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Growing Our Storytellers: Building Belonging with Hilary Gourneau of Pté Collective · The LIFTS Podcast

• 0:09
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Welcome to season six of our LIFTS podcast, where we talk about what it's like to give birth, to raise and nurture our babies and toddlers in Montana, and what it looks like to care for ourselves in this tumultuous season.
• 0:20
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: I'm Gwyneth Hyndman, storytelling coordinator for Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies, the Montana Coalition, and I'm so excited to share this space with mothers, fathers, caregivers, and providers who will speak on the beautiful chaos of the zero to three years Good morning, everyone.
• 0:42
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Today, we are starting our Lifts Podcast short series, Growing Our Storytellers: Exploring Early Literacy in Montana.
• 0:50
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And in this series, we're gonna be focusing in on what this looks like in a few different corners of our state, from preschool classrooms to our evening bedtime routines at home.
• 0:59
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And we're even gonna be going on a late summer garden tour and just seeing how those first storytelling skills can be just honed through sticking our hands in soil and talking to the bugs and the sunflowers.
• 1:11
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: But today, we're gonna be starting our series by talking with educator Hilary Gourneau, who many of you may know as the executive director of the Fort Peck Tribal Head Start.
• 1:22
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And Hilary has a unique perspective in that before she was the executive director, she grew up in Head Start and has very vivid memories of being greeted with, as she says, a smile and a hug and having breakfast and lunch there, and then just having this be a really warm and nurturing place that was also a part of the support system for her mom, who was a single mom working two jobs and also furthering her education at that time.
• 1:50
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And Hilary has really drawn on those early positive memories as she has become a guide in the classroom and in her community.
• 1:57
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: I was first connected to Hilary in the spring when we were talking about doing an early literacy series.
• 2:03
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Uh, and since then, Hilary has transitioned out of that role and into a new role as the founder and director of Pate Collective, which serves Head Start families and children in a new capacity that Hilary will be talking about today.
• 2:17
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: But through our conversation over the summer and into the fall and in the last few weeks as early literacy has again, become a focus around the world really with the passing of Dolly Parton and her work with the Dolly Parton Imagination Library program, it became really clear, as Hilary was describing what she does and what she's been working on, that before we talk about the thrill of our kids getting their first, uh, Imagination Library program book in their mailbox, that they actually need to have a mailbox.
• 2:48
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And we-- our kids need to have a home.
• 2:51
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: They need to be warm.
• 2:52
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: They need breakfast.
• 2:53
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: They need a space to feel safe, and they need to feel seen.
• 2:56
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: So while Hilary's gonna be talking about introducing books to our earliest readers, we're also gonna be backing the conversation up a little bit to talk about the work being done in advocacy for that infrastructure so that kids can actually get absorbed in the words and the pictures and the stories that get us so excited as parents and educators Just providing that space where our kids can thrive as they learn.
• 3:21
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: So Hillary, as we've talked about introductions and giving the world the whole picture of who we are, can you do that for us?
• 3:31
  Hilary Gourneau: I'm a auntie, I'm a daughter, I'm a sister, I'm a community member, along with a, being a new grandma.
• 3:42
  Hilary Gourneau: I am an enrolled member of the Fort Peck Tribes in northeastern Montana.
• 3:47
  Hilary Gourneau: I've grown up here in Fort Peck on the Indian reservation for a majority of my life, leaving to attend college and then to seek some job opportunities, but ultimately returning home to give back to my tribe and my community.
• 4:05
  Hilary Gourneau: I am currently the founder and lead consultant for Pate Collective which I started just shortly after my transition out of my Head Start position.
• 4:19
  Hilary Gourneau: I worked formerly for the Fort Peck Tribes Head Start program here in northeastern Montana.
• 4:24
  Hilary Gourneau: I served four communities and roughly funded for 212 students.
• 4:31
  Hilary Gourneau: And now I am serving Head Start students and families in a different capacity.
• 4:38
  Hilary Gourneau: My role is as a consultant to help and support just children, families, and communities in rural and tribal areas.
• 4:49
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Hmm.
• 4:49
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: You described how feeling safe and loved early on in your life, specifically at Head Start, really shaped where you went, in education.
• 5:00
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Can you share how understanding, uh, how those first interactions with the world work for us in our minds, and how this led to the direction that you felt led to go in?
• 5:13
  Hilary Gourneau: teaching within those five years, I had some major things pop up working with students and families.
• 5:20
  Hilary Gourneau: And Before I started teaching, I told myself five years.
• 5:26
  Hilary Gourneau: Five years I want to go to graduate school.
• 5:29
  Hilary Gourneau: And I know within the education field, it would either be going to administration or this new field that I was discovering, which was mental health, and so school counseling.
• 5:45
  Hilary Gourneau: And a couple things popped up my last year of school teaching.
• 5:50
  Hilary Gourneau: I had one of my students, she was a former fifth grade student, and she was experiencing some hardships at home.
• 6:00
  Hilary Gourneau: Mother got into some trouble and found herself in federal prison.
• 6:07
  Hilary Gourneau: And this young woman, she was one of, I think, five in her home.
• 6:17
  Hilary Gourneau: Grandma was taking care of them on a single income.
• 6:20
  Hilary Gourneau: And this young student, I was just really worried about her, and I didn't see anyone really connecting with her at the school level.
• 6:27
  Hilary Gourneau: She had every red flag that you can probably think of with a student.
• 6:32
  Hilary Gourneau: And she had every reason to drop out, and this was in eighth grade.
• 6:37
  Hilary Gourneau: And I was just trying to get her to finish eighth grade so she can go into high school.
• 6:40
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I stepped in to kinda advocate for her.
• 6:45
  Hilary Gourneau: And through that I noticed that the school counselors that were there, one was a male non-native, and then a female that was older, non-native, and both lived off reservation.
• 7:00
  Hilary Gourneau: She didn't really, she didn't wanna go and see the counselor.
• 7:03
  Hilary Gourneau: She wanted to come to my classroom a lot.
• 7:04
  Hilary Gourneau: And I worked out a plan with the principal, but that was my determining factor in what I wanted to do and what I wanted to go back to to graduate school for.
• 7:17
  Hilary Gourneau: I just noticed that we didn't have a lot of Native American school counselors.
