Against the odds and seemingly endless uncertainty, 2021 has been a year of resilience and expansion for IWES’ Collective for Healthy Communities (CHC). CHC houses the portfolio that provides programming to enhance mental and physical health and emotional resiliency. To pursue these programming goals, CHC utilizes a socio-ecological framework to promote wellness at the individual, community and societal levels.

This work could not have come to fruition without key additions to the team; CHC gained a manager (Leticia De Los Rios), two full-time social workers (Mary Okoth and Emily Doyle), and three graduate-level social work interns (Mia Groedel, Meagan Duhnam, and Aunjenee’ Coner).

The growing CHC team also expanded and ventured into new physical frontiers by forming new partnerships with agencies in the Greater New Orleans area, from the East to the West coasts, and with humanitarian groups along the New Mexico - Mexico border. Locally, IWES teamed up with New Schools for New Orleans to pilot the Trauma Informed Equity Hub for the 2021-2022 school year. Through this collaboration IWES provided specialized training and introduced Universal Mental Health Screening to partnering schools. Based on our Founder/CEO Dr. Denese Shervington’s book Healing is the Revolution, we released a toolkit entitled the Roadmap to Healing with the National Community Action Partnership based out of Washington D.C., and led workshops on trauma-informed care and becoming a healing organization. With the support of the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, this year we launched Puentes Para Invitados (Bridges for Guests), a project focused on both the healing and psychosocial well-being of migrant individuals—or guests—crossing the U.S. southern border, as well as providers serving migrants and asylees in New Mexico. The goal of Puentes Para Invitados (PPI) is to support the creation of a system of support for asylees in New Mexico that builds upon the local assets already present in these communities and expands the infrastructure and capacity for Trauma-Responsive (TR) services for migrant individuals and families. In 2022 IWES will continue to help build bridges to healing for guests and providers by increasing organizational capacity of TR care, and by focusing on narrative change through the creation of media pieces that amplify and humanize the untold stories of community members and migrant guests.

Reflecting on the year, one offering, in particular, served as an anchor for our team by providing space for consistent joy and balance…

In partnership with Metropolitan Human Services District #GetYaMindRight, a virtual support group that began in April 2020, remained a space throughout 2021 for IWES staff and community members to connect and lend support to each other by creating a safe space for collective processing of the lingering effects of COVID-19’s physical and emotional devastation. According to one group member,

“The #GetYaMindRight group has been an important connection for me in these past months. This safe and supportive space has provided a touch point to a reality of caring and concern. Providing useful education about wellness in a non-judgmental way helped me find inner strength and personal acceptance of my own fragility.”

Through compassion, vulnerability, and tenderness, attendees bonded over shared experiences of grief, trauma, joy, strength and resilience, all while reenvisioning and redefining what it means to be a community. While the group came to a close in December 2021, the IWES team looks forward with reinvigorated focus to provide fresh opportunities for community healing in the new year.

For more information about CHC, reach out to Christina Illarmo, LMSW, our CHC Director.