In Her Presence supports immigrant families by cultivating connections, nurturing relationships, and providing learning opportunities essential for successful integration.
Our Mission
Driven by the leadership of immigrant women residing in Maine, our mission is anchored in the firm belief that women’s empowerment, particularly through access to education, is crucial to achievement for the entire family. In deep collaboration with individuals born here, who possess lifelong knowledge of systems and opportunities, we strive to bridge cultural divides and harness the strengths of both communities.
Acknowledging the pivotal role women play in shaping the future, our commitment extends to all members of immigrant families. From infancy to elderhood, we work to establish supportive networks, provide access to vital systems and knowledge essential to the prosperity and well-being of everyone.
Our Values
Empowerment
We build skills, confidence, and pathways that enable immigrant women and families to lead their own journeys. Our goal is not to provide quick fixes, but to strengthen long-term capacity for success and self-determination.
Cultural Relativism
We teach English and U.S. cultural navigation not as replacements for participants’ languages and traditions, but as additional tools for opportunity and connection. We aim to honor and preserve each person’s history while expanding their repertoire to thrive in new contexts.
Co-Creation
Our programs evolve in real time through participant feedback and shared experience. We see growth as a two-way process with staff and participants learning from one another and shaping programming together.
Community Building
We go beyond traditional classes to create programs that strengthen families, foster belonging, and connect immigrant women to opportunities. Our work is grounded in relationships and designed to meet real, lived needs in the community.
Our Origins
In Her Presence began with the vision of two women: Claudette Ndayininahaze and Abusana Micky Bondo. They first met in 2012 at the hair salon, the only one for immigrant women in the area, where they began a conversation while sitting together under the hair dryers. It was a conversation about the challenges they faced every day and hopes they had for the future. It ignited a spark.
“We started talking as sisters,” remembers Claudette. Both were active in their individual immigrant communities — Micky in the Congolese community and Claudette in the Burundian community — but what they saw was an opportunity for immigrant women to come together and advocate for the larger immigrant community in Maine.
co-founders Abusana Micky Bondo and Claudette Ndayininahaze
The spark continued to flicker over the following years as Micky served on the Portland Public School Board and Claudette transitioned from working as a housekeeper at Maine Medical Center to a receptionist at the Opportunity Alliance. Claudette saw firsthand the barriers immigrants faced when trying to build a career in a new country. Despite an advanced degree and a management career with a multinational company in her home country, Claudette lacked the English, the opportunities, and the network to build a successful and integrated life in Maine. While language was a significant barrier, mindset was another.
“I needed the confidence to trust myself,” shares Claudette. She kept going, finding success one step at a time, and finding friends and mentors in the mainstream community. In her role at the Opportunity Alliance, Claudette felt the needs of the immigrant community; they were knocking on the door every day. They needed help calling the doctor’s office, they needed an appointment at General Assistance, they needed someone to translate so they could meet with their child’s teacher. Claudette wanted to do something more to help. She asked City Councilor Pious Ali if he knew someone she could work with to help meet the needs of the immigrant community. He gave her Micky’s phone number.
Claudette and Micky picked up the conversation where they had left off at the hair salon years ago. They got to work. “We started sharing ideas and it was aligning with what I was doing for the Congolese community, but this was little broader, a little deeper...with a straight vision,” shares Micky. From there, they put their vision and their mission on paper: an immigrant-led organization, where immigrant women with lived experiences would help support and empower each other to reach their goals and give back to their community.
A yoga class with 12 women soon became an English class for the women. Martha Nangle, who had been teaching Claudette English every Sunday, became the first volunteer teacher for the new students. With passion and persistence, Claudette and Micky continued to drive their visions forward. A key element of their success was their deeply collaborative approach, building long-term relationships with people who shared their passion. There were organizations in the mainstream community helping immigrants, but an immigrant-led organization that focused on women was unique. “We needed to be a bridge...a bridge to empower each other and a bridge to empower the community,” recalls Micky.
A decade later, In Her Presence is still building relationships and bridges. What began as a spark has become a flame, a beacon of light for the immigrant community. As Claudette and Micky saw early on, it was always about more than English; it was about helping people in the immigrant community change their trajectory to build successfully integrated and flourishing lives in Maine.
Now serving as Executive Director, Claudette remains driven to cultivate relationships, make connections, and provide learning opportunities that help change people’s lives. “The people, our network, donors, partners, volunteers, teachers... everyone...anyone who has been with us for years and years, you really feel like everybody is doing what they can to support us, and they keep continuing. They are not stopping. We are not stopping.”