Dr. Kathi Elliot: Gwen’s Girls/Black Girls’ Equity Alliance

https://gwensgirls.org/

Interviewed by Naomi Shin

Dr. Kathi Elliot is the CEO of Gwen’s Girls and convener of the Black Girls Equity Alliance. Founded in 2002 due to the vision of Gwen a Pittsburgh Police Officer, Gwen’s Girls aims to provide services for at-risk girls in the Pittsburgh area centered around academic success, mental and physical health, and community.

***

Naomi: To start off, would you mind introducing yourself?

Kathi: I am Dr. Kathi Elliott. I am the CEO of Gwen's Girls, and we are the conveners of the Black Girls Equity Alliance.

Naomi: Can you provide an overview of the work done by Gwen's Girls and the Black Girls Equity Alliance?

Kathi: Gwen's Girls was founded almost 21 years ago. We celebrated 20 years last May. May of 2022. So we were started in 2002 by my mother, the late commander, Gwen Elliott. She was in the first class of women police here in the Pittsburgh Police Department. And she did a lot of community work and came across a lot of girls and families that needed additional support outside of this system. And when she was looking to refer them for that support, there were very limited programs for girls. So after  26 years on the police force, she retired and she started Gwen's girls. We are primarily an after school program that provides academic support, and we're known for focusing on social and emotional learning support. So anger management, conflict resolution, healthy relationships- things that we know girls, especially adolescent girls, need. We currently have three program sites. We are here in Allegheny County. Our main headquarters is on the North Side of Pittsburgh. And then we have a site in Wilkinsburg that serves the east end of Pittsburgh. And then we have a site in Clairton that serves the Mon Valley. We average approximately 30 girls per day at each site.

And then over the past maybe 3 or 4 years, we have a program specific for high school aged girls entitled BGALA, the Black Girls Advocacy and Leadership Alliance, that we work with girls across the county in that program. We do in-school support. Also, we have a program called Making Positive Life Choices that focuses on providing schools with support for girls and students who may have had some issues, on anger management, conflict resolution. And look at healthy boundaries and relationships and friendship building and things like that. We've been most recently addressing issues related to bullying and just trying to support schools to do that. We focus on addressing the needs of each girl individually and holistically, so we not only look at her academic needs, but we look at her family needs. And so that's where we pull in and provide the support for the entire family. We make sure that any medical or mental health issues that need to be addressed. And then we look at overall well-being and spirituality. Just making sure that we're addressing them from a holistic standpoint.

Naomi: That's a lot of really amazing work. I know that I was only involved with the tutoring side of it back in 2020, but there is just so much more that Gwen's Girls does. Aside from that sounds like.

Kathi: So, yeah, you know about that part. So again, we do academic support, academic coaching, but through the pandemic, we found that our families were struggling, Parents were struggling to help support our young people. So we created an online academic support platform called ACI Academic Support Institute. And so we continue to do that this school year. We’re looking at not only just still providing some virtual but really doing some in-person. So offering academic coaching and tutoring to students throughout Allegheny County. At one of those three program sites that I mentioned to you.

Naomi: Gotcha. You mentioned you're the convener for the Black Girls Equity Alliance. And I know that the Alliance has done a lot of really great work in Pittsburgh and Allegheny County regarding the school to prison pipeline and juvenile justice. Can you give us an overview of the school to prison pipeline, what that means and how that's manifested in this county?

