Odette Mukole has been about change since the beginning. She grew up in Tshikapa city in the Democratic Republic of Congo ( DRC). Her family was well known for their strong Mennonite faith. Odette first trained as a teacher and then trained and worked in public relations. She always had a heart for social justice. While living and working in the DRC’s capital city, Kinchasa, Odette founded a women’s movement that empowered women to understand and advocate for their often ignored rights. In 2000, after her security was threatened due to her activist work,  Odette immigrated to Canada with her three young daughters. She graduated in 2007 with a degree in Social Sciences from the Canadian Mennonite University in Winnipeg, and has been employed working with newcomers to Canada ever since.

After the death of her father, Odette’s family home in Tshikapa lay empty. Odette had a vision of using the home to help some of the many orphans in the area. Planning for the orphanage began in  2010, the doors opened in 2012 and 35 children have been cared for there ever since. In November, 2015 Mukanzo Orphanage Foundation was accepted as a project of Accountable Works Development, a charitable organization committed to grassroots projects like this in Africa. In the Spring of 2016 Mukanzo Orphanage Foundation was granted charitable status by the Congolese government. The orphanage continues to provide basic necessities to these children which would otherwise have been unavailable to them.