Azhe'é Bidziil (Strong Fathers) Program

Hosts Amber-Rose and Shermaine discuss the Azhe'é Bidziil (Strong Fathers) Program with LeDaniel Gishie Jr., Nolan Tsinigine and Tiffany Begay from Johns Hopkins- Center for American Indian Health. The program goal is to "increase economic stability of Native fathers and their families, reduce violence in rural Native communities and increase health relationships and co-parenting in Native communities." Ledaniel and Nolan share their experience working program facilitators and the ways they educate and engage with other fathers through this program. Since this podcast addresses health for mothers and children, we must also address the health of our fathers, uncles, and grandfathers who take on an important role in Diné families. Ahéhee'!

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This podcast was sponsored by the Arizona Department of Health Services through federal funding from the Health Resources & Services Administration, with support from the Navajo Native American Research Centers for Health (NARCH) Partnership between Diné College and Northern Arizona University through federal funding from the National Institute of Health’s National Institute of General Medical Sciences, award number S06GM142121. The views expressed are the sole responsibility of the program staff and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Arizona Department of Health Services or the United States Government.

Transcript

Amber-Rose
Ya'at'eeh. Welcome to the MCH podcast where we discuss maternal and child health topics and provide strategies for improving the health of Navajo families. Amá dóó áłchíní ats’íís baa áháyá baa yadelti (Translation, we will be talking about the health of mothers and children).

Sharmaine
We invited special guests LaDaniel Gishie, Tiffani Begay, and Nolan Tsingine with the Azhe’é Bidziil’/Strong Fathers program. Thank you for joining us today, could you tell us a little about yourself and your role with the Azhe'é Bidziil’/Strong Fathers program?

Amber-Rose
Amato Ashton at East Bahia by David. Today, we've invited special guests like Daniel, Jesse Owens and Jenny and Tiffany McKay from the Jeopardy! The Strong Fathers Program. Thank you all for joining us today. Could you tell us a little bit about yourselves and your roles within the program.  

Speaker 3
Facilitators coordinator for this new program? And I'm originally from Capitol, Arizona. As I went to the high school here in Iowa City, Green Hills Academy, then I graduated in junior colleges and initially during college went to UAB my junior senior year where I obtained my undergrad in Kansas society with a minor in public health. Currently in a grad program through Grand Canyon. So I have a couple of classes where I'm currently pursuing that, and I'm a husband slash father to two daughters. And that's a little bit about me. I'll pass it on to Nolan. Hello, my name is Nolan and Ginny. What's something that's got that of a 16 to 100 people, $20 an hour. I am a facilitator here with the John Hopkins Drunk Brothers program. I started back in January as a community connector to transition to the city. I graduated from University High School, and I'm just looking forward to promoting our program the best we can. We're actively recruiting and we currently have four groups going right now here in Tuba City.  

Tiffany
 Hello. My name is Tiffany Burke. Twice initially, as she had just been teaching dissertation at Shinola. I'm originally from Arizona. I'm a little background about myself. I obtained my undergraduate degree from Arizona State University and then also my graduate degree from the University of Arizona. I am currently a research associate with Johns Hopkins University and with the Center for American Indian Health. But I also serve as a research project coordinator for both the Strong Father's Bigil program and the ad stop in our Female Pathways Program.  

Amber-Rose
It's great. Thank you for introducing yourselves. It's nice to meet you all and have you part of our series on maternal and child health. For this podcast, we wanted to include topics on the entire family unit, including the father. We heard your presentation during the 2021 Navajo Nation Human Research Review Board Conference, and we're very excited about your program because we don't see many programs that focus on fathers, especially since fathers, uncles, Chase and Grandpa play a very important role in Navajo families. So first, we'd like to discuss the Strong Fathers program, and any one of you can answer this. How did this program get started?  

Speaker 4
So, Amber, I can answer that question. This program started from drawing on three other evidence based interventions, and those three other programs are respecting the circle of life, the Arrowhead Business Group and the Example program, which is the Female Pathways Program. From these interventions, it was mentioned during calls and meetings that there needed to be a program for fathers. And so that's how the program came about.  

Amber-Rose Okay. Thank you. And what's the overall goal of the program?  

 Speaker 4 So the overall goal for the Asia, but still strong for others program is to increase economic stability, reduce violence in rural native communities, and increase healthy relationships and co-parenting in native communities.  

