Soccer, Service and Solidarity: Mia Mitchell Leads Relief Effort in Jamaica

A common New Year’s resolution is to help others and volunteer to work with those in need. This January, a group of past and present Terps will waste no time on that goal. 

A “Relief and Rebuild Trip” in St. Ann Parish, Jamaica, will take place from Jan. 4-10, 2026, as soccer star Mia Mitchell, her family, and a dedicated bunch of volunteers head south to help the island recover from Hurricane Melissa.

Mia’s parents started doing medical missions down in Jamaica in 2007. She’s helped with medical missions, soccer clinics, and worked with kids in schools throughout her life. By the time Mia was nine, she was working in and overseeing the pharmacy on several mission trips, learning more about the medical field and the people she served with each passing day. 

“As a mom, my heart swells with pride to see our youngest daughter care about people other than herself and those in her environment,” Mia’s mother, RuthAnne Mitchell said. “It makes it all worth it to know the lesson we wanted our kids to learn through mission work sank in! Not just Mia, but her other siblings — two of whom are going on the trip — know that they have a responsibility to care for others.”

A lot of the time, the nonprofit work stems from pastors at various churches throughout the country. This particular time, the pastor at Church On The Rock Ocho Rios contacted RuthAnne with the opportunity to rebuild St. Hilda's Diocesan High School For Girls, which had been decimated by Hurricane Melissa back in October. 

All but one building at St. Hilda's Diocesan High School For Girls had been damaged to the point where they couldn’t hold classes. 

“We hope to get at least one other building working, so the girls can get back to going to school more,” RuthAnne said. “Additionally, the girls have a soccer team, and they lost all their equipment, so we’re hoping to collect and piece together a uniform kit, soccer balls, and other things we can take down so they can start their training.”

Soccer truly is the world’s sport. This upcoming mission trip serves as the latest of countless examples of soccer bringing people together, something Mia is extremely passionate about.

“Soccer attracts very good people,” Mia said. “Very giving people. Both within Maryland and Jamaica, there’s definitely a lot of girls who care a lot about people other than themselves and people who don’t necessarily have the means to help themselves during times like this.”

Mia said the most rewarding work she’s done in Jamaica is working with a place called The Infirmary, which cares for elderly and disabled individuals who can be expensive to care for. 

“The connections that you make with these people, I almost feel like I’ve grown up with them since I started so young,” Mia said. “They’re a big part of my childhood, so I feel like I’ve made family with the people that we work with down there.”

Along with playing for Maryland’s women’s soccer team, Mia also plays for the Jamaican National Team. It’s a soccer connection she shares with Audra Poulin Esper, who played at Maryland from 2000-03.

The two got to know each other earlier in 2025, and just months later, are headed on a non-profit mission trip together. Esper was in College Park in September. She spoke to the women’s soccer team about not taking a moment of their college careers for granted, but also encouraged them to find ways to serve others.

Esper works with Rayo De Sol, a non-profit organization that's focused on sharing hope with children and their families in Nicaragua through collaborative, community development programs. She spoke with the soccer team about the work she was actively doing at the time: raising money for rain-water harvesting equipment to bring safe water to villages in Nicaragua. 

She recalls seeing one specific pair of eyes, Mia’s, locked on her throughout her talk. The two connected after the talk and immediately bonded over their hearts for others. 

“I said to her, ‘you and I are going to do something together.’,” Esper recalls telling Mia. “‘I don’t know what, if it’ll be Jamaica or rain-water harvesting or what, but we’re going to do something.’ It all just came together because of this five-minute conversation I had with her. The Lord works in mysterious ways. There are no accidents.”

Just days after the hurricane landed, Mia was on the phone with Esper, who got in contact with some of her colleagues at Rayo De Sol, as well as RuthAnne, and started working logistics for a life-changing mission.

“The trip is just snowballing,” Esper said. They currently have close to a dozen members ready to head south, with a couple more possible spots remaining. 

“In all the years, this is the 21st trip that we’ve led down there, we’ve ranged from 12 people to 65 people,” RuthAnne said. “But literally, God always works it out where the exact right number of people are there at the exact right time. It all just works out. I lose a lot of sleep, get super nervous, and then we get there and it just kind of works out.”

RuthAnne’s heart for helping others and the joy she finds in generosity has passed down to Mia, and her connection with Maryland soccer has created an incredible opportunity for the Terps to make meaningful impacts down in Jamaica. 

“What we follow is out of the book of Luke that says, ‘to whom much is given, much will be required’,” RuthAnne said. “In my family, we have been so blessed to be able to do this. We have formed some real relationships.”

They’ll spend the week in Jamaica cleaning up debris, replacing windows, painting roofing,

light construction, and delivering supplies to affected families. This will be the first time that Rayo De Sol works outside of Nicaragua, and the non-profit’s executive director and another U.S.-based coworker of Esper’s is making the trip.

“I’m very new to this line of work,” Esper said. “But I’m just so excited. This is the first time we’re using our gifts and resources, not for Nicaragua, but for a totally different cause.”

The trip is being funded through Bridge Church in Winter Haven, Florida. People have been able to help out in more ways than just going on the trip. Mia’s been asking her teammates for gear donations, cleats, and clothing. 

“I know on my end, I have enough gear under my bed to give to each girl out there,” Mia said. “We get so much gear here and we’re so blessed, but I just want to share what I can with people.”

The goal is for this to be the first trip of many from College Park to Jamaica, as January’s trip looks to lay the blueprint for what service from the Terps can look like. 

“I plan on this being successful and then repeating it,” RuthAnne said. “Hopefully, we get into a rhythm and figure out how to keep coming back and doing things like this.”