• 7:21
  Hilary Gourneau: And if we did, they went into teaching, or the backwards, they were going and getting it, but nobody was really into it yet.
• 7:27
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I went off and I decided that's what I wanted to do, is I wanted to go into school counseling.
• 7:33
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I applied for one program and that was Portland State.
• 7:37
  Hilary Gourneau: It was a dual program, so you could be you get your LPC and school counseling.
• 7:42
  Hilary Gourneau: It was a three-year program.
• 7:43
  Hilary Gourneau: And I just Thought if this isn't meant to be, then, we'll figure something else out.
• 7:49
  Hilary Gourneau: And then out of almost 200 candidates, only 50 were selected, and I was one of the 50.
• 7:55
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I sat and I had to make this big decision on what I wanted to do, and I decided to move out to Portland and go to school, and I graduated in 2020.
• 8:06
  Hilary Gourneau: That was right when the pandemic started.
• 8:09
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I graduated online, which was a bummer.
• 8:12
  Hilary Gourneau: But, I returned back to Fort Peck here and stayed with my mother and my niece.
• 8:19
  Hilary Gourneau: And at that time, my sister was in federal prison.
• 8:26
  Hilary Gourneau: She had committed a crime and she was using at the time, and so her mental state was not clear.
• 8:37
  Hilary Gourneau: So my, my mom was helping raise her granddaughter, and so I came home and I helped her there.
• 8:43
  Hilary Gourneau: And my mom was like Hillary, you need to get a job." So I decided to apply for the Head Start position here and didn't know what I was really walking into.
• 8:54
  Hilary Gourneau: Little children freaked me out a little bit, scared me.
• 8:58
  Hilary Gourneau: And which is so interesting because in those five and a half years I've spent at Head Start, I have come to really appreciate children in their early years and see how wonderful and amazing gifts that they have to give us.
• 9:18
  Hilary Gourneau: Patience flexibility in the sense of they can adjust really quick.
• 9:23
  Hilary Gourneau: They're resilient.
• 9:24
  Hilary Gourneau: They see good and happy in in a lot of things, and they're so curious.
• 9:29
  Hilary Gourneau: And so working with that age group, it just really changed my perspective on zero to five and what that really looks like, but also how important it is even in the building stages of a human, right?
• 9:41
  Hilary Gourneau: The prenatal, like that is really crucial.
• 9:44
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I just have learned so much about that special population, and it really is.
• 9:51
  Hilary Gourneau: Early learning, early childhood is really its own specialty.
• 9:55
  Healthy Mothers: When you look back on your time since 2020, what are you most proud of when you look back at the projects that you really fought for?
• 10:05
  Hilary Gourneau: Yeah.
• 10:05
  Hilary Gourneau: So when I first started after I did a like a overview of the program and where it was at currently when I stepped in, where they'd come from, in which direction, you know, what directions were we looking at going in.
• 10:19
  Hilary Gourneau: And then also having to remember that as much as we wanted to control and dictate things, the pandemic really was driving our decisions because of keeping our elders and children and that vulnerable population safe during that time.
• 10:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And really thinking about what did I want to do and what I want to accomplish.
• 10:45
  Hilary Gourneau: So I made a list and on that to-do list, it was increase wages for staff, which we did.
• 10:53
  Hilary Gourneau: We created wages.
• 10:54
  Hilary Gourneau: I had to learn about a wage study.
• 10:56
  Hilary Gourneau: I had to visit with partners and talk about competitive wages.
• 11:00
  Hilary Gourneau: And so that was a whole learning curve for me, but we did it.
• 11:04
  Hilary Gourneau: We increased wages to be competitive within our area.
• 11:07
  Hilary Gourneau: Now, is that saying that it's reflective of what teachers and educators should be making?
• 11:13
  Hilary Gourneau: No, it's not.
• 11:14
  Hilary Gourneau: It's far below that.
• 11:15
  Hilary Gourneau: But I know that is something that is being continued to being advocated for, especially within the state and at the federal level.
• 11:21
  Hilary Gourneau: The next one was to update curriculum.
• 11:25
  Hilary Gourneau: The curriculum at the time was probably about eight years old, seven years old.
• 11:30
  Hilary Gourneau: and so we selected Frog Street because within Head Start standards, it has to be a scientifically researched curriculum.
• 11:38
  Hilary Gourneau: But the special thing with Tribal Head Starts is that as long as you have a research-based curriculum, you can also align that with your cultural standards.
• 11:47
  Hilary Gourneau: And if your tribe has any cultural teachings in language traditions, you can apply those and work them into your curriculum, which is beautiful.
• 11:56
  Hilary Gourneau: And we went into Frog Street, and we started to indigenize that curriculum.
• 12:00
  Hilary Gourneau: The other thing was the new facilities.
• 12:03
  Hilary Gourneau: Because at the time when I started we were out of hand-me-down buildings that were old community halls.
• 12:11
  Hilary Gourneau: And so based on some of those community halls they're almost a timeline for safety codes and building codes because you can see how they were kind of-
• 12:19
  Healthy Mothers: piping
• 12:20
  Hilary Gourneau: Patchworked together.
• 12:22
  Hilary Gourneau: The pipes were old, corroded and some of that asbestos they had to do testing and make sure they covered that up.
• 12:29
  Healthy Mothers: Having to go into your buildings too.
• 12:31
  Healthy Mothers: I think
• 12:31
  Hilary Gourneau: Yes
• 12:32
  Healthy Mothers: you had to go in with...
• 12:33
  Healthy Mothers: Did you use duct tape in one point?
• 12:35
  Healthy Mothers: It
• 12:35
  Hilary Gourneau: in, yep, duct tape.
• 12:37
  Hilary Gourneau: I've had to crawl,
• 12:39
  Hilary Gourneau: I had to break into one of my Head Start buildings because I was trying to find the water valve shutoff.
• 12:44
  Hilary Gourneau: Little did I know the water valve shutoff was down the road.
• 12:48
  Hilary Gourneau: A modular building that was not on a foundation, it just was on beams for 30 years.
• 12:54
  Hilary Gourneau: My whole underneath of that modular, about three feet up, was all flooded and destroyed all of our duct work underneath.
• 13:02
  Hilary Gourneau: I've had to climb fences I've cooked in the kitchen I've worked in the classrooms.
