About – New Mexico Christian Children's Home

ABOUT US

OPEN HEARTS! CONNECTED HANDS!

The Mission of New Mexico Christian Children’s Home in partnership with family, church, and community is to transform each child we serve into a Christian champion who is a respected, responsible citizen through quality residential, adoptive, and single-parent homes and services provided by a dedicated professional team under God’s direction.

OUR HISTORY

In 1954, the New Mexico Christian Children’s Home opened its doors to help children and families in crisis.

Today, we serve about 45 children in our residential homes to help children whose families can’t or won’t provide for their needs.

In 1979, we added “A Mother’s Choice”, a licensed New Mexico adoptive agency. A Mother’s Choice provides a complete range of professional services and confidential, compassionate assistance to birth mothers and fathers and provides each child we serve a quality adoptive home.

In 1983, we began our ministry to single parents to meet a growing need in our society. Our single parents are provided a home, utilities and other necessities during the 2-4 year program while they live with their children and improve their living conditions. Our goal for each single parent is that after completing our 2-4 year program, they are able to fully support their families with a new career or a higher paying job.

The New Mexico Christian Children’s Home has 3 causes, yet one mission. Our mission is to serve the needs of children and families. We serve together with families in need of our residential homes, we bring families together in our adoptive homes and we keep families together in our single parent homes.

https://youtu.be/v58TZ0cjUPg

WHAT WE DO

At the New Mexico Christian Children’s Home, we serve children in three ways through our Residential Homes, Adoptive Homes and Single Parent Homes. With these emphases on family, it is our goal to raise the children we serve by following the example of the family of Jesus. Luke 2:52 gives us a brief glance into the childhood of Jesus and the four areas that His parents focused on. Based on this model, we have four areas of focus that support the children and families we serve.

“And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.”
Luke 2:52

Recreation and Fitness (Stature)

Our focus on Recreation and Fitness addresses the physical needs of our children in a variety of ways. We provide opportunities for recreation through our gym and playgrounds on our campus. Many of our children participate in football, baseball, basketball and soccer in city leagues and at the public school.

We also provide them opportunities to learn the value of work through internships and working on the ranch. We teach the importance of proper hygiene and balanced nutrition to ensure they grow up to be physically healthy.

We also provide medical, dental and vision care for our children to ensure they are healthy and properly cared for.

Many of our children grow up at the Home so we do our best to make their time here as much like a family as possible. We have family meal times in the cottages, celebrate birthdays, holidays and other milestones with our children just as any functional family would do.

Extended Learning (Wisdom)

Our children come to us with a variety of issues. Some of these require loving discipline and behavior management while others may require professional counseling. Many of our children come to us with deficiencies in their education and we work hard to help them catch up.

To focus on extended learning, we provide our children with trained caregivers to live in our cottages, and a professional staff to provide advice and training to our single and adoptive parents. Utilizing our relationships with local mental health care providers, we work to ensure the children in our care get the professional help they need.

Our Learning Center contains a computer lab, volunteer tutors and a well-stocked library of books to aid in our student’s education. Through generous donations, we are able to provide scholarships for college and vocational schools.

Our goal is for each child who finishes our residential program to graduate from high school and with every child we serve, that they learn to make wise choices in their lives.

Farm and Livestock (Favor with Man and Creation)

Our Farm and Livestock focus serves two purposes. First, through the ranch, the program provides our beef and pork for the children and single parents in our Residential and Single Parent Homes. You will see a variety of animals at our ranch. There are cattle, sheep, pigs, goats, rabbits and even a miniature donkey and a llama! The ranch provides our children an opportunity to participate in 4-H and to show animals at the County Fair. By working on the ranch with the animals, our children learn the value of work and develop a love of God’s creatures.

Shooting Stars 4-H provides our residents an opportunity to interact with other adults and children in the farm and ranch communities of New Mexico. This instills in them a sense of community and belonging as they learn to love God’s creatures and God’s people.

Spiritual Life (Favor with God)

A focus on spiritual development is also a major aspect of our work at NMCCH. We have a full time Campus Life Minister that ministers to the spiritual needs of our residents and single parent families. Our Campus Life Minister shares the good news of Jesus with our residents and single parent families through both individual and group Bible studies, provides spiritual counseling and encourages them in their walk with Jesus.

We also meet their spiritual needs through church family activities, Bible camps, Leadership Training for Christ and the positive Christian example of our house parents and staff.

Our goal is to teach our children how to be responsible members of society and involved members of a local church family. Ninety percent of our residents and many of our single parents and their children come to Christ during their time at NMCCH.

1 Mission – 3 Causes

This is what we are all about at the New Mexico Christian Children’s Home. We do this without government money and depend on the generosity of private donors to accomplish our mission. Will you help us today?

Donate

OUR LEADERSHIP TEAM

R.C. “Rod” Self, Executive Director
R.C. Self (Rod) has served New Mexico Christian Children's Home for forty years, currently as Executive Director. He holds Bachelor's degrees in psychology and religion from Eastern New Mexico University and a Master's Degree in Biblical Studies and Counseling from Abilene Christian University. He and his wife, Liz, have raised five children in Portales.

Rod is currently a member of the national Coalition on Residential Excellence and serves as the Vice-President of the Christian Coalition of Homes for Children in New Mexico.

Aaron Goodman, Director of Business Operations
Aaron holds a Bachelor's Degree in Electrical Engineering and a Master's Degree in English with emphasis in Critical Theory and Cultural Studies, both from New Mexico State University. He came to NMCCH after a thirty year career in engineering and project management supporting NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, and spends his working hours happily "building new stuff" to continually improve our technology and methods.

Aaron has been married to his wonderfully patient wife Lana for nearly thirty years, and together they are blessed with three amazing daughters.

Allen Mann, Director of Public Relations
Allen holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Biblical Languages from Harding University and a Master’s Degree in Christian Counseling from Louisiana Baptist University. He brings many years of Christian ministry experience along with 8 years in Residential Childcare to the Public Relations Department.

He has been married to his high school sweetheart, Resa for almost 40 years and they have 3 adult children and two grandchildren.

Aaron Stickler, Director of Residential Homes
Aaron earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice from Fort Hays State University. He and his wife, Tiffany have been married for 7 years and have 5 children, 3 girls and 2 boys. He has worked with children for 16 years, including 7 years as a house parent. He joined the NMCCH family in April 2018.

Sandra Caldera, Director of Adoptive Homes and Counseling
Sandra holds a Bachelor’s degree in University Studies with an emphasis in psychology and early childhood education and a Masters degree in Mental Health Counseling from Eastern New Mexico University. She has 5 years experience working in the community with families and children. She is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and is SAFE certified to provide home studies. She provides counseling services to Adoption Families, Birth Parents, Children in our Residential Home, and Families in our Single Parent Homes. She enjoys spending time with her son and family.

Bill Marshall, Director of Single Parent Homes
Bill Marshall has been working for New Mexico Christian Children's Home for the past 10 years. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Bible & Theology from Gulf-Coast Bible College and served as a minister for more than 30 years. He loves spending time with his wife, Judy, and serving the single parent families through the ministry of the Home!

OUR BOARD OF DIRECTORS

If you would like to contact any of our Board Members you may e-mail them at board.of.directors@nmcch.org. Please indicate the board member you would like to contact or the specific committee for which you would like information. Thank you for your interest!