 Amber-Rose Thank you. Could you tell us a little bit more about the program, such as where it's available, recruitment, enrollment methods, how long the program is the lessons taught, and if it will be available in other communities across.  

 Speaker 3 The country where recruiting, actively recruiting in the deposit area. It's a very free service area. The entirety of America, 39 canyons and also in a regional area where we're also actively recruiting around there within that 50 mile radius for groups currently running right now. The criteria who is eligible are native fathers or father figure, such as grandfathers, uncles who are 18 years of older and are helping to take care at least one child. Like Daniel said, they must live in or around the to the city or in the area. Some of the topics we do talk about are healthy relationships and positive communication. Co-parenting, strategy and skills. Domestic violence and positive parenting practices. Understanding child development. The importance of being an involved parent, parent child communication and the benefits of quality time, problem solving and goal setting. Building skills to improve economic stability, budgeting and financing, literacy and career resources. We incentivize each participant as part of the recruitment process. They're the guys that complete the surveys and the feedback forms and complete all 12 workshops can make up to $350 and gift cards to bashes or Walmart. Also, if they meet criteria as far as 50% and 90%, they will get a $50 gift card with the visa preloaded $50 gift card. Also, we provide dinner and transportation, and if needed, we provide child care for their their children. And we coincide a workshop with an activity on the weekends or weekdays, just depending on the participants schedules. We recently took a group to our fishing and we worked out of spending Quality Time with Children workshop into that activity. In a couple weeks we have scheduled a sweat lodge, so we really try to keep the participants actively engaged throughout the program.  

Amber-Rose Awesome. Thank you. That's a lot of awesome activities that you do with them. I was wondering, is there like a virtual option currently?  

Speaker 3  Right now we don't have that virtual option yet. I think they're currently working on that to implement that. But if need be, I think we can do makeup workshops via Zoom, but we can't hold an entire workshop over Zoom just yet. Got it. Tiffany can elaborate more on that.  

Speaker 4 Our Abigail program, when it first came about, it was before the pandemic. So the curriculum that was introduced for this program was specifically for in-person, and we do know the challenges, but we do take the precautionary measures when it comes to in-person. There are face masks, bacterial. We wipe down everything. We we practice the protocols that the Navajo Nation has in place for a group holding. None of our groups are no more than at least ten individuals, and they're spaced at least six feet apart. And at this moment, when we do talk about the meetings, there hasn't been any indications from the fathers that they have issues about COVID. But we do take those precautionary measures when it comes to holding our group session. So we make sure that we accommodate all of the needs when it comes to COVID. But when it comes to the virtual portion, that is something that we are discussing, which has been brought up by our working group community members. This time it is a discussion that we are having. But currently, as Nolan had mentioned, that if a participant misses a workshop, they are able to do it over Zoom but is still in discussion for the virtual option because that would mean we would have to reconfigure our whole curriculum because it was based on an in-person program.  

Amber-Rose  Oh, okay. Thank you for answering that. I'm just wondering too, there are some other challenges with Internet connectivity across the Navajo Nation. So that's really great that you are able to still keep it in-person. And also just all the activities that you do with the fathers, like the fishing. And that sounds right. And offering like childcare. That's so awesome. And so the next question is we know fathers play an important role in a child's development, especially culturally. Are there any specific cultural teachings included in their curriculum and system?   

Speaker 3 What the importance of the clan system and what it represents, and how is a clan created to that realm? Of course. Is this from your mother's side, then my father's. Then you're my son is the maternal side and your father's side, the personal side of things talked about was this letter represents love and fire carrier of generation versus gene represents protection to Che represents knowledge and teachings are Chanel that represents sense of humor and reflections of life. So yeah, we just really are just going to give them a self awareness of who they are and where they come from. And they have a workshop here with that gives them a clan in that class and their traits and they can go through that themselves. And also we're finding that they can go through that with their children as well. Some of our participants asked for some of our workshop, you know, extra copies and like the initial first class says clan name in Navajo, it says clan name and English clan talent, Animal, Guardian and Kane for protection and guidance. So there's a whole listing of their clans. And you know what they like, what they what they can find as far as talent and guardian. Some of the guys come back, our participants come back and they say that it had a really good evening, you know, implementing this with their children. And that right there just shows that, you know, the workshops are doing it actually, you know, getting getting used at home. And what that's that's what we went over. This is in behavioral model through glossary of our Navajo culture. I think it was developed through the college and it is we go through the four Sacred Mountains pathways, what it represents when they are faced with adversity, challenges in their life and you know, from the east to to the south, to the west, to the north. And what would those mean when when you're facing challenges in your life, in your personal situation? So that's one of the cultural aspects of our program of teaching them how to cope with situations.  