• 13:07
  Hilary Gourneau: I've sawed off tree limbs to make sure trees, branches weren't falling off on kids.
• 13:13
  Hilary Gourneau: When you're a Head Start director, I feel you're a jack of all trades.
• 13:17
  Hilary Gourneau: And if anyone were to ever see a, a former Head Start director on a resume, and if they knew, that would be boom, automatic hire.
• 13:27
  Hilary Gourneau: 'Cause the things Head Start directors have to do is multifaceted.
• 13:33
  Hilary Gourneau: It's all 24 hours I've gotten phone calls the one with the water, fire, flooding break-ins.
• 13:40
  Hilary Gourneau: So looking back at that time what really sparked that I was looking on Facebook one evening and I saw Cherokee Nation put 60 million towards their early learning, like revamping it, building facilities, everything.
• 13:58
  Hilary Gourneau: And what had come from the government at that time was these ARPA funds, the American Rescue Plan Act monies.
• 14:06
  Hilary Gourneau: And our tribe received a large amount.
• 14:09
  Hilary Gourneau: An unprecedented amount.
• 14:10
  Hilary Gourneau: It was the largest amount that they've ever received as far as I'm aware of.
• 14:14
  Hilary Gourneau: And it was like, I think it was 67 million in which they got.
• 14:20
  Hilary Gourneau: It was a large amount of money.
• 14:21
  Hilary Gourneau: This was back in 2020, 2021.
• 14:27
  Healthy Mothers: OK
• 14:28
  Hilary Gourneau: We had meetings, and these meetings that they had brought us all together, all these programs, and they had like documentation that we had to fill out and how, what ideas did we have how to utilize this money and if we, our programs would qualify for it.
• 14:43
  Hilary Gourneau: And so one of the qualifications on there was education disparities.
• 14:48
  Hilary Gourneau: And so out of the educational disparities, because of COVID we fell under that because the facilities in which we were operating were not Adequate.
• 14:57
  Healthy Mothers: Yeah
• 14:58
  Hilary Gourneau: so they were thinking about the droplets in the carpet.
• 15:00
  Hilary Gourneau: Carpets were hard.
• 15:01
  Hilary Gourneau: We didn't have a really good ventilation system.
• 15:04
  Hilary Gourneau: And so thinking about how they could spend some of that money, but we had to also qualify within our selection criteria that our own tribe developed.
• 15:14
  Hilary Gourneau: And we fell under that, and at the first meeting, I was just like, "I'm going for it.
• 15:19
  Hilary Gourneau: I'm gonna ask.
• 15:19
  Hilary Gourneau: They should be able to.
• 15:20
  Hilary Gourneau: Everybody campaigns on children and our elders.
• 15:23
  Hilary Gourneau: Let's do this, and let's see how important children really are." And at that point, I went on social media, and I was advocating already and sharing pictures where the floor was detaching from the wall, and so there was about a two-inch gap in some of those areas.
• 15:39
  Hilary Gourneau: Toilets, I've had to clean out so many toilets because the pipes were old pipes, and so being damaged and having to plunge toilets.
• 15:47
  Hilary Gourneau: And heating was out.
• 15:48
  Hilary Gourneau: Heating would always go out, and so kids would be cold.
• 15:51
  Hilary Gourneau: Teachers would have to plug in the the floor heaters, which that was hard.
• 15:55
  Hilary Gourneau: Sewage gas would get backed up.
• 15:57
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I was just thinking about all that, and I was just like, "Nope, I'm going in there," and I was, hot to trot.
• 16:01
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I go in there, and I say, we would like," I think it was eight million I asked for at the time.
• 16:08
  Hilary Gourneau: And mind you, at this, in this stage, I was not like, oh, I had a architect build me stuff and draw things out.
• 16:15
  Hilary Gourneau: I did not have a concept of that at that time.
• 16:17
  Hilary Gourneau: I feel like it was really an infantile mindset but I had the vision, and I had the heart.
• 16:23
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I went in there, and I said, "This is what we need." And then one of my partners in my group, they were like, "Eight million?
• 16:30
  Hilary Gourneau: Just ask for twelve million." So I was like, "Twelve million." And so I went in.
• 16:36
  Hilary Gourneau: I had a resolution typed up, and I went in and requested from the tribal executive board, They're broken up into committees, and I went to the education committee in which I report to, and I asked for twelve million to start building new Head Start facilities.
• 16:54
  Hilary Gourneau: And they were all on board for it.
• 16:57
  Hilary Gourneau: And that was in '21.
• 16:59
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we wrote this 12 million set aside for Head Start facilities.
• 17:06
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Yeah, and 12 million seems like so much, but you talked about then reality just hitting at the end of that year and then into 2022
• 17:15
  Hilary Gourneau: reality hit in the form of inflation, in the form of Timeliness in the form of weather, inclement weather, and then job shortage.
• 17:30
  Hilary Gourneau: So through all of that, cost of price and material, labor, all of that started to go up.
• 17:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And so twelve million, it wasn't covering everything.
• 17:42
  Hilary Gourneau: And so the tribe had put another five point five million into the project.
• 17:47
  Hilary Gourneau: So it ro-rose it up to fifteen point five.
• 17:50
  Hilary Gourneau: And then Head Start put a little bit in.
• 17:52
  Hilary Gourneau: And from what I do know is that Head Start really struggled before the pandemic.
• 17:56
  Hilary Gourneau: They were not given a lot of money for a lot of extra things.
• 18:00
  Hilary Gourneau: And so it was this time where it was like, there's extra funding out there for mental health, for health and safety for social-emotional.
• 18:09
  Hilary Gourneau: So we made sure and utilized that money to support our students within the program so that when they came to school, they would have everything they needed.
• 18:17
  Hilary Gourneau: And so the fifteen point five is what we were operating.
• 18:21
  Hilary Gourneau: And then, costs kept climbing up, and so we fell short of that fifteen point five by three million.
• 18:26
  Hilary Gourneau: And that's currently what our tribe is working on with MOFI.
• 18:31
  Hilary Gourneau: It's They're called new tax, new market tax credits.
• 18:34
  Healthy Mothers: Okay
• 18:35
  Hilary Gourneau: MOFI is working with the tribe, on kinda coming up with that additional cost with some tax credits that they'll be able to utilize towards finishing the project.
