Students cross the border from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, to El Paso, where they attend the Lydia Patterson Institute. More than 400 students go to the school.
The Lydia Patterson Institute, the only United Methodist school on the Texas-Mexico border, aims to develop bilingual and bicultural leaders for mission and ministry.
The participating congregations are Lovers Lane UMC, First UMC Rowlett, First UMC Coppell, First UMC Dallas, University Park UMC, First UMC Frisco, Suncreek UMC Allen and First UMC McKinney. The young adults will rotate through the different departments of the local churches.
The Instituteand the North Texas Conference are covenant partners through the NTC’s Center for Leadership, said Dr. Keith Payne Boone, center director.
“The partnership exists to foster a deeper and lasting relationship between the Lydia Patterson Institute, high school students, host churches and host families,” he said. “While the students who come from the Lydia Patterson Institute gain insight and leadership skills from the host pastors, church, youth group and their host family, we in the North Texas Conference, likewise, receive the zeal and passion of a young person with unique gifts and grace for ministry.”
More than 400 young men and women — most of them from Ciudad Juarez, just across the border from El Paso — are educated annually at the Lydia Patterson Institute.
The school got its start in 1913, when Lydia Patterson, a Methodist laywoman acting through the Women’s Missionary Society of her church, noticed that Hispanic boys in el barrio had no school to attend. In response, she set up schools in the homes of some Mexican Methodists.
Churches interested in participating in next summer’s internship program may contact Dr. Boone at boone@ntcumc.org.
