Jetsun Pema (Tibet)

Jetsun Pema (Tibetan: རྗེ་བཙུན་པདྨ་; Wylie: rje btsun padma; Chinese: 杰千贝玛; pinyin: Jiéqiān Bèimǎ, born July 7, 1940) is the sister of the 14th Dalai Lama and served for 42 years as the President of the Tibetan Children's Villages school system for Tibetan refugee students.

Jetsun Pema was born in Lhasa, on July 7, 1940. She went to India in 1950 and studied first at St. Joseph's Convent in Kalimpong and later at Loreto Convent in Darjeeling from where she completed her Senior Cambridge in 1960. In 1961, she went to Switzerland and then to England to do further studies. She returned to India in April 1964. At the behest of her elder brother, the 14th Dalai Lama, she became the President of the Tibetan Children's Villages, holding that position until her retirement in August 2006. She held this position for more than 42 years.

Because of her efforts, today TCV projects includes five Children's Villages with attached schools, seven Residential Schools, seven Day Schools, ten Day Care Centers, four Vocational Training Centers, four Youth Hostels, four Homes for the Elderly, and an outreach program for over 2,000 children in exile. All in all, the TCV overlooks the well-being of more than 15,000 children and youths. In 1970, at the first General Body Meeting of the Tibetan Youth Congress, Jetsun Pema was elected as its Vice President, and at the 1984 first General Body Meeting of the Tibetan Women's Association, she was elected as an Adviser. In 1980, she was sent by the Dalai Lama to visit Tibet as the leader of the third Fact Finding Delegation and for three months traveled extensively all over the country. Jetsun Pema is also the Governing Body member of the Tibet House in New Delhi and the His Holiness the Dalai Lama Charitable Trust.

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