One Small Step from Santa Isabel
Inside Collins Aerospace’s Santa Isabel operation: advanced manufacturing, workforce training, and an emerging lacrosse community.
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The people, businesses, and ideas shaping Puerto Rico’s future through the game of lacrosse.
Connecting athletes, coaches, professionals, and the Puerto Rican diaspora with opportunities on the island, and introducing Puerto Rico to people who may never have considered it as a place to live, work, or invest.
Read the first featureThree pieces. One spark.
A Conversation with Pedro Rosaly
The head of Hecho en Puerto Rico on the seal, the diaspora, and why entrepreneurs must support entrepreneurs.
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Why La Mecha
A 2023 trip to Puerto Rico with his father, an injury in Seoul, and the idea that became this journal. A reminder that opportunity often begins by seeing potential where others see obstacles.
Read the letterPONCE, PR THE ISLAND THE DIASPORA
Opportunity begins by seeing potential where others see obstacles.
La Mecha is rooted in Ponce, where an abandoned public school (one of hundreds closed across Puerto Rico since 2007) has been restored into a sports academy offering after-school opportunities to students.
01Connect
Athletes, coaches, professionals, and the diaspora with opportunities on the island.
02Highlight
The people and organizations investing in Puerto Rico’s next chapter.
03Inspire
Someone to visit, return home, volunteer, or see the island through a different lens.
From the Editor
Why La Mecha
In the opening game of the 2025 World Lacrosse U20 Championship in Korea, I tore my AC joint and was ruled out for the remainder of the tournament. Representing Puerto Rico had been a goal I had worked toward for years, and suddenly it was over.
I stayed with the team and looked for other ways I could contribute. During the championship, World Lacrosse interviewed me about the Ponce Lions Project and the work we had begun in southern Puerto Rico. That conversation made me realize there was a much bigger story to tell. The idea for La Mecha stemmed from that experience.
La Mecha began as an extension of the Ponce Lions Project. Our goal is to share the people, businesses, and ideas helping shape Puerto Rico’s future through the game of lacrosse, and to connect athletes, coaches, professionals, and members of the Puerto Rican diaspora with opportunities on the island.
As I begin studying business at Boston University, I have become increasingly interested in how sport can bring together community, education, and economic development. If La Mecha inspires someone to visit Puerto Rico, return home, volunteer, or simply see the island through a different lens, then it will have served its purpose.
— The Editor · La Mecha, a Ponce Lions Project
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Feature · Issue 001
One Small Step from Santa Isabel
Neil Armstrong’s “one small step” reached Earth through a Collins radio. Half a century later, inside a Collins Aerospace facility in Santa Isabel, Margaret Horsfield continues that same forward-looking spirit, while her family helps build lacrosse in Ponce from the ground up.
“A bag of lacrosse sticks sitting in a storage room doesn’t build a program. Coaches build programs.”
The Horsfield family moved from Iowa to Puerto Rico and put down roots. David Horsfield became the Ponce Lions’ first coach, and the club now offers a free weekly practice to any student interested in learning the game.
From printed circuit boards to apprenticeship programs training 62 new employees, Santa Isabel shows how first opportunities become lasting pathways and why awareness is the critical first step.
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Pathways to the island.
Organizations and programs mentioned in this issue, for anyone looking to live, work, study, or invest in Puerto Rico.
InvestPRAccelerating economic growth in Puerto Rico.El ComebackAttracting and retaining talent for Puerto Rico. Find your comeback story.Study in PoncePonce Health Sciences University, main campus.Hecho en Puerto RicoDetrás del sello: 117 years uniting the island’s productive sector.Careers at RTXJob openings with Collins Aerospace and RTX, including Puerto Rico.IslandwideDetrás del Sello: Islandwide on the seal, in partnership with Hecho en Puerto Rico.Careers at IslandwideDriver and warehouse openings in Puerto Rico.
La Mecha Dispatch