Best of Neighborhood News 3/28: Washburn Fellowship program gives resources to people of color becoming counselors

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KeodAra Moua, a Pathways fellow: “Going to school is expensive. I try to explain my career goals to my family, but it can be hard, because in the Hmong community, we don’t even have words for mental health.” Caption and photo by MinnPost and Washburn Center for Children respectively.

 

Washburn Center for Children has established a new fellowship for people of color in order to address the disparity between the number of POCs seeking mental health services and the number of POCs offering them. The Fellowship includes a stipend to help cover the cost of schooling and unpaid internships, professional mentorship with other POCs, and a supportive cohort of fellows.

“This program comes from our commitment to advancing equity in the field and to helping expand the number of therapists of color,” Tom Steinmetz, [CEO of Washburn Center], said. “We realize our mission through the services we provide to children and families. By expanding the number of therapists of color in the state we directly impact access to care.”

Learn more about this fellowship and who it benefits at MinnPost.

Neighborhood organizations face budget uncertainty

The city of Minneapolis has released a 2020 Roadmap for funding neighborhood organizations, and a number of folks in these organizations are concerned about the future of their programs. Sources for funding past 2019 seem unclear as the plan currently stands, and Neighborhood Community Relations Director Dave Rubedor is scheduled to meet with City Council in May with a revised version.

“The neighborhood system in the city is really our formal engagement system, so it’s really critical that it reaches as many people as possible and they’re really representative of the people within their neighborhoods,” he said.

Find more community perspectives and details at The Journal Minneapolis.

New president for Minneapolis NAACP chapter: Leslie Badue

Following the stepping-down of current NAACP chapter president Jason Sole, Leslie Badue will complete Sole’s term with a focus on education, incarceration and the sustainability of the organization. She notes that she hopes for institutional change as well as change in the way people think.

“These institutions aren’t broken; they are actually functioning in the way they were created,” Badue said. She added, “They weren’t created to be equitable. They weren’t created for people of color to thrive in.”

Read more on this story at the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder.

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