Ohkay Owingeh school grief-support groups give Indigenous children space to heal together

Dec. 24—OHKAY OWINGEH — Iryen Montoya, 9, supplied the day's "special question": What's your favorite doughnut?

A group of students and school officials sat on a rug in Ohkay Owingeh Community School's Tewa instruction room one morning earlier this month, answering Iryen's special question and those on a well-used check-in list asking students their names, how they were feeling and who they missed.

Everyone in the circle — including adult facilitators Daniel Archuleta, a Tewa instructor and substitute teacher, and Martha Tenorio, the school counselor — had experienced the death of a close family member, often a parent or sibling.

One by one, the kids and adults answered the four questions. Discussions of sprinkles and icing blended with the names of lost loved ones.

These days, it's not uncommon for students to tackle weighty, emotional subjects within the walls of Ohkay Owingeh Community School, Principal Claudia Sena said. There's a growing awareness at the tribally run school, which serves over 100 students in kindergarten through sixth grade, that "emotions are OK," the principal added.

That's due in large part to relatively new support groups on campus.

In 2021, the school partnered with Gerard's House, a Santa Fe-based nonprofit that provides support to grieving children, teens and families, to create in-school, culturally responsive grief support groups for students.

In the past few years, the support groups have flourished, strengthening not only the students involved but the adults leading them, too.

"I just fell in love with Gerard's House because I needed that support — and I'm sure there's countless other adults here in the pueblo that could use the same support," Archuleta said.

By the time they reach 18, 1 in 8 New Mexico children will experience the death of a parent or sibling, according to the Childhood Bereavement Estimation Model, a nationwide data tool that determines the rate of grieving children in the U.S.

That figure — the second highest in the nation, trailing only West Virginia — is significantly higher for New Mexico's Indigenous children, the model shows. One in six Native American kids in the state will lose a parent or sibling by 18, and 1 in 4 will lose an immediate family member by 25.

Such statistics prompted Gerard's House to consider pilot programs in Native American communities, said Maggie Boyle, the organization's associate director.

The chance to do that came in 2021, when Sena — at the recommendation of an Ohkay Owingeh Community School parent — reached out to the organization in search of services.

Gerard's House already had programs geared toward particular groups, including homeless kids, Latino immigrant youth and pregnant or parenting teens.

"We had kind of had on our hearts and minds for a while supporting the pueblos, supporting Indigenous communities," Boyle said. "But that invitation really helped us to then get together an advisory committee of Tewa leaders and elders and parents and staff from the school."

The support groups would be led by Archuleta and Tenorio, both of whom are members of Ohkay Owingeh and completed Gerard's House's volunteer training, with support from the organization.

The two facilitators adapted the organization's processes and materials to suit the pueblo's cultural and linguistic traditions.

They call the weekly sessions wôe bidí — "medicine mound" in Tewa. And each session begins and ends with a prayer, a component that offers the added benefit of allowing students to practice their Tewa.

The adaptations also ensure the support groups' curriculum acknowledges and addresses Ohkay Owingeh cultural expectations surrounding death.

Among the pueblo's families, Archuleta said, there can be a hesitancy to discuss grief long term, outside the context of a recent death.

"Culturally, it's not something we do — like we don't bring up death unless it's at a funeral. ... No one really ever gets down to the, I guess, core of death and loss," he said.

Instead, Archuleta said many members of the pueblo urge people experiencing a loss to "be strong." That's not the wrong message to send in the aftermath of a death, he said, but there has to be a safe place for children and families to process their grief and receive resources.

That's what the support groups offer each week. Students gather together to express their feelings, work on cathartic art projects and play games.

They discuss doughnuts and death at the same time.

"When they're in a space where it was OK and they were with fellow students, it was safe to grieve," Tenorio said.

But students aren't the only ones benefitting from the support groups. Archuleta and Tenorio found themselves starting to heal, too.

When she first started leading support groups at Ohkay Owingeh Community School, Tenorio said she was still reeling from the death of a loved one. She saw the support groups as an opportunity to heal alongside her students.

"You guys also play a big part: You help us heal. So thank you guys," Tenorio told her students in a session this month.

Archuleta, too, said he "still trying to get a handle on [his] grief and loss" — particularly the death of his father — when the support groups began at the school. The skills he learned from Gerard's House have helped him manage those emotions.

Now, Archuleta calls healing "infectious," something he shares as much as he can and something his students impart on family members at home. He likened each student who has participated in the support groups to a little flame, spreading their sparks to friends and family in the community.

"That's kind of what my thinking behind that was: Just kind of getting the fire started, just a little small flame," Archuleta said. "And those little flames will make their own flames."

He added, "But eventually, I hope that it'll be a bright fire."