For 28 years, Midway residents Kent and Priscilla Pate have served as missionaries, pastors, keynote speakers, and life and business coaches. From American inner-city neighborhoods to communities across the globe, they have shared the Gospel while also bringing leadership skills they gained in the corporate world prior to their ministry calling.
Five years ago, Kent and Priscilla discovered a new mission field–incarcerated U.S. military veterans. Today, through their KPM Leadership Academy, they have supported and graduated over 1,500 students behind the wire through transformational leadership programs. Their vision for 2024 is to continue expanding the academy’s reach into eight Texas prisons, furthering their dedication to transformative rehabilitation and societal reintegration.
As a result of their legacy of selfless service, the Pates were recipients of the 2024 Governor’s Lifetime Achievement Award, presented by First Lady Cecilia Abbott at the 40th Annual Governor’s Volunteer Awards. Presented in conjunction with One Star Foundation, this award recognizes exemplary service of individuals, groups and organizations that have made a significant contribution to Texas communities through service and volunteering.
Kent: Back in 1995, Priscilla and I were mentored by our pastors, some really powerful spiritual Christian people. Our lives were really transformed, to the point where we left our corporate careers in Houston and went into full-time ministry training in Fort Worth. From there, it opened up a whole new world for us. Because of our corporate experience, we were immediately thrust into leadership, and we began teaching leadership in the mission field.
Priscilla: Kent and I have always felt called to underserved communities. When we traveled to other nations, we were teaching leadership–going in and finding those people that were influential in their communities and building them up to be able to then lead, you know, in schools and churches and communities and things like that. They became influential people.
We were doing some leadership training in churches and in businesses, and five years ago someone approached us about taking our leadership training – we call it transformational leadership, it’s servant leadership – into a prison. So basically, we just transitioned exactly kind of what we were doing in other nations and in the corporate world, and we brought that same type of high level training into the prisons.
Kent: We just began to take one step at a time. When we went into our first prison, we were nervous. We were uneasy about it. We didn’t know what to expect when we walked into our first maximum security prison five years ago. We met six men who were veterans, and when we walked out, we were changed. We realized it was like a calling; we really needed to pursue this seriously.
Kent: When we began doing prison ministry, we discovered there were all these incarcerated veterans – over 8,000 – that we do nothing about. Both our dads are Marines, and we have a lot of family members who are veterans, so we asked ourselves, “How could this be and how could this happen, and what could we do about it?’.
Priscilla: When Kent and I first found out, we were shocked because we had never even thought about veterans being in a prison, but over 50 percent of those veterans come back (from serving) with diagnosed PTSD. Without the proper support and the proper training and proper reintegration from their military life back into civilian life, a lot of them have drug abuse problems, addictions, anger–you know, all the things that go with PTSD. Then on top of that, we found out that over 20 a day commit suicide. So we just felt like now that we knew this, we had to do something about it. That’s when the KPM Leadership Academy in the prisons was formed.
Our vision has been to unlock potential and unleash purpose in these veterans, and we believe there’s no better noble cause than this, because they fought for our freedom and now it’s our opportunity to give back to them. So we chose to serve those who have served us.
Kent: We do color guard. We do a missing man ceremony. We do a cap and gown graduation. When you reactivate veterans, that leadership and training they had in military causes them to be rebirthed and transformed on the inside. When that happens, it gives a purpose in prison. I like to hear what Priscilla says to them, which is to have your purpose while in prison. Don’t wait till you get out of prison, because it will be too late. If they keep their prison mindset when they’re released, they’ll go right back in. The recidivism rate is very high, so our goal is to raise them up in leadership (so they will succeed when they get out).
Priscilla: In each program, we have some standard classes they go to. We have personal development, an entrepreneurship class, and a core class called Beyond Success. That book is divided up into core values and intentional living, so we start with that. Then we have some electives, which we would call my Toastmasters. We also have some PTSD courses that are peer-to-peer.
The facilitators are actually the inmates. Those are usually our veteran leaders. When we first start in a unit, we just have veterans in our courses. We take them through our training; through that, we have leaders that surface who really are exceptional. Then we branch out to the general population.
Once we get to that point, the veterans can invite people, and they’ll fill their table up with people they’ve invited. And it’s great, because we start each class with our veterans; they do the pledge of allegiance, and they do a call to arms. We start out with a prayer, and we have a video we watch. It really gives a sense of patriotism. A lot of those young men who are non-veterans have never really had that exposure for the love of country, so those veterans really set a precedent I believe is much needed for young people in our society today. It’s really a beautiful thing to watch. Our veterans do a great job.
Kent: We go once a week to four maximum prisons, and we’re growing. We have a couple of invitations right now and a couple of prisons we’re looking at going into. In the past five years, we have graduated over 1500 men from the KPM Leadership Academy, and it’s still evolving and growing. Our goal for 2024 is to be in eight Texas prisons.
Kent: From the original six veterans we started with, one has been released, but the other five are still incarcerated. They’re still doing an outstanding job in leadership, and we’re still learning and growing by watching and observing them and getting to know them.
From the 1,500 people we’ve graduated from the KPM Leadership Academy, we’ve got multiple people who’ve been released. Last year, we had our first gala at The Woodlands Waterway Marriott. We had a whole group of men who have graduated the KPM Leadership Academy at a table together. Our goal is to build an alumni program, to have them speak to our guests, and let them hear and see how well rounded they are due to the programs we teach. At our gala last year, we had two of our graduates speak, and they did an outstanding job. Our guests said they were surprised at how well they communicated.
Priscilla: It was wonderful. We went to a beautiful ceremony at the governor’s mansion, where they told a little bit about our organization; then we received a framed certificate from the governor and a beautiful crystal award. Our children were there, too. We always say we may be the face of the organization, but our kids have been a big part of all we’ve done. We couldn’t have done it alone.
For more information on the KPM Leadership Academy, visit kentonpateministries.com/leadership
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