• 18:44
  Hilary Gourneau: And within those buildings, this is what I was really super excited, so I did, I was able to help design that.
• 18:50
  Hilary Gourneau: And there's one in Poplar and one in Wolf Point.
• 18:54
  Hilary Gourneau: Within those two facilities, you'll find right in the middle is a gymnasium,உ because those that know Montana, especially northeastern Montana or the Hi-Line, know that winter comes, and it comes hard, and it stays for a long time.
• 19:09
  Hilary Gourneau: So having children be cooped up and not have anywhere to run around, especially three, four, and five I really thought about making sure that they had adequate space to do their physical health, which is just as important as mental health.
• 19:24
  Hilary Gourneau: And it was a place for families to gather because that was another issue we faced here, and I would say that's in rural communities as well, not just tribal, is that facility need.
• 19:34
  Hilary Gourneau: It's a facility crisis.
• 19:35
  Hilary Gourneau: Housing is a crisis everywhere.
• 19:36
  Hilary Gourneau: Also, just finding buildings.
• 19:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we didn't have a building that was ours.
• 19:41
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we'd have to popcorn around and find places to set up our family engagement nights.
• 19:46
  Hilary Gourneau: And this gymnasium will have a lot of multipurpose and I'm really excited for that for them to get in there and see that 'cause it's really important for them to have, again, somewhere to be able to run during the wintertime when it's raining or when it's, fifty below, somewhere that they're safe.
• 20:03
  Hilary Gourneau: And also find a nurse's room.
• 20:07
  Hilary Gourneau: I wanted to make sure that we had our partners, because one thing about Head Start is that...
• 20:12
  Hilary Gourneau: And just I would say that population, prenatal to five, is they have to rely on adults a lot, and that's also with even within the, the health realm.
• 20:23
  Hilary Gourneau: So we do a lot of partnerships with our local health providers, and that's one of the beautiful things about Head Start is it's a very holistic program, and so they take in consideration the whole child, including the family.
• 20:37
  Hilary Gourneau: And part of that is working with our local dentists, our local health partners and nutritionists.
• 20:45
  Hilary Gourneau: So we work with WIC in making sure our children are receiving those services early on because early intervention is crucial to making sure that those challenges down the road are getting addressed earlier.
• 20:57
  Hilary Gourneau: And this nurse's room is there, and I wanted to make sure and also build in a shower because accidents happen.
• 21:04
  Hilary Gourneau: Also, just making sure that if anything, there's place to wash off.
• 21:10
  Hilary Gourneau: And then what I wanted to do in that room though was work with a a dentist to bring in a pediatric dental chair so that they can get their teeth looked at there.
• 21:19
  Hilary Gourneau: Not just a pediatric dental chair, but almost a A transferable one.
• 21:23
  Hilary Gourneau: I don't know that word I'm looking for, but...
• 21:25
  Hilary Gourneau: A mobile, yes.
• 21:27
  Hilary Gourneau: There we go.
• 21:28
  Healthy Mothers: Yeah.
• 21:28
  Hilary Gourneau: a mobile pediatric dental chair.
• 21:30
  Hilary Gourneau: I also built in a an OT/PT room that we would be able to utilize for occupational therapy, physical therapy, but also a private room when we have children that, and families that are working with social services or they're getting assessments done or our staff need to do any type of mental health counseling on Zoom or, on a social media platform 'cause that's something that Head Start was really pushing was mental health and making sure not just families and students, but also that your staff were receiving mental health services.
• 22:03
  Hilary Gourneau: And I wanted to make sure to create a space that was private enough for them to feel comfortable doing that.
• 22:08
  Hilary Gourneau: Another place I wanted to intentionally build in was this all staff and parent gathering space.
• 22:16
  Hilary Gourneau: And it's an open space that faces this big window because the other thing is that I wanted a lot of windows in our facility because sunlight, vitamin D is crucial to brain development at this age.
• 22:29
  Hilary Gourneau: We know that anyone that's living north of the hemisphere is vitamin D deficient.
• 22:35
  Hilary Gourneau: So any type of sunlight we can get, please.
• 22:39
  Hilary Gourneau: Yes, please.
• 22:40
  Hilary Gourneau: And so there's a lot of windows in these buildings.
• 22:42
  Hilary Gourneau: But this open, this looks out this beautiful window and when you sit there long enough, you can see the sunset, a beautiful Montana sunset.
• 22:54
  Hilary Gourneau: And that was something that I really found very, beautiful, just, gorgeous to watch.
• 23:00
  Healthy Mothers: How far along is it from it being completed, the building?
• 23:04
  Hilary Gourneau: The one in Wolf Point the one in Wolf Point, Montana, that's probably about 90% completed.
• 23:09
  Hilary Gourneau: And the one in Poplar, I would say about 75%.
• 23:12
  Healthy Mothers: Okay
• 23:13
  Hilary Gourneau: They are they're sister buildings.
• 23:15
  Hilary Gourneau: So the one in Wolf Point is the little sister to the Poplar design because the Wolf Point one has a smaller size of student population, and then Poplar has a larger size.
• 23:26
  Hilary Gourneau: There's one additional classroom in in Poplar.
• 23:29
  Hilary Gourneau: But another, another space that I built in there was a almost like a restaurant-style kitchen because I've had to cook in our facilities because that's one of the many hats we wear.
• 23:41
  Hilary Gourneau: And just realizing that some of the equipment that we had and some of the spacing that was available within those kitchens was not ideal in, in serving and meeting the needs of students.
• 23:52
  Hilary Gourneau: One of the things that we do here is that we, We dry meat.
• 23:56
  Hilary Gourneau: And some of the things that we've done is we've taken our buffalos, we get a buffalo donated, and there's dry meat that will be there, and we learn how to cut it really thin and then hang dry it.
• 24:08
  Hilary Gourneau: I remember watching my mom do it when we were little.
• 24:11
  Hilary Gourneau: So it's just part of, this is what we used to do.
• 24:16
  Hilary Gourneau: We had to harvest and make sure our summer stuff was getting ready for our winter meals.
• 24:21
  Hilary Gourneau: And that's something that I really wanted to, our families to participate in.
• 24:25
  Hilary Gourneau: But we never had the fridge space.
• 24:27
  Hilary Gourneau: We never had the meat cutting station spaces.
• 24:30
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I wanted to really build that in.