Amber-Rose Thank you. So you go over the dinner educational philosophy model. We teach that to some of our high school interns that work with us, and then also different research projects within the community. So that's very awesome that that's implemented within your curriculum. I think it's, you know, implemented in a lot of different curriculums that are culturally inclusive and that's awesome to hear. And you actually answer. Like one of our next questions we're going to ask about how a father can continue to carry out and implement the teachings within the curriculum, within the home, and know and give a great example of how you go over the clan system and what you know, each clan represents and how, you know, the fathers are taking home that information and sharing it with their children. And so are there any other additional teachings like specifically about fatherhood roles.  

 Speaker 3 And something that's important as far as guys? I think learning and knowing what masculinity is and when it becomes toxic, you know, we're talking about this day to day and how like there's a time to turn it off really in with you're in a relationship or you have kids, you're raising kids, whether they're yours or not, where we can be and all can talk about how there's that time to turn it off as far as being a guy and. I think that those just talk, just the topic, toxic masculinity and masculinity is one of the. Our program workshop, it's really key to have them distinguish the old man and good men side and you know and we emphasize that, you know it's up to them. They have that power to change all of that, you know, and although in the past, you know, you don't really take into consideration their children, whether it's a girl or a boy and how different each one is and unique, they are in their way and in their upbringing. I think like Daniel has that that feeling of he has two girls, whereas some of us, you know, have all boys. And you have to really understand how to approach them in different ways. Some individual, their life skills that some of us guys already know, but we've got to keep it on the back burner. So this program is kind of it brings it to light again. And the premise that these workshops are not to teach, teach them how to be dads or or that, you know, we don't that's not what we promote. It's just giving them life skills and situational skills they can use if there ever in any of these events. You know what I mean? Co-parenting, basic communication skills, parenting styles and like like Daniel said, these guys, we all know about these topics, but yet we can need a refresher. One of our participants used the analogy of a of a tool belt or a multitool. You know, you know, these tools are there in your pocket and sometimes they need to be dusted off or re reuse it, reshape it just so you can stay on, stay sharp and be ready for any adverse situations that may, may present in your life.  

 Amber-Rose Yeah, thank you for that. I think it's a very important topic, especially about unlearning toxic masculinity, and I see some challenges that people deal with due to that. But the next question that we have is were there any challenges and benefits that fathers have experienced in this program?  

Speaker 3 I think initially it's just the. They don't really know. It's a first of its program here into the city. And they're kind of like thinking like, what are like me and Daniel getting out of it, you know, like, what are you guys getting out of it that I signed up on that we're not we don't get no bonuses. We don't get no extra anything. You're doing this for the community and we're trying to just give back to our community and in a positive way, just initially getting better at keeping their attention when we first engage with them, it's kind of hard because you only have like maybe 15 to 30 seconds to promote your program and you're almost like a salesman. And then when you start losing them a little bit, we give them little incentives. They kind of bring it back in. We got we got stickers, we got keychains, square meters, carpentry, pencils, pens. You know, we try to keep them, keep them there as long as we can. And then in the end, hopefully they sign up, they give us their name and number and we can set up an appointment with them to kind of go more over the program in depth. And once they come to the office and kind of see the set up and we can talk to them about, you know, what what the whole premise of this program is, you know, that's when they're like, oh, okay, they kind of got the wrong misconception when I see them. I mean, I'd be kind of apprehensive, do it. Some random guy came up to me with a business card in the stickers say, I got this program, so we're just trying to get the word out there best way we can. And I think just word of mouth for us and social media as far as like a benefit for them, we get a lot of positive feedback. So some of the guys, they even asked, is there a strong father's part do or oh, they asked, are they even mentioned like, this is an outlet, this is an outlet for me for whether it's 2 hours out of the week, I'm here coming out with you guys. And we had some good discussions. So there's there's some benefits on there. And the take away from this program, gift cards. You know, I got to say that was how, you know, we have bosses here in town and they're buying groceries and getting supplies for their family. Yeah. Then it's a night where they don't have to cook. If they want to bring their families in, we can provide dinner for them. And it's like a healthy outlet, you know, It's a positive. You know, we try to make them make it more comfortable here as best we can. Also, they can use myself and then as resources as far as if they're looking for a job and they also will get a duplicate at the end of each of 12 week workshops and that will credit them 24 hours to completing this project or, you know, and they can use that for any kind of special certificates they want to put in their resume. I guess it would be a support group. You know, some of them are kind of like wary about topics you talk about, but as soon as one person opens up about it, you know, it seems like it opens up the floodgates and everybody says, oh, yes, I had the same situation or, oh, yes, you know, this this happened to me, too. And how did you handle it? So we have our scenarios in our workshops, but at the same time, too, I think the gentleman really liked the real life scenarios as far as, you know, each other goes and do our workshop. Do we do a social support visit? We do an on our end with them to the hospital. You know, we work with our workforce development. We work with, you know, St Jude's, if they're in need of food or any kind of other help, we can provide them that resource we have on our end. And you know, if there's anything else we can do personally, we do we help one guy help. He cleaned up his yard and he just needs to take that, you know, his stuff to the dump, you know, simple things like that. He'd give us a call and we know we fit into our schedule and we helped him take his Josh away, you know, And he's very grateful about that and really appreciated it. And, you know, it just just our little way of giving back to the participants and our community.  

