First Lady, surgeon general listen to Project Aware progress at Ziibiwing Center

When Melissa Isaac started her teaching career, nobody told her how challenging it might be to help students going through tough times.

She was teaching second grade, and one student in her class lost one parent to suicide and the other to cancer.

Isaac, who is now the Saginaw Chippewa Tribal education director and a parent, saw children act out after they dealt with emotional trauma.

She saw anger and fear, and she didn’t quite know what she should or could do to help, other than to hug the student who lost his parents; all the boy wanted was his father back.

Later in her career, she taught a student who had lost five parental figures, and others who experienced severe emotional trauma, and wanted to do something to help them.

Now, Isaac is the driving force behind Project AWARE (Advancing Wellness and Resilience in Education, a program being utilized at the Saginaw Chippewa Academy, and Mt. Pleasant and Shepherd school districts.

On Sunday, Isaac and other Tribal leaders, students and parents, spoke to First Lady Jill Biden and physician Vivek Murthy, surgeon general of the United States, about the progress and how the program is helping youth cope with mental health issues.

During the “listening session,” Biden and Murthy heard from several Tribal parents and educators, and educators from Shepherd and Mt. Pleasant schools.

Security was tight as Biden’s entourage arrived at the Ziibiwing Center, with state police, Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Police and US Secret Service on site, and a small group of protesters on the road near the entrance.

Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Chief Tim Davis, who was once the youngest member of the Tribal Council and is now the oldest, spoke of former federal policies that caused unimaginable harm to Native youth, including the indoctrination of Tribal children at the Mt. Pleasant Indian Industrial Boarding School. and today’s reversal of federal policies that caused so much harm to Native children when they were forced to speak English and abandon their culture.

Part of that reversal brought Biden and Murthy to Mt. Pleasant, to hear how Project AWARE is helping youth through the Tribe’s five-year, $9 million grant from the US Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration, which creates trauma-informed school programs that provide training to educators and other school officials on how to detect and respond to mental health issues, and connect children with families who may need mental health support, including the use of therapy dogs and creating quiet spaces in classrooms for students who need a break.

Isaac and husband Nathan and their child, Gimiwan; Olivia and David Meshkowzii and their children, Zaagiidiwan and Shad; Kehli Henry, Project AWARE coordinator; Mt. Pleasant Middle School teacher Kelly Bechtel; Shepherd Elementary School counselor Brogan Holmes; and Mgizi Wemigwans, a senior at Mt. Pleasant High School.

Biden started the session relating to teachers and parents, telling the group that, as a teacher, she knows first hand how difficult it was for students to return to classrooms during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Biden, who is a teacher, spoke of educators falling back to their parental instincts to help troubled students and said many children have lost parents to Covid-19, adding more pain to a situation that was already extremely difficult.

“We want to do the right thing by our students and our families,” Biden said, adding that teachers expected a struggle following a year of virtual school, but the trauma for many students was worse than educators expected.

Holmes, the Shepherd Elementary counselor, told Biden and Murthy that Project AWARE has given the district the opportunity to introduce grief and loss support groups, that she has seen the miracle of therapy dogs, and that the grant supports Hopwell Ranch, an equine therapy farm on North School Road in Isabella County’s Sherman Township.

Biden also said the program allows teachers and counselors to be proactive, and gives them a way to be supportive rather than punitive.

That, Biden said, might be one positive that comes from the pandemic.

Murthy agreed.

“We have the opportunity to rethink and invest in supporting youth,” he said.

When Murthy asked what gives the students, parents, teachers and counselors hope, virtually all at the session said family.

Wemigwans, who told the First Lady and surgeon general that he’s seen how therapy dogs and other measures have helped students, said he finally feels like the community is getting to a better place after the pandemic disrupted in-person school.

Wemigwans said the future gives him hope and that he wants go go to college and return home to help the Tribe.

To thank Biden for visiting and listening to how Project AWARE has helped local youth, Tribal council members presented her with gifts, including a handmade blanket and basket.