• 24:32
  Hilary Gourneau: I said, "I want a walk-in freezer built, and I don't really care about the refrigerators.
• 24:36
  Hilary Gourneau: I want a walk-in freezer." And the guy was like how big do you want it?" And I said large enough to fit at least a couple deer, hang a couple deer in them." Some white tails because that's, traditionally, those are the meats that we would eat, that buffalo, wild game.
• 24:50
  Hilary Gourneau: And that is really important to our community here.
• 24:53
  Hilary Gourneau: So it would provide spacing for that.
• 24:58
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Now can you describe the cultural room that you envisioned?
• 25:04
  Hilary Gourneau: So there's no windows in this room because some of our traditional ceremonies take place in the dark, and this would be able to provide that setting if it was needed to be held there.
• 25:18
  Hilary Gourneau: One of the things I always think about is that identity is really important.
• 25:24
  Hilary Gourneau: Identity is that protective factor.
• 25:26
  Hilary Gourneau: Who am I?
• 25:26
  Hilary Gourneau: Where do I belong?
• 25:27
  Hilary Gourneau: That sense of belonging.
• 25:28
  Hilary Gourneau: And as indigenous people, we have our Indian names that we, in the past, were gifted right when we were born.
• 25:38
  Hilary Gourneau: That isn't always so now.
• 25:41
  Hilary Gourneau: People have become, distant or they lack that knowledge that isn't maybe being shared or they don't live close to home, they don't live close to where those traditions are practiced.
• 25:55
  Hilary Gourneau: And I thought It would be almost sometimes a life-saving thing to have is your Indian name.
• 26:05
  Hilary Gourneau: When you're in some of those really dark places, who are you?
• 26:09
  Hilary Gourneau: Suicide rates are really high amongst tribal people, and so half of me wonders if that sense of identity is missing within some of those individuals and if they didn't feel that sense of belonging.
• 26:22
  Hilary Gourneau: And so part of why I created that room was that so potentially anyone that wanted to participate and gift their child an Indian name, that they would have a cultural space to do that, so that when they go into the public school or when they leave this, this program that they have this piece of who they are, this identity piece.
• 26:44
  Hilary Gourneau: And it gives that, I think too, this sense of purpose.
• 26:47
  Hilary Gourneau: And so that was one of the reasons why I built in that space because I had students that I taught back, what, 10 years ago, fifth graders, and they didn't have Indian names, and they would ask, they would say, "Ms.
• 27:02
  Hilary Gourneau: Gourneau do you have an Indian name?" And I would say, "Yes, I do have an Indian name.
• 27:06
  Hilary Gourneau: I got it when I was a baby." And they would say "Am I Indian?" "Yes, you are." And, so they would really compare.
• 27:12
  Hilary Gourneau: This piece was really important to them.
• 27:15
  Hilary Gourneau: They didn't think that they belonged or that they were part of the group because they didn't have this identifier.
• 27:21
  Hilary Gourneau: But it also goes deeper into that of community and family, and some of these Indian names, they've been carried on for generations and generations.
• 27:31
  Hilary Gourneau: To be able to be gifted an Indian name is a really special milestone within somebody's cultural identity I believe.
• 27:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And and it's not, it shouldn't be any child's fault that they don't get that because their parent didn't know.
• 27:46
  Hilary Gourneau: The parent shouldn't be held at fault necessarily because I feel like it's also a community responsibility.
• 27:53
  Hilary Gourneau: And what a beautiful place to be able to get your Indian name is in, your really early years.
• 28:00
  Hilary Gourneau: So when you are off on your journey, your life journey, you'll know who you are, where you came from, and you'll have this sense of purpose and this, this guiding light or guiding energy that you'll be able to have.
• 28:11
  Hilary Gourneau: I remember I had a, a student got, they got older, and they said, Ms.
• 28:16
  Hilary Gourneau: Gourneau, can you help me get my Indian name?" And at that moment I was a little taken back because now I'm being seen as not just a young teacher or this young person in my community, this kid.
• 28:30
  Hilary Gourneau: I'm being seen as this adult, and I've stepped into a new role unknowingly.
• 28:36
  Hilary Gourneau: And I feel like that again where I've stepped into another new role, a developmental milestone as a adult, and have become somebody within the community that is respected and also a person that people can go to and ask questions and get some guidance.
• 29:01
  Healthy Mothers: Hillary, can you talk about Pete Collective and where that came from and how long that was in your mind and your heart before you started moving forward with that?
• 29:13
  Hilary Gourneau: So Pete Collective was born out of My desire and heart calling to help and support Native children and families.
• 29:27
  Hilary Gourneau: I had been thinking about going into starting a small business around consulting for about, I'd say two years now.
• 29:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And it really started by me seeing a need for Native voice within early childhood and early learning, especially in our tribal rural areas.
• 29:49
  Hilary Gourneau: So I started to think about this idea and I held it pretty close to my heart and pretty private for the first part of it just because I wasn't sure if I was ready.
• 30:00
  Hilary Gourneau: And with my recent transition out of Head Start, I still knew that My communities and our rural communities in Montana still needed to have a voice, especially at the table when they start talking about funding.
• 30:18
  Hilary Gourneau: And currently, the Head Start standards are being proposed for big changes.
• 30:24
  Hilary Gourneau: I feel like Pete Collective it made its entrance into formation, I think, right at the right time.
• 30:31
  Hilary Gourneau: And it really is about supporting community, supporting partnerships, supporting families because I feel that with those supports, then in turn the child will have great success.
• 30:47
  Hilary Gourneau: Pate is the Dakota word for female buffalo.
• 30:52
  Hilary Gourneau: And female buffalo in my culture is a sign of strength and they're very matriarchal.
• 30:59
  Hilary Gourneau: And so my mother has taught me a lot and she currently also sits on a volunteer board that speaks on behalf of our buffalo that we have here in Fort Peck.
• 31:11
  Hilary Gourneau: And part of my mother's passion and heart work is to help educate, protect, advocate for our relatives, which are the buffalo.
• 31:23
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we refer to ourselves at times as the Tatanka Oyate, which tatanka is buffalo and oyate is family, and so the buffalo family.
• 31:34
  Hilary Gourneau: That's part of our creation story as well.