 Amber-Rose Those are such great examples of how men are benefiting from this program and how they're able to connect and relate to one another. And I think that is so awesome. I feel like they don't always have that kind of setting, you know, to be able to do that. The next question is, since our podcast is focused around healthy families, what are some co-parenting strategies that are taught.  

 Speaker 3 That communication with your spouse or whoever or whoever is helping you raise your child and also being present, reach out. We go over that like there's quantity time over quality time. And we would go into that with this conversation. It's open in the question part of our workshop and we use like a basketball team or a baseball team or football team, you know, and you're only as good as your team and to go parenting. Usually now in most native communities, it's just not the mom and dad, you know, it's the knowledge is the the my son is you know, that help out the in-laws, you know, and you're just you're your brothers or sisters. Everybody is in this cohesive team and everybody has to work, you know, with the initial goal of making sure that kids are safe. Cared for. And nowadays, now with with how things are with the pandemic and schooling, a lot of them have to figure out, you know, the school schedules, the zoom times for for classes, if they're going in class or staying home, you know, just kind of navigating through that, maybe getting, you know, the the older generation a little bit more computer literate to log on to to Zoom or log on to their school for or, you know, X amount of hours. We also try to emphasize on problem solving, managing conflict, talking and listening, backing up each other, accepting each other and beginning with the co-parenting and just communication is key. Just really, really continuing to have those open lines of communications. If you're with your current partner or if you're not with your partner, you still have to have some sense of a relationship and take responsibility for the upbringing of your children or if you have stepchildren. You know, so it's it's a big, big, big workshop that we really do emphasize. We actually did this workshop, um, yesterday with our group. They met their 50% mark with Workshop six. So like we mentioned before, they got a $50 visa card along with a $10 workshop feedback form card. So they walked out of here with $60 last night.  

Amber-Rose That's awesome. Thank you for sharing that.  Are there any other resources that you help provide to these fathers for work in college?  

Speaker 3  Anything that no program that they're interested. We on our end, we we try to get them the information. We try to push them along that line, to initiate them, to go back to school or try to apply for this job ride to the workforce, or they're trying to get you know, they look at use our Internet to look at jobs here in town. You know, we can help them with that. Initially. We won't, you know, fill out the forms and applications for them. We can guide them through it. But they had to take that initiative on their part to apply for a job or if they want to apply for school or transfer, you know what I mean? We can provide all that information for them. But initially, in the end they have to do it themselves. You know, we just try to make it as convenient as we can for them and just use our resources as well. You know, if we know anybody that might be looking for or some help or just recently we had a participant that did some yard work for us at J two trailer here, Tuba. He did some yard work for, you know, X amount of hours and we figured out a payment and he got paid and, you know, his work was done really well. So we told him, you know, we're going to you know, we're going to use you in the future if you want some extra work. And he's like, Yeah, yeah, I'm available. So we just try to do what we can for them. But initially it's up to the fathers of everybody engages with any obstacles they're facing or any suggestions. And like I said, they can use this as references as well. You know, we have no problem writing a letter, a reference for them or, you know, providing a phone call of reference for them. And once they finish this program, like I said before, they can use this certificate as backing, that they did complete a 12 week workshop. They did were here every every time on time and were engaging. And, you know, they really benefit from the strong Fathers workshops.  

