CAMP CHINLE - Providing Youth With a Foundation for Success

Camp Chinle, a summer youth program for Youth, Families and Community in Chinle, Arizona, captured the imagination of people of all ages in the Navajo community. The program focused on recreational and cultural activities, informal education, and promotion of positive values.

Several underlying themes were incorporated into the day camp program: Physical Fitness, Hygiene, Safety, Drug and Alcohol Awareness, Nutrition and Food Preparation, Agricultural Science and Archeology, and History of Chinle.

"The success of the program was in part due to the community coordinators who conducted the program," says Joyce Alves, Apache County Cooperative Extension, and director of the program. State Strengthening Funds from Cooperative Extension provided salaries for two coordinators during 10 weeks of the summer. The co-coordinators organized the camp, secured volunteers to teach the workshops, assisted the volunteers, and encouraged parents to become active members of the program.

"We also had support from community leaders before starting the program," says Alves. "That support was a result of years of networking with community members by cooperative extension field faculty and having the program idea come from the community."

By summer's end the results showed that Chinle youth attended 22 different workshops resulting in over 1,000 face-to-face contacts. Fifteen volunteers conducted two workshops each and volunteer parents assisted at each workshop.

"Keeping Young People in School: Community Programs That Work" is a new publication available through the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP).

Over 3 million young people, between the ages of 16 and 24, dropped out of school before earning a high school diploma, according to a 1992 study by The National Center for Education Statistics. Dropping out of school can have profound and lasting effects on a student's life.

The 11-page bulletin describes the Communities In Schools (CIS) program, which delivers comprehensive services directly to troubled youth. CIS creates a support system of caring adults who ensure each student has access at school to the resources that can help build the self-worth and skills needed for a productive and constructive life.

Black people see a problem; whites don't. The gulf in American perceptions of national race relations is laid out in a comprehensive survey released by the Gallup Organization.

Blacks are far more pessimistic about how the races get along and how they are treated than whites, according to the survey. Whites see little to be concerned about when it comes to opportunities for blacks in jobs, education, and housing.

Thirty-four percent of whites surveyed felt the government should make greater efforts to support minorities, while 59 percent of blacks saw a need for greater government remedies for inequality.

The survey's results illustrate the challenge President Clinton faces as he steps up efforts to promote racial harmony. Clinton has named a seven-member multiracial panel to encourage Americans of all races and ethnicities to talk frankly about race. The panel is expected to develop actions that the president, individuals, and corporations can take to achieve greater racial understanding.

Among blacks, young males report far more discrimination than any other segment of the population.

Asked whether they had been treated unfairly in the past month in situations outside their homes, 45 percent of blacks overall said they had been discriminated against.

Asked if race relations will always be a problem in the United States, 58 percent of blacks said yes. Among whites, 54 percent said race relations will always be a problem.

The poll was based on 18-minute telephone interviews with 3,036 adults conducted between Jan. 4 and Feb. 28 and had a margin of potential sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

Arizona Daily Star, June 11, 1997

Survey Results on Gender Issues

The National Association of Gender Diversity Training conducted a survey on gender diversity issues in the workplace. The following is an excerpt from the results, published in their July newsletter. Answers were provided by a "select number of professional male participants."

Q: What do you think or feel is the number one issue in the workplace regarding men and women working together?

A: Uncertainty of behavior; competition for existing opportunities; power and control; and lack of networking between men and women.

Q: In your experience what observations have you made about men and women working together?

A: Men tend to draw upon their experiences to problem solve. Women depend upon logic, reason, evidence, and intuition to aide in their decision making. There is less mentoring of females by individuals in leadership positions for fear of legal repercussions. There is still a lot of negative stereotyping between men and women.

Q: Why do you think more men have not attended the past gender training conferences?

A: Men are still "too cool" and don't believe they need to learn anything. Many men think this is a women's problem. Diversity in its initial phase was seen by most men as a touchy feely kind of thing."

Q: What can the association do to attract more men to conferences?

A: Provide workshops that demonstrate to men how working in concert with women particularly affects their bottom line by providing more exposure and contacts with attendees.

Q: How have you seen the bottom line effected in regards to gender issues in the workplace?

The Norton Anthology of African American Literature sold more than 30,000 copies in its first month of publication. The anthology is rich in early slave narratives, folk tales, 19th-century poetry, and commentary of black women. It includes well-known and new authors of black literature. Harper's Magazine, July 1997

Bill Bray, CEO of a tribal corporation, has published First Person, First Peoples: Native American College Graduates Tell Their Life Stories, released by Cornell University Press. The book examines Bray's life as an Indian academic, and the problems and challenges of locating a "home" within the academic structure.

Where in the World Are You Going? by Judith Blohm helps children age 5-10 work through the process of international relocation.