• 31:37
  Hilary Gourneau: And so that work that my mom has done in order to help protect, support, and advocate for her buffalo, our buffalo, has filtered down into me and my sister and my niece.
• 31:50
  Hilary Gourneau: And my mom also is a educator.
• 31:53
  Hilary Gourneau: She's taught in the public schools.
• 31:55
  Hilary Gourneau: She's taught at in higher education.
• 31:56
  Hilary Gourneau: And now she's currently giving back by helping support our community with I would say growing back to our roots of who we are as Dakota people especially how we are related and identify with the buffalo very closely.
• 32:19
  Hilary Gourneau: And so Pete Collective to me embodies what our buffalo mean to us, especially our female buffalo, the Pete, and that matriarchal keepers, directors of their community, of their family.
• 32:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And oh, I'm getting a little emotional.
• 32:40
  Hilary Gourneau: I don't think I've really thought about it and expressed it in words but my mission is to support children and families and all, all children and families.
• 32:59
  Hilary Gourneau: But my passion is working with my indigenous communities and making sure that they're seen and they're heard, and that anyone that works with children in that capacity, especially our native children, that they feel supported.
• 33:15
  Hilary Gourneau: So Pete Collective is now, Is now ready take care of just like our buffalo took care of us
• 33:23
  Healthy Mothers: Hilary, when you talk about consulting, what does that look like in the role that you're in?
• 33:29
  Hilary Gourneau: So my role that I find myself in is as a former Head Start director working with the federal government, it was challenging at times because we were always told how to do things in a very directive way.
• 33:43
  Hilary Gourneau: And I know as a director, we don't take direction.
• 33:45
  Hilary Gourneau: But in, in the sense that I was really watching how the delivery was being done from a federal office to a tribal community, it lacked a lot of, to me, warmth and guidance in the sense of let's walk side by side and let me help you do these things.
• 34:06
  Hilary Gourneau: Because I feel like with the High turnover rates that we're experiencing because a lot of Head Start directors, once they were in that position, they held that position for many decades, so we have this age that's starting to retire.
• 34:20
  Hilary Gourneau: And when I stepped into that role, it was during pandemic.
• 34:23
  Hilary Gourneau: And it really shined a light on how that age group was aligning or working with technology and this nuance from going from in-person school to online based.
• 34:39
  Hilary Gourneau: And so throughout those conversations that I was hearing from the office of Head Start having with other fellow directors when I was just in the Zoom calls and just listening, because I too was learning how to be a director and what that all entailed, i heard a lot of assumptions that were being made on the federal side that our directors knew how to do all these things in the realm of technology.
• 35:01
  Hilary Gourneau: And so the way I was hearing some of the partners speaking to my directors, and I call them my directors because we formed a really good bond my Montana Head Start directors, tribal Head Start directors also with non-tribal Head Start directors.
• 35:15
  Hilary Gourneau: But it was in a way that left them confused, a little disoriented, and still asking what do they want?
• 35:24
  Hilary Gourneau: How do they want it?" There wasn't a lot of, "Let's hold each other's hands, and let me help you walk through this." It kinda felt just like a number, and that's it.
• 35:33
  Hilary Gourneau: Just making sure you're checking these boxes off.
• 35:35
  Hilary Gourneau: There wasn't really a feeling of support in a compassionate and like humanist, human way.
• 35:43
  Hilary Gourneau: I just felt like a lot of my tribal Head Start directors, they're older, they're elders.
• 35:51
  Hilary Gourneau: And the way I view and have been brought up to view elders is that there's a lot of respect, and there's a lot of appreciation that goes there.
• 35:59
  Hilary Gourneau: And so there's a certain way that you talk to them, and there's a certain way that you help teach them so they can learn.
• 36:04
  Hilary Gourneau: I know their plates are heavy.
• 36:06
  Hilary Gourneau: I know there's a lot of changes coming yet again for Head Start.
• 36:09
  Hilary Gourneau: And I just wanna be that that program or that business or that person, a friend, to just help sit with them if they need even to bounce ideas off.
• 36:18
  Hilary Gourneau: Sometimes I think people are a little afraid of being called out or shamed for not knowing how to do something, and so they keep from sharing.
• 36:27
  Hilary Gourneau: I do know a lot of our tribal children, and not just tribal children meaning from Fort Peck, tribal children from all over, they go to non-tribal Head Starts or non-tribal pre-Ks.
• 36:37
  Hilary Gourneau: And their pre-K programs, they want to do what's right by that family, by that indigenous family, but they don't always know how to.
• 36:47
  Hilary Gourneau: They don't always know where to go.
• 36:50
  Hilary Gourneau: And so part of also what I provide with consulting is some of that cultural education.
• 36:55
  Hilary Gourneau: And not all tribes are the same, and not all Native families are the same.
• 37:00
  Hilary Gourneau: And so but being able to help a program, teachers, directors staff, help them understand a little bit of the cultural and traditional context in which some of our families are coming from and how they can support Native families in their program, help them feel a little bit more seen and a more of a sense of belonging I think that would really strengthen their partnership and the relationship.
• 37:25
  Hilary Gourneau: And so that's another thing I offer.
• 37:27
  Hilary Gourneau: I do have a bachelor's in elementary education with a minor in Native studies, and then I received my master's degree in counselor education with a focus in school counseling.
• 37:38
  Hilary Gourneau: And so being able to bring that mental health perspective forward, has really been a gift that I've been presented with.
• 37:45
  Hilary Gourneau: I love helping others, and if I can do it through whatever way possible in a, a partnership, that's what I wanna do.
• 37:53
  Hilary Gourneau: And that's what Pete Collective's about.
• 37:56
  Healthy Mothers: And this was an idea that you started thinking about, you said two years ago.
• 38:00
  Healthy Mothers: So you were right in the middle of your time in your role as executive director, and you saw that need there.
• 38:08
  Hilary Gourneau: Yes.
• 38:08
  Hilary Gourneau: Yes
• 38:10
  Healthy Mothers: that as a role that you, someone that you might be able to at that time, or you sometimes would go into an organization and think, "Gosh, if I could clone myself into someone who had this,"
• 38:25
  Hilary Gourneau: Both.
• 38:25
  Hilary Gourneau: Yes, both.
• 38:26
  Hilary Gourneau: I had the technological awareness and skills but I didn't necessarily have the perspective in which some of those things that come from like a community needs assessment or working with your health agencies.