Kathi: Yes. So back in 20, probably 14 or 15, when I got to Gwen's Girls, the staff were looking at just what was happening with the girls that we were having coming into our program. And, you know, we wanted to look at just holistically again, what was the state of girls in our region. And at the same time, the foundations were supporting several initiatives that looked at boys and particularly black boys, because of the disparities that they were facing. And there was very limited information about what was happening with black girls. And so we started to look at that as well. And because there was like all these multiple initiatives going on, we said, let's just pull together and, you know, do it jointly at that time, one of our partners, Dr. Sarah Goodkind from the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work. She was commissioned to take a lot of the information that the various entities had, data that was out there that highlighted what was happening with girls. And she pulled all of that together and that created the Inequities Affecting Black Girls in Pittsburgh and Allegheny County report that was published in 2016. From that we learned that [in] different systems that are supposed to be supporting girls and young people in general- the education system, the juvenile justice, child welfare- black girls were experiencing some of the most discriminatory and inequitable types of treatment. And specifically, when we looked at schools and education, the suspension rate, especially within Pittsburgh public schools, was not only high in the city of Pittsburgh, but across the country, when we compare the national rates. And so when we talk about the school to prison pipeline, it is the various avenues and situations that can lead a girl or a student or anyone from being involved in something in school, then ending up in the juvenile justice system or the child welfare system. But mainly when people talk about the school to prison pipeline, we're talking about juvenile justice. And so in Pittsburgh and Allegheny County, black girls at that time were 11 times more likely to be referred to the juvenile justice system for charges that really were not criminal acts. So things like disorderly conduct. And then we took a step further and looked at what does that mean? So if a child didn't listen to the teacher, didn't sit down, was disrespectful- those were things that could result in suspension.

But then because of her getting upset, could lead to some type of altercation which then ends up into a referral to the magistrate or to the court system. So that is how we have seen many girls here in our region be referred to the juvenile justice system through suspensions, expulsions, behaviors. One of the main charges that we saw was 55% of girls were referred for disorderly conduct. So no specific charge, no like simple assault or assault or weapons charge, but mostly things that were related to what boiled down to disrespect. So when we looked at the report and looked at the data, we said, what are we going to do about it? And so we held a press conference. And then at the same time, we held an equity summit to highlight the report. And that happened in September of 2016, I believe. Yes. And then, we said what needs to be done? How can we work together? What's the collective impact that could happen to bring these numbers down or address the needs of what's happening with the girls, but also to support the schools as well? Because we understand, you know, there are a variety of different reasons that, you know, these charges end up being filed.

And so we started meeting in December of that year, and that led to the creation of the Black Girls Equity Alliance. For a while we were meeting and we didn't even have a name for it. But it is a group of stakeholders. And one of the things that I always say is that here in Allegheny County and Pittsburgh, we are fortunate that we do have system leaders who have acknowledged that this is a problem and have openly said that and have been with us at the table trying to find solutions. So the superintendent of Pittsburgh Public schools and staff have been a part of our working groups, as well as the teachers union representatives. We've also had folks from child welfare judges, magistrates, folks from probation to be a part of the work that we're doing because we could be a community group that has identified these issues and said that this is a problem and it needs to change. But we know that we can't make the change happen by ourselves. And we know the systems have not been able to spearhead that change. Collectively, though, we have been able to make some great progress in addressing the issues.

Naomi: That's really amazing that there's been leadership investment in this.

Kathi: Yes. So that's what I mean. Always have to give them credit because I know that there are different cities and areas that see this problem, but they don't have the buy-in or the support from the system administrators because we can come up with, you know, a whole bunch of recommendations and different things that we think need to happen. But if the leadership of those systems are not willing to, first of all hear or be a part of what that is and implement, you know, implement what's being proposed, then it's I wouldn't say a waste of time, but it's not it's not beneficial to the folks and the youth that we're trying to support.

Naomi: Right. There needs to be some kind of action.

Kathi: Mm hmm.

Naomi: And speaking of that, can you talk about the changes that are being instituted or the changes that you hope to see?

Kathi: Unfortunately, the pandemic kind of shifted things for us and sometimes some in a good way because, you know, the kids weren't in school, so obviously there couldn't be as many referrals and some of the issues that we were seeing. But we were able to continue to work to create different what we're calling diversion options. So we know that the referral to juvenile court is an issue. And oftentimes when we had listening sessions with police and teachers and schools, oftentimes it was like we just want to get this young person help. And so the juvenile justice system and the folks that represent that system themselves will say, that's not what we have been created for. We're not, you know, a mental health support because a lot of times we know that the root of some of the behaviors that are exhibited is because of a need for additional support for depression, anxiety and some of the other disorders or just even just exposure to trauma that has gone unaddressed. And so, one of the things that we heard again from the police officers was that when they get a call and they don't have anything, no other resource to refer to, they're either going to refer to juvenile court or they're going to refer to the magistrate, give the child or family a citation, which again, that is what we're talking about the pipeline to the system. And so we started to think about what we could do to kind of mitigate that? How can we provide a opportunity for not only police and school administrators, but families and community partners and youth themselves to reach out to community based providers because we have a wealth of different organizations and youth serving entities that can be utilized in the community, but they just don't get called or folks don't know that they exist.

