Maternal Health: Volunteers Assisting with Training Mothers about Maternal and Infant Health in Remote Central Mexico
Location
Based on a 20-year history of cooperation with local schools, social and health services this proposal is a springboard for additional educational health services in remote areas of central Mexico. Three non-profits (nongovernmental organizations: NGO) propose this idea by several changemakers who are who are collaborating on solutions. This proposal was developed to improve maternal health after a year-long (2009) doctoral research of 665 infants and children within the same remote area found nearly one-third of all children are malnourished; some at birth. Their pregnant mothers were malnourished and incapable, due to illiteracy, to fill out government forms for nutritional supplements.
This idea incorporates university students from a University of Arizona Study Abroad program (in Mexico since 1986) with Ashkoa Fellow Helena Todd participating since 2005. In 2008 year-round volunteers were found and incorporated into new remote literacy programs. All aforementioned volunteers will be trained to teach health options for indigenous mothers in remote areas outside the city of Guanajuato, Mexico. Low socioeconomic status, single caregiver mothers are often left with many children and no financial resources. Fathers leave home to find employment elsewhere, often for two or more years without returning. One NGO interviewed man was gone for 24 years, others never return. Mother’s physical and emotional health diminishes. Indigenous mothers reported to one NGO that they desire access to nutritional and other women´s health knowledge. They want to understand nutritional food choices.
About You
Section 1: About You
First Name
Donald
Last Name
Mackenzie
Website
Organization
Summerland Corp.
Country
Mexico, GUA
Are you an individual between the ages of 18 and 35 who would like to apply for a nine month Young Champions Program mentored by an Ashoka Fellow?
No
Section 2: About Your Organization
Organization Name
Summerland Monastery
Organization Website
Organization Phone
520-883-4444
Organization Address
2343 West Old Ajo Hwy, Tucson, AZ 85746-9113
Organization Country
United States
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Your idea
Name Your Project
Maternal Health: Volunteers Assisting with Training Mothers about Maternal and Infant Health in Remote Central Mexico
Country your work focuses on
Mexico
Describe Your Idea
Based on a 20-year history of cooperation with local schools, social and health services this proposal is a springboard for additional educational health services in remote areas of central Mexico. Three non-profits (nongovernmental organizations: NGO) propose this idea by several changemakers who are who are collaborating on solutions. This proposal was developed to improve maternal health after a year-long (2009) doctoral research of 665 infants and children within the same remote area found nearly one-third of all children are malnourished; some at birth. Their pregnant mothers were malnourished and incapable, due to illiteracy, to fill out government forms for nutritional supplements.
This idea incorporates university students from a University of Arizona Study Abroad program (in Mexico since 1986) with Ashkoa Fellow Helena Todd participating since 2005. In 2008 year-round volunteers were found and incorporated into new remote literacy programs. All aforementioned volunteers will be trained to teach health options for indigenous mothers in remote areas outside the city of Guanajuato, Mexico. Low socioeconomic status, single caregiver mothers are often left with many children and no financial resources. Fathers leave home to find employment elsewhere, often for two or more years without returning. One NGO interviewed man was gone for 24 years, others never return. Mother’s physical and emotional health diminishes. Indigenous mothers reported to one NGO that they desire access to nutritional and other women´s health knowledge. They want to understand nutritional food choices.
Website URL
http://www.resplandorinternational.org www.summerlandmonastery.org wwwspanishimmersioneducation.org
Innovation
What makes your idea unique?
We have already been significant changemakers in this remote area and in the lives of mothers and infants. We have a history of making changes in other parts of the world. Todd V. Fletcher, founder of Resplandor International, completed his undergraduate college degree in Mexico. As a professor at the University of Arizona in special education he returned to Mexico in 1986 to start an immersion program that today continues to create changemakers out of university students. Their lives are enhanced by the 5-7 week immersion program. This has occurred since the first year because he understands the culture and speaks the language. Fletcher, who lectures worldwide about education in Mexico, has dedicated 40 years to establishing contacts in this Mexico State and in the Federal level. When political contacts are needed, he can make changes happen and get approval. The culture of Mexico functions through relationships. Fletcher has treated Mexicans with dignity and respect for decades.
