Kathleen Buescher is President & CEO of Provident Counseling, a St. Louis-based non‑profit family & children’s agency founded in 1860. She works with the Board of Directors to set direction for the organization, securing funding and implementing programs to serve the community.
Provident offers services in three divisions: counseling, community services and social enterprises. Within these divisions are programs including: counseling services for adults, children and special groups (batterers, alcohol & drug dependent persons, compulsive gamblers, sex offenders), suicide/crisis hotline, youth development, a community technology center, workforce preparedness and entrepreneurial services such as employee assistance and private home care. Buescher oversees a staff of more than 70 full-time positions in seven locations in metropolitan St. Louis.
Kathleen is a native of Indianapolis, Indiana, and has also lived in Texas, Michigan and Ohio. Her undergraduate degree in psychology is from the University of Texas at Austin. She earned a Master of Social Work from the University of Michigan. Prior to joining Provident in 1989, Kathleen was the CEO of Family Service of Northwest Ohio in Toledo, Ohio. Her early work in social services was with the Texas Department of Human Resources providing child protective services.
Kathleen is the past-chair and a founder of the Board of Directors of The Missouri Alliance for Children and Families, L.L.C, a collaboration of 9 social service agencies which addresses the needs of difficult-to-serve youth in state custody. She is one of the people involved in establishing the Alliance for Social Entrepreneurship in St. Louis to raise the visibility of social entrepreneurship in the community while cultivating the environment for such initiatives to thrive.
She is a member of the board of Logos School (St. Louis) and FEI Behavioral Health (Milwaukee). She's on the Professional Advisory Committee of the School of Social Work at Washington University; is a member of Mental Health Corporations of America; and is an appointed member of the St. Louis County Mental Health Board. She joined The University Club of St. Louis in 1990, and is a past board member. She is a director of the Fund for Education of The University Club. She was in the 1991-1992 class of Leadership St. Louis and has been involved with the St. Louis Forum since 1990.
Her hobbies include genealogy, photography and alternative health care. Kathleen lives in University City, Missouri with her husband David Milligan. She has 2 stepchildren and seven grandchildren. The couple is active at Cornerstone Evangelical Free Church.