And so that has led us to create what has been now named Caring Connections for Youth. It's a program that Gwen's Girls actually facilitates, and it's a 24 hour access. I want to call it a hotline, but a support line. Someone can dial 211 - so we're connected with United Way, contracted with them to be able to receive the calls on the off hours. But then we also have staff that are able to answer the phone during daytime hours, but also are out in the community giving information about this opportunity, educating police officers and families and schools, but also being supports of ourselves so that we can connect the caller or the person in need that has a young person in need, instead of dialing 911 and getting law enforcement involved, to dialing 211 or calling us or emailing us or going to our website and getting that information so that we can connect the young people with the resource that they need and address the issue at hand and not just send them to the magistrate. Oftentimes that's the end result is they go to the magistrate, then the magistrate will look to see what resources are in the community. They're getting the supports and services that they need sooner before they go to the magistrate and they're not being introduced to the system itself.

So it is only a few months in existence. And so we have seen some great progress in getting the word out and having some families connect with organizations. And so we're looking forward to continuing this and hopefully seeing the decline in number of referrals to the juvenile justice system. So that is the work that we do within the Black Girls Equity Alliance to look at what are some of the solutions being action oriented. Another example of that has been the success of us looking at within the Health and Wellness Workgroup. We've been looking at the need for comprehensive sex education in schools and for young people in general. And so we have been working with Pittsburgh Public Schools to adopt a kind of a policy that says that they will address comprehensive sex education. So where we're at with that is now the implementation. What does that mean? What is the programming that needs to happen? And so looking forward to working with them again, these things happen like right before the pandemic, during the pandemic. And so now with everything getting back into full swing and now we're kind of in the second year of school being in person, we can now see some of the initiatives that we have had put on hold be put back into action.

Naomi: That's so awesome. You mentioned challenges specifically to black girls. Is there anything that you haven't mentioned that presents challenges or disparities to black girls within education?

Kathi: So the suspension and expulsions they've had at a higher rate. The other thing that we were looking at was just academic achievement and the achievement gap. And so, unfortunately, all of our children are now testing below proficiency and need that additional support. But pre-pandemic, that was an issue that black children and children with disabilities have faced. So just looking at how we can again support the schools and programs like Gwen's Girls and out-of-school time programs have provided enhanced academic support to meet the needs of the young people alongside with the school.

Naomi: Do you have any ideas of how [physicians and medical students] can support Gwen's Girls work and how we can work with the community more in general to help create better educational environments for kids? 

Kathi: One would be to stay informed of what is in our region and refer our young people to community supports that you may have vetted that have been helpful- you can always contact us through 211 and we can provide additional information on the various programs that are in different communities. The other thing is staying connected with schools. I know sometimes it's hard to make inroads with connecting with school districts but I think that that's something that would be beneficial. The other is from an education standpoint. One of the things that we do at Gwen's Girls is we focus and try to expose our girls to as many STEM careers as we can. And so obviously medicine, anything with healthcare. So, we'd love to have as many volunteers and folks to come in to speak to our girls and mentor our girls. But Gwen's Girls isn't the only organization that providers can reach out to. It takes a village for all of our young people to flourish and to not just survive, but to thrive, especially in this time of a lot of violence and different adversities that are happening. So we need everybody's support. I think the medical profession, and me also representing being a nurse practitioner is something that, it doesn't have to be just pertaining to medicine. We know that all the things that happen in mental health and with trauma can impact somebody's medical or physical well-being. So that's what I would say, just to find ways to possibly volunteer or to connect with youth serving organizations or schools so that we can all have some type of input and address the needs of our young people.