Jacqueline Zaleski Mackenzie, founder and president of Summerland Corp., a USA 501 c(3), and Tierra de Verano, A.C. (a Mexico nonprofit) is also a changemaker. She ran a bilingual outdoor education program on the Arizona/Mexico border: 1996-2008. Taught Mexican students (95%+ in each classroom) during her teaching career. The bilingual school she directed was an early intervention program with strong maternal involvement. She employed all Mexicans and taught those women how to take over and continue the school on their own. Her ability to teach, inspire and apply her business/organizational skills molded their success. Mackenzie has 30 years experience working with volunteers and 20 years experience running a non-profit. This is a pilot collaborative effort to reach into remote areas. Fletcher and Mackenzie’s goal is to inspire others to take this culturally appropriate maternal and infant educational program into other areas of Mexico.
Do you have a patent for this idea?
No
Impact
This Entry is about (Issues)
What impact have you had?
Fletcher has influenced multi-generational teachers by developing their cultural sensitivity. He has done the same for doctors, lawyers, public administrators and others worldwide. He is considered the premier world authority on Mexican special education and speaks at international conferences. June 2009, he dedicated a literacy center in remote Mexico. More than 450 people attended the dedication. Influential administrators from public and private institutions came from other areas of Mexico and the USA. About 35 visiting academics attended, many stayed to volunteer teach for the following week in the center. As of March 2010, more than 200 volunteers, from the USA, Mexico, Japan, Germany, and France have taught indigenous residents, up to 90 people a day.
Since May 2008, Mackenzie has visited 18 remote health clinics and examined 665 children. Her goal was to identify whether special education needs existed. In 2009 she raised $30K+ to remodel a nearby ruin into a literacy center. She found volunteers to build the facility and teach there. She raised another $40K to remodel an indigenous-owned home and land into a home for permanent volunteers, an equine therapy center, water therapy center with a wheelchair ramp, artist's studio to preserve “The Faces of Mexico” and a volunteer base. A local Mexican family donated one horse for therapy. Mackenzie assisted a local man in remodeling and renting his modest home to volunteers and helped a local women create an income serving food to those visitors. Over 200 volunteers have visited since May 2008 to help teach English, art, assist with homework, build or offer their specialty. Sometimes Mackenzie transports teacher volunteers into more remote areas to teach additional caregivers and their children. Mackenzie and Fletcher located a recent PhD willing to help develop the program presented here. Visiting volunteer teachers have become teachers with culturally appropriate behavior.
Problem
The problem is malnutrition in mothers and children. Many medical staffs said that malnutrition was “epidemic” in remote areas. Mackenzie found that nearly one-third were malnourished. Education for women is lacking. There are few volunteer teachers, no libraries, limited references and lack of access to nutritional supplements,lack of assess to services for adequate health care or information to help them selves. Public transportation is frequently inaccessible. Special education services are non-existent before the age of 3 years. Diagnosed special needs children were extremely malnourished. Labeling (using USA standards) indigenous children as having special needs because of symptoms or behaviors is often due to a misunderstanding of cultural influences or culturally-based factors, not actual disabilities. This problem is due to biased assessment standards, a lack of cultural sensitivity training for the observer-evaluators and/or rigid testing materials written in a foreign language. This is a considerable problem because misunderstood cultural influences or culturally based factors may reduce the likelihood of attaining academic success. The opposite
Actions
All the involved on-profits are willing to make whatever efforts might be required to meet the needs of the community. February 21, 2010 was the most recent community meeting. Collaborators always look inside the community for answers. We never assume that we know what the community needs. We ask the teachers, the school children and the people walking down the road. Printed flyers go out encouraging participation; children read them to their parents. We stop on the roads and talk to anyone we can approach at any time.
Fletcher visits the area about 6 times a year to oversee what efforts, physical, financial or political that he can initiate to make positive intervention changes. He emails about 20 times a month to keep informed regarding the community’s pulse.
Mackenzie and her entire family are permanent residents. Every member of her home is a volunteer for teaching, counseling, designing, implementing, researching, fund-raising, cultural awareness efforts, and global outreach.
Results
Trust has been created between us (the collaborators and the residents). The local population knows that we respect them. They know that we listen to them and respond to what they request within our ability to create the needed implementations. We know from experience that mothers will attend classes, ask questions and listen. We have already learned how to teach them "hands-on." We have a kitchen in the literacy center ready to access for food prep classes. Our other NGO is a short walk away. At that NGO we can show how we eat well and save money doing it. We can explain the way to create organic vegetable gardens. Women can taste the food and see the ease of growing veggies organically. We are also raising rabbits and chickens organically, giving the animals the homegrown food that we are also eating. This cycle of life using available natural manure, not cash, to create food will appeal to these low socioeconomically challenged women. We can show that the gathering of eggs as food is a high protein food source.
