Academy.
___The unique arrangement will combine a love for teaching with a love for missions.
___It also will fulfill the longtime dream of Jim Todd, chairman of the Wayland's School of Education. For years, he has dreamed of exposing students to other cultures while completing their requirements for student teaching.
___Todd called Henderson "a pioneer, a door-opener" and noted that "it takes a special student to be able to do this."
___But the rewards will be great, he predicted: "She's going to be able to see the interaction of culture and the impact of the various socio-economic levels in a third-world country. She'll also be doing a multicultural study, looking at the public schools in Kenya and comparing them to a private school. When she gets back in April, she'll do a seminar for our students on education in third-world countries."
___Henderson's love for international missions was sparked by a trip to Romania in summer 2001. She worked with Buckner Orphan Care International in orphanages.
___On that trip, she said, she understood God's call on her life.
___"God has given me this compassion for orphans that I can't run away from," she explained.
___Last summer, Henderson participated in a three-week mission trip to Kenya through Wayland. She and a dozen other Wayland students visited three orphanages. During her student-teaching assignment, Henderson will volunteer in one of those orphanages she previously visited.
___Henderson will be teaching sixth-grade science at Rosslyn Academy, an American day school following American curriculum. The school was established for children of missionaries but has now attracted others. The student population is about 70 percent North American, and students span 30 nationalities.
___Becoming the first Wayland student to do her student teaching overseas did not happen easily. It happened in part with guidance from Vaughn Ross, a Wayland science professor who is a former missionary to Kenya.
___"Through all of it, I've seen God's hand and God's leading or I wouldn't have continued," Henderson said. "I've gone through the really excited phase and the really scared phase. The comfort level and friends here are unbelievable, but God has really provided and has worked out the details, so that eased my fears."
___Henderson left for Kenya Jan. 9 and will return April 19. She hopes the double-edged experience that weaves her teaching skills with missions work will help her discern God's will for her future.
___"My mom would rather me not leave," she admitted. "But my dad says he couldn't be more proud that he raised someone who will follow God anywhere."
___

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