• 38:41
  Hilary Gourneau: I didn't know how to really do those things, in a Head Start director role.
• 38:45
  Hilary Gourneau: Having somebody come in, and I actually did, but she wasn't in that official role or capacity.
• 38:52
  Hilary Gourneau: She was my grantee specialist through Head Start, which is like a third-party contract that they use.
• 38:58
  Hilary Gourneau: But this woman, she was a Native woman and she had that same belief and mission about supporting tribal directors.
• 39:12
  Hilary Gourneau: She worked for a non-tribal, organization, but she understood what it meant and how to connect and work with tribes.
• 39:22
  Hilary Gourneau: And so from her I learned a lot.
• 39:24
  Hilary Gourneau: She really was a big supporter of the work, but also mentored me very well and, I did have that, and that's what I want to be able to give to other directors.
• 39:35
  Hilary Gourneau: Now, the flip side too is going into programs, tribal and non-tribal programs, and seeing and saying, "Oh, this is where they could really use somebody that could, help with cultural education, help with understanding what some of the terminology is that you're hearing from tribal families.
• 39:55
  Hilary Gourneau: Or around traditional practices or ceremonies that are taking place, and how can I help bridge that relationship or how could somebody help bridge that relationship for this program because there are a lot of Native families that are attending here, and how can you help them strengthen that?"
• 40:12
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: So right now, with the proposed changes for Head Start, with your long background as a participant and then most recently as an executive director, what are your thoughts?
• 40:25
  Hilary Gourneau: So I think what I'm getting the feel for with other directors in the state, there's a lot of anxiety and fear on how this is going to impact their communities and their children.
• 40:41
  Hilary Gourneau: What I'm hearing is mental health special needs, and then local control.
• 40:48
  Hilary Gourneau: There's more standards that are being proposed and how they're going to change those or get rid of them.
• 40:54
  Hilary Gourneau: But these ones stuck out to me because I feel like they're the ones that could do more harm than good, Because they're talking about suspension and expulsion and being able to move forward with those and not having to have a lot of Documentation in order to suspend or expel.
• 41:16
  Hilary Gourneau: And those to me are really touchy and could be a little dangerous.
• 41:21
  Hilary Gourneau: Because if we talk about mental health and we talk about how trauma affects and impacts children and families, there's research out there that shows that by the time children come to Head Start at the age of three, they've already experienced multiple ACEs.
• 41:35
  Hilary Gourneau: And if you're familiar with the ACE scores, it's those traumatic events that a child either has witnessed or has been involved with and that has impacted them.
• 41:45
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we look at children within the areas that we serve, and I'm gonna talk more on the tribal side, we have high levels of poverty, violence, suicide, mis- substance use, and then we tack on some of those other ones that are divorce.
• 42:03
  Hilary Gourneau: And so right there you have five ACEs.
• 42:07
  Hilary Gourneau: And I think two or three is common, but by five years old you're already talking about some really major things coming in their little backpacks that they're bringing to school, their emotional backpacks.
• 42:22
  Hilary Gourneau: And so I feel that looking at those, if those do come up and that being proposed as coming back, I would really push against those.
• 42:35
  Hilary Gourneau: We know that the children that we serve, that they do face a lot of trauma and it would be very detrimental to their access to receiving services if they, because of their behavior that they get expelled.
• 42:50
  Hilary Gourneau: But that behavior is a result of what?
• 42:53
  Hilary Gourneau: And so being able to really work with that family and get that child some support would be the most beneficial and more proactive approach than just saying, "Your kid's bad, they're biting.
• 43:06
  Hilary Gourneau: Boom, suspended, expelled." What good does that do to your future community member, who we know that when they get early services, their trajectory for success is stronger.
• 43:18
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we have to also think about those things, because that little three-year-old will eventually become a community member in your community.
• 43:27
  Hilary Gourneau: And then another thing, thinking about our children with special needs, they're talking about rescinding or taking out language that supports children with special needs.
• 43:38
  Hilary Gourneau: We think about cognitive and physical and developmental delays and how if a child has special needs and they have a behavior that comes out in the classroom, and they get expelled or suspended.
• 43:52
  Hilary Gourneau: How is that child or that family going to get any support or services?
• 43:57
  Hilary Gourneau: And then how is that child going to be ready for kindergarten and public school age?
• 44:02
  Hilary Gourneau: The one that I find that's a little bit more unique is the language around state and local control.
• 44:09
  Hilary Gourneau: When they're talking about local control, what does that mean for tribes?
• 44:13
  Hilary Gourneau: Because we are a separate region within Head Start.
• 44:18
  Hilary Gourneau: Before we were Region Eleven, which was known as the AIAN, American Indian Alaska Native region, but now with the new administration, we've been renamed as the tribal region.
• 44:30
  Hilary Gourneau: So what does that look like when they're talking about local control?
• 44:34
  Hilary Gourneau: And how are tribes going to embrace that and or navigate that process?
• 44:41
  Hilary Gourneau: Are they going to continue to want to advocate for some of these standards that are being let go?
• 44:47
  Hilary Gourneau: So making sure that tribal council and their leaders know that because the feds are saying get rid of these things, but yet we see them that they're beneficial to our community, and they promote health and safety, we wanna keep those.
• 45:01
  Hilary Gourneau: And so making sure your policy council's involved, making sure your tribal, tribal council is involved.
• 45:10
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And we'll put in that link to to comment in our show notes.
• 45:14
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: And that comment period does close on October 6th
• 45:20
  Hilary Gourneau: You can just even type in Head Start comment period for new, twenty twenty-six proposed changes.
• 45:26
  Hilary Gourneau: It'll pop on there.
• 45:27
  Hilary Gourneau: Please make sure and share your voice.
• 45:30
  Healthy Mothers: Early literacy is now back on the table, especially this month with the passing of Dolly Parton and looking at her work with the Imagination Library.
• 45:39
  Healthy Mothers: Can you return back to what you had talked about, learning begins with feeling safe, and feeling warm, and being fed, and having your basic needs met, able to access those books.
• 45:53
  Hilary Gourneau: Yeah.
• 45:53
  Hilary Gourneau: So our partnership with Imagination Library started with First Lady Ms Gianforte.
• 46:00
  Hilary Gourneau: This was her initiative.