Amber-Rose Thank you. It sounds like you do a lot for them, you know, going out of your way to help these men, you know, get on track, especially with work and with their education. So this being one way your program can support and uplift fathers, what are some other ways families or the community can better support these fathers in their roles at home or within the community?  

Speaker 3 I think for the families to better support their fatherhood, I would think just encouraging them and giving them, you know, a lot of positive praise when they're going through these workshops, you know what I mean? They could be doing a lot of other other things, negative things, I guess you can say. But, you know, making sure that they're recognized and appreciated, you know, you need all the whistles and horns and fireworks, but just just just realizing, you know, hey, good job tonight. I'm very proud of you. You know, thank you for taking this initiative to, you know, try to better yourself so you can better the family. I think that's one thing that families can do to help support their dads and their fathers. And we're seeing that, too, when we're recruiting. The ladies are coming through and they're my say, making their husbands boyfriends sign up. But they're the ones engaging us in this, I guess. I know. I know somebody that could benefit from this. I know my son. You could use this, you know, And I think it's just that support from the wives and the kids we even see that with the kids do is the kids are like, oh, dad, you're going to your two classes even. Okay, we'll see with the 8:00. You know, they I think the dad's is going to understand that. Wow. You know, these these kids are really watching what I'm doing and they're kind of they're proud of me, you know? And we saw that at one of the workshops. You can see the this kid was having a this guy was having an issue with his his child spending time with him. And he brought it up. And one of the other dads, you know, said, yeah, you know, at that age freshman in high school, they tend to do this. Don't take it personal. You know, it's a real life experience. And then we had that fishing trip and going to find out is his kids showed up, his son showed up, and they've been doing a lot of stuff more outside, outside of old together now. So just those little things, I think with the family and the support would go a long way for for that. That's that's.  

Amber-Rose Awesome. Thank you for sharing that. This program is available. It is working. It is helping fathers to connect and also to, you know, get that support that they need that, you know, otherwise isn't available. Do you have any other insights?  

Speaker 3 Dads do realize, do you know when they get in this kind of a setting that they're not alone? You know, they're and I think that's a big thing for them to realize is, you know, they sometimes feel like they're this is only happening to me. And, you know, this is the way I got to handle it. Or I just I'll know if I can handle this. But then once the other dads do open up about, you know, situational events or real life events, you know, they I think it's itself like kind of like a like a relief, you know, off their shoulders, like, man, okay, I'm not alone. This helps. You know, there's other people going through the same situation that I'm going through. And, you know, they like I said, they really use utilize each other really well. You know, sometimes just kind of just sit back and just kind of let them discuss what they're doing. And that's almost like they're running the group themselves, which is awesome, you know?  

Amber-Rose So is there anything else that you want to mention about the program?  

Speaker 3 We're just doing our part, you know, community members to give back the best way we can. We're actively recruiting all day, every day. You can give us a call back at 9283600577. Our email address is Are strong Fathers 21 at gmail.com? We're actively on Facebook so you can look us up on there. Also, we do have radio broadcasts with in so you can hopefully hear some of the our programs here due to waves.  

Speaker 4  So we have a primary and secondary like theme of our project. And our primary aim is to assess the preliminary impact of the BIGIL program on father involvement, quality of co-parenting, communication, healthy relationships, fathers, engagement in communication with their children, protective factors and economic empowerment and stability. And our secondary aim is to assess the acceptability, feasibility and satisfaction of the SEALs through a pre and post study design. And also I wanted to mention that the curriculum that was developed for this program, a lot of it went into it, took a lot of meetings. We actually have a working group that we have community members who are part of, and these community members range from traditional practitioners, teachers, counselors. I believe we have about 12 to 15 working group members who actively participated in giving us feedback on our curriculum. So that way we would know that our curriculum had the input of community members and leading community members in that too as well. So I just wanted to mention that.  

 Amber-Rose  Awesome. Thank you so much for joining us today. We really appreciate your time and all this valuable information and for sharing the experiences of these fathers with us today. And you know, we only want the best for, you know, our fathers within our Navajo communities. So thank you for all the work that you do with them. You know, the extra mile that you go, even just being there to listen. I think that's one of the most important things that we all need.

Outro Ahe’hee. Thanks for listening to the MCH Podcast. For more information about the Diné College MCH project please visit Navajo MCH Project at Diné College on facebook.