About

In 2005-2006, Therese, Steve, their two sons and Steve’s mother traveled around the world for one year, encountering the people and cultural and natural sights of close to 30 primarily developing countries, as well as, working on volunteer projects. View the archive of the trip. Ole Ronkei and family were then living in Colorado Springs, Colorado, at the time, as he was working in global development with Compassion International. Through Ole Ronkei, we visited his and Renoi’s Maasai village of Enoosaen in southwestern Kenya, stayed at his homestead in Enoosaen and worked on phase 2 of a water project, funded by another long-time friend of Ole Ronkei, Jim Bryson of Bryson Distributing of Eugene (a wholesale supplier of knitting needles internationally), and Rotary International. Over several weeks, we cleared and leveled the site of a second underground water source in preparation for the engineers tapping and piping it, as a second clean water source for the community. Read about their work. Scroll to Feb. 5-15, 2006, “Introducing the Enoosaen Water Project.”

Prior to departing on the trip, Therese worked as a public information officer for City of Eugene Parks and Open Space, and, just a few months before the family launched their travels, she received an inquiry about starting a community gardens from Pastor Edward Kanyesigye of then Victory Community Care Services (now Victory Africa Ministries). She forwarded this inquiry to the City of Eugene Community Gardens Manager and also informed Edward that she and her family would be traveling to East Africa during their world trip. Edward immediately invited the family to visit them in Kabale, Uganda. A year later in February 2006, the family arrived and, along with a group of women of the village, helped terrace and prepare the leased plot of land for an active community gardens site, as well as, presented a week-long seminar in a variety of subjects, including land use management, volunteer management and recruitment, and media relations.

In 2016, Andrea Rosenzweig and a delegation of women from Bend, Oregon visited Ole Ronkei and Renoi in their Maasai village in Enoosaen, Kenya and learned about the work of the community based organization founded by Renoi, Pakishu Women Organization. The group visited local schools and met girls returning to school under Renoi's mentorship. They also met the mothers of these girls as they created Maasai beadwork in their workshop. The mothers presented each woman in the group with a handmade beaded bracelet and explained that they create these bracelets in hopes of earning money to help send their daughters and granddaughters to school. This experience was the inspiration for “The Power of Connection Project,” an initiative where she partnered with Pakishu to sell Maasai beaded bracelets in Bend, Oregon and donate the proceeds to sponsor the education of girls in Enoosaen, Kenya.

It started with a 24-day challenge in December, where Andrea purchased 24 bracelets, gave one away each day to a different stranger leading up to Christmas and shared these stories of connection on Facebook. What began as a small act of kindness quickly grew into something much larger. People were deeply moved by the stories and began asking how they could help these strangers and purchase bracelets and become part of the educational sponsorship of Maasai girls in Kenya. This challenge is now an annual event, and, in 2025, Andrea published a book about these stories and building meaningful bridges between people across cultures while addressing barriers to opportunity, especially for young women. Over the years, she has sold thousands of bracelets and helped support girls at every level of education from primary school through college programs.

Over the years, these friendships and partnerships have born much fruit, as Ole Ronkei and Renoi and Edward Kanyesigye and his wife Peace Komugisha have expanded their operations to include robust programs of outreach to marginalized communities, and Therese, Steve, Andrea and many other Oregonians, as well as communities around the world, have contributed to these projects.

In spring of 2023, Ole Ronkei visited Eugene and shortly after that in June 2023, Edward and Peace also visited and shared their work in the community. From these discussions and interactions, the idea of establishing a 501-c-3 charitable organization to provide tax deductibility to donors was born. We called the fledgling organization Lekishon Outreach. “Lekishon” was the name that was given to our son Paul by his adopted Maasai godparents when we celebrated his 12th birthday at Ole Ronkei’s homestead in Maasai lands; it means “Promise of Blessing” in Maasai, and we thought this was an apt description of this effort born out of many years of friendship and cooperative ventures to lift up the marginalized through education and sustainable microenterprise.

Guided by the expertise of tax consultant and investment advisor Steve, we were fully operational by July 2023, and since then our impact has grown exponentially. Therese, with her background in project management and community relations, serves as project coordinator and president of the board, Andrea as co-project coordinator and vice president of the board and Steve as treasurer, and we have recruited board members and members at large who have helped expand our impact.

Lekishon Outreach serves as the principal entity for charitable donations from the U.S. for projects undertaken by Pakishu Women Group in the Maasai lands of Enoosaen, Kenya and by Victory Africa Ministries in Kabale, Uganda.

Steven Curtis, Treasurer
Jennifer Giustina, Secretary
Andrea Rosenzweig, Vice President
Therese M. Picado, President
Stephen Ssenkaaba

Jim Bryson
Edward Kanyesigye
Peace Komugisha
Ole Ronkei
Renoi Ronkei

Our Mission

To provide financial assistance for projects and education, associated with marginalized people in developing countries, and to help facilitate sustainable microenterprise and the achievement of at least a high school education and preferably an advanced education in a diversity of fields, including conservation and wildlife management and eco-tourism.