Foster Grandparent Program director honored

Fort Belknap Indian Reservations volunteers in the Foster Grandparent Program of St. Vincent Healthcare met at the Duck Inn's Tavern and Sandwich Shop late Wednesday morning to present their program director a star quilt as a token of their appreciation for her hard work.

Program Director Barbara Brady has been working at St. Vincent's with the Foster Grandparent Program for 15 years. The program is a national program and 90 percent of the funds come from the Corporation for National and Community Service.

Brady had been running a tutoring program at her previous job in Delaware and said she had "recruited the Foster Grandparent director not realizing she was moving on to another job."

That previous director then asked Brady to take over her position and she has been there ever since.

Brady said she places volunteers in various facilities such as schools or health care facilities or with programs like Head Start to be an additional resource to kids who need it.

"Because of them, these kids get an extra start. They get extra help. It's just a really good deal," she added.

Brady said most of her volunteers serve about 15 hours per week and "most of these ladies, they serve way more - like 20 to 30 hours a week."

Brady added that, annually, the program has totaled about 40,000 hours from its volunteers.

Fort Belknap has 45 volunteers in the Foster Grandparent Program. Three of them are sisters, Brady said, along with "a sister-in-law, and sister-in-law of a sister-in-law, and a granddaughter of a former volunteer."

"I love our volunteers," she added. "They're just true-blue, just true-blue. We only get true-blue people. They're just amazing, amazing people."

Brady said volunteers are asked to contribute at least 15 hours per week, but they can work around what the foster grandparent's schedule is. She added it is a combination of what their government grant requires, what the site requires and what the volunteers want to work.

Volunteers are assigned to children who need extra help and the foster grandparents provide academic assistance to those children. Brady said volunteers help with social skills, vocabulary and literacy.

The people who volunteer for the Foster Grandparent Program come from different backgrounds, Brady added. Some used to be teachers or school cooks and police officers.

Philomene Hawley said she loves working with the kids at the school.

Brady said Hawley has won multiple awards within the program and has logged more than 4,000 hours of service.

Holly Kirkaldie, Hawley's granddaughter, said she has been a foster grandparent for four years now and she got into it as something to do and because her grandma was doing it.

Kirkaldie works with children from Hays-Lodge Pole High School and helps tutor them and said she loves working with the kids.

Fort Belknap Head Start Education Director Robert Fox said the work that the

foster grandparents do is important because many of the kids they work with don't receive strong family values in their homes.

"(Grandmothers are) the backbone of the tribe," Fox said.

Rosemary Peak said she has been

there the longest out of all the current volunteers with 24 years of service. Her sisters, Lois Snell and Geraldine Doney, have served for 20 and 18 years respectively.

Elizabeth Doney has served 16 years with Foster Grandparent and her sister, Florence Fox, has been there nine years.

All of the women said they enjoy working with kids. Each has their own group of kids whom they work with.

Geraldine works with a group of 17 3- and 4-year-olds and, she added, "They keep me on my toes, those kids."

Brady added that the dedication to service is attributed to the family

atmosphere that exists within the program.

Brady said she is always looking for more volunteers and hopes to recruit more volunteers in the future.

More specifically, she said, she would like to see more grandpas volunteer. Brady said of the volunteers she has, only four are male.

Requirements for people to become volunteers are in place. Brady said volunteers have to be on a limited income, have a doctor sign off on their physical fitness to serve and pass a background check.

Brady added that the limited income qualifies the volunteers for the stipend that they receive.

All foster grandparents undergo training as well. Brady said they cover child development and receive "tips from other foster grandparents."

With more and more schools utilizing technology, Brady said they have offered training for volunteers to become more familiar with technology such as an iPad.

Brady said seeing what the volunteers do for the children is what she likes the most about her job.

"Their heart is so big and their mission is so big," she added.

Brady said she also likes that the Foster Grandparent Program gives retired people something to do.

"Someone said you have to jump through a lot of hoops with our program and Head Start jumps through hoops, too," she said. "But I told someone from D.C. the other day you got to jump through hoops to stay healthy and jumping through hoops is a form of exercise."

"I know why you do it," she added. "The schools, it's those kids calling you grandma and it's knowing and seeing all the people."

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Changes in background checks for foster grandparents

During the presentation at the Duck Inn, Foster Grandparent Program Director Barbara Brady also announced a couple of changes that would be coming to the program, with the biggest being the redoing of background checks.

Brady said that all personnel will have to go through a background check again, including herself. This time, she added, the background checks will include fingerprinting.

Havre is the nearest town that has the needed fingerprinting capabilities, and Brady said she would arrange for them all to meet in Havre in the future to go through the process.

Brady said she wanted to be first so she can see what the process is like and then inform the volunteers and assist them.

She said everyone must have a current, government issued photo ID such as a license or tribal ID card.