What will it take for your project to be successful over the next three years? Please address each year separately, if possible.
Year one will focus on (1) program development, (2) surveys of maternal health needs by geographic area to prioritize the curriculum to fit the individual communities and (3) testing teaching methods for initial effectiveness. Both Fletcher and Mackenzie have many printed resources so this will be less a matter of writing or developing programs and more a matter of “fine-tuning” existing maternal health programs to best serve the local populations (recognizing their lack of literacy as a need for more visual “hands-on” materials) and their most pressing health needs divided into categories for analysis and intervention.
Year two will be dedicated to establishing a network of volunteers willing to be unbiased evaluators by helping locals to express what they think are the benefits or drawbacks of the first year program. Their replies will be analyzed and categorized to promote efficient modifications. On-going modifications of the teaching materials and adaptation of methods of administering the material will be recorded for reference in the event we move backward by misunderstanding the best approach. Our efforts toward (1) developing a smooth running system of training volunteers, (2) maximizing engagement by indigenous women students and (3) having successful retention will be our major focus.
Year three will focus on outstanding documentation of results and plans for further expansion. By that time four years will have passed since Fletcher and Mackenzie voiced a desire to have vans, trailers, pop-up canopies, tables and chairs for a mobile classroom taken into remote areas with volunteers and student researchers or interns being the additional teachers. Year three of collected data would fine tune and expand on that concept by planning for ways to make the mobile program begin to take shape and seek funding. During that process would be an excellent time to (1) reevaluate the needs of indigenous women students, (2) survey the results of the classes on filling their needs and (3) examine the satisfaction of the volunteer teachers. An ongoing “win-win” situation for indigenous women students and volunteer teachers is the ideal situation. We will need to determine if we are making an impact on both parties to enable the program to be sustainable.
What would prevent your project from being a success?
Outside of a natural disaster or global pandemic, there is little that will stop the hardcore volunteers who continue to come into Mexico even when negative tourist advisories mount. There have been warnings of dangerous contagious illnesses, on-going drug wars and increased crime and still volunteer students and teachers continue to arrive in our nearby city to study. Fletcher has a reputation of protecting students by placing them with very responsible families. This information travels far in helping overcome fear of international volunteering. Visitors participate in classes or by teaching at one of the several capable Spanish language schools or several universities or trade schools. Our nearby city is also known for cultural attractions. We advertise for volunteers inside those academic environments to help increase awareness that remote areas have little in common with the social, living and educational standards in the tourist occupied city. Visitors who come to learn are more drawn to assist us in our efforts to raise the standard of living for indigenous people. There is little doubt that those living in the rural areas will not suddenly be allocated education opportunities. The structure of the social class system in Mexico is well defined by deeply ingrained rules of social conduct. The indigenous resident is at the bottom of the social class. After seeing such need it becomes impossible not to be effected by the hope and survival instinct of the indigenous women. Every day in the remote areas is a test of physical, mental and emotional endurance. The maternal caregiver, mother or grandmother, is the one who remains there as the overseer of all others. The need for maternal health care information here is unlikely to decrease without our efforts and the efforts of many more dedicated individuals.
How many people will your project serve annually?
101‐1000
What is the average monthly household income in your target community, in US Dollars?
$50 - 100
Does your project seek to have an impact on public policy?
No
Sustainability
What stage is your project in?
Operating for 1‐5 years
Is your organization a
Non‐profit/NGO/citizen sector organization
Is your initiative connected to an established organization?
Yes
If yes, provide organization name.
Summerland Corp. (est. 1990) Tierra de Vernao (est. 2008) Resplandor International (est. 2008)
How long has this organization been operating?
More than 5 years
Does your organization have a Board of Directors or an Advisory Board?
Yes
Does your organization have a non-monetary partnerships with NGOs?
Yes
Does your organization have a non-monetary partnerships with businesses?
Yes
Does your organization have a non-monetary partnerships with government?
Yes
Please tell us more about how these partnerships are critical to the success of your innovation.
Fletcher and Mackenzie have worked together since 2004 in academia. For the last five years that has included the University of Arizona Verano en Mexico program in addition to year-round academic projects and courses. Since Mackenzie lived on the Arizona-Mexico border for 12 years and Fletcher traveled the world discussing the Mexican educational and physical needs, together they have an understanding of the target population. They also understand what strengths and weaknesses all three organizations and the diverse volunteers bring into the project.
