Calgary Sexual Health Centre Focus Group Tonight!

A reminder that we will be gathering for the Women and Community Leadership Focus Group tonight, March 11th at the Calgary Sexual Health Centre. We will begin around four in the afternoon and then feast at seven in the evening on buffalo stew, bannock, salad (and chili for the veggies).

All women from all backgrounds are welcome to this focus group. We have eleven women signed up so far and we would love to have more voices in the circle.

This is a great opportunity to gather as women and look deeply within ourselves, and into our connections with our greater community to discover our own healing. This group is open to women of all backgrounds, so please join us this evening or pass this on to women you think may want to attend. All voices are vital to the circle.

If you would like to attend, please notify Sarah Lertzman, Program Coordinator, via email at sllertzman@gmail.com. Or by phone at 403-609-2052.

Awo Taan Healing Lodge-Parent Link Focus Group

On Monday we held the Awo Taan Focus Group for the Sisters in Circle Program. It was successful beyond all hopes and expectations.

Doreen Roy, coordinator of the Awo Taan Parent-Link Centre began the group with a prayer and a smudging circle. The women discussed for two hours how they might improve their communities by shifting thoughts around their own validity and empowerment, while keeping open and accepting of all within their community. That in approaching those in their community who are oppressive or causing pain as people who are in deep pain themselves, and so in need of deep healing, not only are the oppressed empowered as healers, but the community heals itself. It has no need to bring in administration or experts from outside.

This circle of Aboriginal women generated ideas around community healing and development strategies that I have only heard from wise elders and medicine people. And the only recommendation for improvement on the evaluation of the focus group was that they all wanted more gatherings like this and more implementation of their strategies. This was an example of the power of women coming together with care and respect and for the good of all. Thank you to all of you who made this possible.

Thank you!!!

We have enough volunteers for watching the children at Awo Taan on Monday. Thank you to all of you who volunteered to help!

We now need to increase our number of participants. We currently have eight women registered and we would like to see four to eight more. Please pass this on to any Aboriginal women you know who would be interested in attending. Childcare and lunch is offered. It would be great to have a full group as the more voices we have, the more we can learn from each other and find connections. Please direct those who are interested to register by phone at Awo Taan, 403-531-1880, ext 200. Thank you again to all of you who will help these women attend by watching their children!

We Need Volunteers!

Our Aboriginal Women and Community Focus Group is in need of volunteers to watch the children of mothers who want to attend the group. The Focus Group is the is coming Monday, March 8th from 10am-2pm at Awo Taan Healing Lodge (100- 1603 - 10 Ave. S.W., Calgary). Please email or phone Sarah Lertzman, Program Coordinator (sllertzman@gmail.com, 403-609-2052) if you are interested in assisting with this.

There will be some fun activities for someone to do with the older kids as well as toys and materials brought in. We are hoping for five volunteers as this will make the work load lighter on everyone. We have two women so far. Take advantage of this great opportunity to serve women, motherhood and community.

Reconnection Feast at Ghost River!

Sisters in Circle has been an opportunity for women to connect over a broad range of diverse backgrounds and to reflect on the potential and opportunities we all have to empower and enrich our communities. As the project reaches completion, we would like to honor our participants with one last gathering where we might meet again, reconnect, and feast together on traditional foods.

From the Women’s Camp on Waiparous Creek last summer to the focus groups for women at three Calgary community organizations, Sisters in Circle women have gathered and reflected on what their community means to them and how they can effect healthy change within their communities. Join us in a celebration gathering for all women involved in the project to meet each other and experience the culmination of Sisters in Circle project at its birthplace, Ghost River Rediscovery.

Calgary Women's Centre Women and Their Community Focus Group

The Women's Centre of Calgary will host a Women and Community focus group on Monday, March 15th. It will run from ten in the morning until one in the afternoon and include a feast of buffalo stew, salad and bannock. Women from all backgrounds are welcome. The staff at the Women's Centre encouraged us to give an honorarium to the participants to cover some of their expenses for attending as well as to show that we honor their time. We agreed to offer this for the Women's Centre Focus Group but do not have the budget to do this for any other focus group.

We will offer the $20 honorarium to the twelve to sixteen participants who attend. Though we realize this is not enough to cover all of the expenses that participants will have to pay in order to attend the focus group, nor is it an adequate wage for the time these women will be giving, this is all that our budget will allow. Our goal is for these participants to take away a deeper understanding of the inter-dependence of their communities and how they may enhance their role within and develop their vision for their own community. Register in person at the Women's Centre of Calgary or by phone at 403-264-1155. Art in this post by Suzanne Cheryl Gardner.

Calgary Sexual Health Centre Women and Community Leadership Focus Group

Calgary Sexual Health Centre is hosting a Women and Community Leadership Focus Group on Thursday, March 11th from 4-8pm. Women from all backgrounds are welcome to join us as we discuss how we may envision strength and health in our communities along with paths to realizing these visions.

Take time to reconnect with yourself and with other women who want to bring all manner of healing to their communities. We will work together for two-three hours and then we will eat a feast from traditional foods of this land. Vegetarian options available. To register, email the Sisters in Circle Program coordinator, Sarah Lertzman at sllertzman@gmail.com or call her at 403-609-2052. Art in this post by Suzanne Cheryl Gardner.

Awo Taan Aboriginal Women's Focus Group

Join us at Awo Taan Healing Lodge and Parent Link Centre as we discuss our role in both urban and rural Aboriginal communities. How do we raise our children with one sneaker and one moccasin? How do we find supportive and healthy community in downtown Calgary? How do we retain our cultural identity? How do we channel our community's resilience? How do we overcome the obstacles that keep us separate? What are the roads that bring us together? What tools and support do we need to visualize, and then realize strength within our communities?

This group is for Aboriginal women who are interested in making a change and in being a part of the leadership in their communities. We will meet and discuss and then feast.

The event takes place on Monday, March 8th from 10 am to 2 pm. Childcare and food are provided. Please pre-register at Awo Taan Healing Lodge and Parent Link Centre by calling (403) 531-1970, ext. 200. But for the Awo Taan logo, the art on this post is by Laurie Houseman-Whitehawk.

Waiparous Camp 2009

On the banks of the Waiparous River in the summer of 2009, twenty women from diverse backgrounds embarked on a journey of self-rediscovery and powerful group bonding at the first Sisters in Circle Pilot Camp through Ghost River Rediscovery Society.

The camp bought together Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal women community leaders and health workers in the greater Calgary area to practice traditional skills, participate in deep bonding activities, and to approach the land in a sacred way.

With the guidance of Aboriginal Elders and trained staff, the participants experienced respectful, healthy community and an opportunity to reflect on the communities they came from.

“This land-based program where we slept in teepees and bathed in the river, showed us all how dependent we are to the land upon which we walk. The group-based processes practiced in the camp showed us how we are all connected, though we may come from different backgrounds,” related one camp participant.

The largest learning from the camp was how vital programs such as this are that bring women together to reflect with each other on the health of their communities and how they may improve them.

This early spring we are bringing this model into urban Calgary as we hold three focus groups in three community organizations. We will ask ourselves challenging questions about our role within the health and vision for our communities.