Tell me about Wildwood Hills.

The basic purpose of Wildwood Hills is strengthening the community and transforming lives through giving kids healing, hope and God’s unconditional love. At-risk youths are what we mainly focus on. We serve about 1,000 every year. They come from all across the state.

What’s your role there?

Officially, I’m the development director, but that just means I’m a fund-raiser. My responsibilities include making sure we meet our annual operating budget. So I do a lot of presentations, one-on-one meetings with people and sponsorship stuff as our events happen. Fundamentally, I am a connector. I love meeting people. If they can’t come down and do things one-on-one, this is kind of their opportunity to support the ranch and help on a larger scale. I consider myself kind of a town crier. I love telling everyone about the ranch because I think what they are doing is amazing. So I get to go out and build relationships and connect them to an organization that they believe in and offer that opportunity to effect change.

What went on this past summer?

Summer is our biggest time. For nine weeks, we bring down kids from all the major metropolitan areas and the rural areas. The bottom line is we use that building block of the unconditional love that God provides. The kids need to know that they are valuable, because they go through some of the craziest stuff that I have ever heard of. We have 150 kids there every week. All the kids come on scholarships. None of them are asked to pay any money; people sponsor them. On Saturday, we have our annual “Wild About the Child” fund-raiser at the Des Moines Club.

What’s new?

We are finishing up a capital campaign that built our new equestrian center and we are getting ready to start another one. We want to have group homes so that we are not sending kids back into unsafe homes. The main thing about our program is that it is 10 years long. They start at 8 and come back every year after that. During the school year, we see them at least a couple of times to keep reinforcing skills.

Describe one of your goals.

It’s just succeeding in this position. I’ve only been here for about four months. It’s a huge step for me. I’m pretty young to have it, and I consider it a huge blessing to be director. It’s really important to me that I do this job well. I see it as more of a mission than just a job. It’s a vocation; it is something I’ve been called to do. In the 10 years that Wildwood has been open, over 3,000 kids have been served. I feel like my job, every day, even if I don’t want to do it, I feel like I need to leave myself at the door and bring my cause in. Every time I go out and talk to somebody, that’s sponsoring another child.

What do you do in your spare time?

I like to keep busy; that is for sure. Now that I work on a ranch, I officially need to become an outdoors person. I am learning to ride horses and fish. Specifically, bass fishing; I’m getting lessons on both of those. On the side, I’ve always been more of a creative. I like picking up different forms of dance. Belly dance was the most recent form I picked up about a year ago. And I’m super-involved with my church, which is the Gateway Church. I sing in the band now, which is huge. I’m a hospitality person now, so you can come and I’ll be the smiling face that greets you at the door.

How do you relax?

I paint and listen to music and kind of wander. I’m an extrovert, so I like people and I like being out. Once in a while, I need some down time, so I go on a walk and just be by myself for a little bit.

What else can you tell me?

I have two mentors in the Des Moines area. They are both at Iowa Health System: Cheri Bustos and Marie Murphy. I know that I can go to them with everything, no matter what’s happening, even in my new position. They were super-supportive beforehand, and they are now. I can trust them to give me absolute honesty. They are unapologetically who they are, and I think that is just encouraging to me.