Fletcher has the Resplandor International Community Center a very short walk from the home where Mackenzie resides and Summerland is offering service to the local population. Without that center the service work that Summerland is offering; equine therapy, water therapy, and art classes would be restricted to good weather. Having Resplandor, weather is a non-issue.
Fletcher has 20 years of experience within the Mexican local, regional and national areas; that is priceless within this culture. His contacts make it easier for both organizations to get the cooperation they need to serve the public and expand.
What are the three most important actions needed to grow your initiative or organization?
We need (1) funding for publicity. There is a need for publicity to inform locals what is available and when and make sure we are geared to their needs. We also need publicity to attract volunteers from a worldwide pool so that the students are exposed to a variety of cultural diversities and learning opportunities. The indigenous woman needs to feel emotionally supported and that she has accurate and up-to-date information at her disposal.
We need (2) to gather a great deal of community participation (3) to create sustainability from within the community. We need to “train the trainers” within the community: The “each one teach one” philosophy. At some point the locals will modify their own cultural attitudes to empower the women to lead healthier lives. When we work ourselves out of a volunteer service position, we will know we have been a success in this geographic area.
If we wish to expand into a mobile service project then physically we need (1) electricity in the building created by Resplandor International where we are teaching ($4,500 USD to install), we need (2) a second floor to house volunteers in the remote community by adding 1800 sq. ft of space for temporary housing ($11,000 USD) and we need (3) a van so we can reach to outlying areas and do workshops in the communities where the mothers live ($4,400 USD).
The Story
What was the defining moment that you led to this innovation?
In 2007 Fletcher realized that he wanted to give back some of what had been given to him by Mexico where he completed his undergraduate degree. He wanted to help Mexicans to maximize their human potential.
In the spring of 2005 Mackenzie had a kind, dedicated, motherless Mexican student in her math class (I.Q. slightly over 70); math was his weakest subject. His father left him in the care of two elderly great-aunts. He was devoted to them and never complained about not having a two-parent family. For many extra hours Mackenzie tutored him after school; he could only earn a "D" with special needs accommodations. Mackenzie watched painfully as he failed to pass the tests to enter the Army. Mackenzie made arrangements for him to take one class in physical therapy at junior college while still in high school. He was good working with older people. He had a natural ability to touch people in a healing manner. The goal was to raise his self-esteem by giving him the opportunity to learn life-skills that could be an appropriate income source. School administrators underwrote the goal: he had to pass standardized tests to graduate. He carefully read the first few pages. With each completion of the reading he looked more discouraged; finally he closed the book and quietly laid his head on his hands folded over the test booklet. Mackenzie was required to keep him at his desk for the three hours allotted for the test. Mackenzie swore that very day that she would no longer be in a position that required the psychological abuse of Mexican children. Furthermore, she would put her self in the position to discover some of the reasons why children of Mexican heritage find academic success evasive and would do something for Mexican students to make academic pursuits easier. It took over three years after that day to finally relocate to a rural village in Central Mexico so that she could begin to find answers. Which seems to be that malnutrition and maternal health education is vital to empower themselves and their children.
Tell us about the social innovator behind this idea.
Mackenzie was born in New Mexico, weeks before “space aliens” left objects her father inspected. He was early on site. Before he died he was the last inspector on the Saturn, Apollo, and Shuttle projects. Mackenzie was told that government felt that he had to be re-called him into the military. The events of one afternoon in 1947 gave an immigrant Polish son “from a weakened community support system which contributed to family difficulties for Polish immigrants to the United States in the early 1900’s” (Rogoff, 2003)(p. 131) a Top Secret Clearance in the Armed Services and NASA. That changed the course of her family’s life forever. Her grandfather emigrated from Poland, made a living as a butcher and drank himself to death. Her father overcome his cultural challenges, abandoned his language and created a military “family” to replace his cultural heritage. Mackenzie moved 22 times in 22 months between her 1st and 3rd grade in school under the command of General Curtis Lemay. An enlisted family, they lived in minimal housing, staying too short a time to have any real connections to others. There was little regard for personal lives with so much upheaval. At an early age, Mackenzie left home to wait tables as a peer of the people who made her feel welcome in her childhood: Mexicans who spoke Spanish. Twenty-three years of working in the table service industry taught her much about the lives of those living in the USA as undocumented aliens.
How did you first hear about Changemakers?
Friend or family member
If through another, please provide the name of the organization or company
Helena Todd, PhD, an Ashoka Fellow
 | djmackenzie updated this Competition Entry. - 695 days ago |
| djmackenzie submitted this idea. - 695 days ago |
