Meskwaki Nation Child Support Services is dedicated to strengthening the emotional, physical, social, spiritual, cultural, educational, and financial support that children receive from their parents and the Meskwaki Tribal community.
At the time of the Iowa Institute, Allison was a case manager for the Child Support Services Division and now serves as the Title IV-D Director. Allison’s goal leaving the Institute was to develop collaborative partnerships to cross train and integrate healthy marriage and relationship education into their agency’s programming. Following the Institute, Allison received federal funding for case management and integrating healthy relationship education through new partnerships. Shortly after receiving the funding, Allison began meeting monthly with the Tribal Council to discuss how relationship education could help strengthen families. Having funding and council buy-in proved crucial to strengthening the partnerships Allison has since formed.
At the institute, Allison met two individuals who later became partners in her pursuit to integrate healthy relationship education throughout her community. Allison has continued to partner with other organizations in her community to spread the word about healthy relationship education, and she has since co-hosted events and helped other tribal child support programs embed healthy relationship education into their service provision.
One of Meskwaki Child Support Services’ newest programs is called Elder Circle. This program helps families who are having trouble communicating by pairing them with elders in the tribe. The elders help mediate conflict and guide families to other services they might benefit from. Allison recently shared with the Resource Center that she received feedback from parents expressing a need for information on parenting. She printed copies of the Strong Families Series tip sheets and has started passing them out at various classes and meetings.