• 46:01
  Hilary Gourneau: And I had heard about Imagination Library and it was something I didn't realize that was open to organizations to help support.
• 46:12
  Hilary Gourneau: And so she presented me the opportunity, and I said, "Let's try it out, and let's figure it out." And so I said, "But can you please make sure to give me weekly phone calls so I'm staying on task?" And she was like, "Oh, you betcha." And so of course she would do it.
• 46:29
  Hilary Gourneau: She would call, and she would visit, and she would ask, "What are some of the challenges you're having?" And one of the challenges was not all of our students' families have a mailbox, and some of them also use the same mailbox.
• 46:43
  Hilary Gourneau: And so what we noticed was that Imagination Library was kicking back the application because it exceeded the amount of books that could be sent to one mailbox.
• 46:54
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we came up with an idea to utilize our tribal drop-off, which is for the Fort Peck Tribes overall, where they receive mail.
• 47:03
  Hilary Gourneau: And so we started to utilize that, and then in between, we noticed that we had to treat each family like an apartment number Because the system itself had its little flaws here and there, and so we had to learn how to work with that.
• 47:16
  Hilary Gourneau: So we started a kind of a, a system where every family had a unique number that would match their apartment number.
• 47:23
  Hilary Gourneau: And so then we were able to transition those out when the child would graduate, and then we'd be able to repurpose that number.
• 47:28
  Hilary Gourneau: But children were getting their books.
• 47:30
  Hilary Gourneau: I had families Facebook messaging me pictures, and just really excited about receiving their first free book.
• 47:37
  Hilary Gourneau: And that partnership opened up other partnerships around early learning and early literacy,
• 47:42
  Healthy Mothers: Hillary, you talked about also these books really working to bring in books that were reflective of the tribal area that you're in.
• 47:52
  Hilary Gourneau: Yes.
• 47:53
  Hilary Gourneau: So it was called Little Buffalo.
• 47:55
  Hilary Gourneau: It was one of the first books for Imagination Library that they would get in their little welcome pack.
• 47:59
  Hilary Gourneau: Our families just loved it here.
• 48:01
  Hilary Gourneau: And a couple other books that I've noticed that have come out are Powwow Trail.
• 48:06
  Hilary Gourneau: That was another one, and it was a hardback book, and It showed and reflected what you would see at a local powwow.
• 48:13
  Hilary Gourneau: Jingle dress dancers, fancy dancers the regalia.
• 48:16
  Hilary Gourneau: Also not being in regalia, seeing the audience or seeing the grandmas, the aunties, the uncles, the grandpas, the drum group.
• 48:25
  Hilary Gourneau: That book I was just super excited to see.
• 48:27
  Hilary Gourneau: It's a beautiful book.
• 48:30
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Hmm.
• 48:30
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: But like you said, it's not just the book, it's who's giving the book to them.
• 48:36
  Hilary Gourneau: That's that relationship.
• 48:37
  Hilary Gourneau: That's that, a key piece to somebody or a child believing in or having a relationship with reading, with words.
• 48:47
  Hilary Gourneau: And so when we give our books out, it's really not just, "Oh, here's a book." It's, "Look at this book.
• 48:54
  Hilary Gourneau: Look at this amazing book.
• 48:55
  Hilary Gourneau: Look, your baby will love this book." Or showing it to a little one and saying, "Look at a book that you got.
• 48:59
  Hilary Gourneau: Oh my goodness, it's about the little buffalo." And so being able to build that relationship on initi- initial contact with them is something that, Is just proactive.
• 49:14
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Mm-hmm.
• 49:14
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: So Hillary, as we're wrapping up, can we just go back to Pete Collective, um, just to kind of point our listeners in that direction?
• 49:23
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Um, can you just talk a little bit about the website?
• 49:26
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: It's just beautiful and has so much intention to it.
• 49:31
  Hilary Gourneau: So when we're on the website, the buffalo is there.
• 49:34
  Hilary Gourneau: And now the buffalo, when I first was looking at pictures, a lot of the pictures you'll see are of male buffalos.
• 49:40
  Hilary Gourneau: The female buffalo is really hard to come by.
• 49:44
  Hilary Gourneau: And this picture that I have is a female buffalo with two calves.
• 49:49
  Hilary Gourneau: I think they may be, like adolescent yearlings or whatever.
• 49:52
  Hilary Gourneau: Teenagers.
• 49:53
  Hilary Gourneau: But it shows the female buffalo.
• 49:55
  Hilary Gourneau: The pte, a lead female, that she leads the herd, and she is the one that they follow.
• 50:02
  Hilary Gourneau: She's the one that says, "We need to move here.
• 50:04
  Hilary Gourneau: We need to move there." It's not the male.
• 50:06
  Hilary Gourneau: It's the female.
• 50:07
  Hilary Gourneau: They're very matriarchal.
• 50:08
  Hilary Gourneau: And their family system is very much reflective of a tribal family kinship system.
• 50:16
  Hilary Gourneau: So one thing that I really wanted to form Pâté around is women And that women empowerment and that female collective because I really do truly believe that when women do come together, really amazing and great things can happen and that, That hard work that native and non-native women carry is that natural nurturing, protective, wanting to do what's right and best for children.
• 50:51
  Hilary Gourneau: No fear of judgment, no fear of speaking up and speaking out.
• 51:02
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Hmm.
• 51:02
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: I love that.
• 51:03
  Gwyneth Hyndman - HMHB: Thank you, Hilary
• 51:07
  Gwyneth Hyndman, HMHB-MT: The Lifts podcast is hosted by Healthy Mothers Healthy Babies, the Montana Coalition, a nonprofit organization out of Helena, Montana dedicated to the health and wellbeing of families expecting and raising little ones.
• 51:20
  Gwyneth Hyndman, HMHB-MT: Opinions and views expressed in these interviews do not necessarily represent the views expressed by HMHB as an organization.
• 51:28
  Gwyneth Hyndman, HMHB-MT: If you have a topic or a story you would love to see covered on our podcast, or if you have any feedback on a podcast that has aired, you can contact me at gwyneth@hmhb-mt.org.
• 51:41
  Gwyneth Hyndman, HMHB-MT: You can also go right to our website at hmhb-mt.org.
• 51:47
  Gwyneth Hyndman, HMHB-MT: We look forward to hearing from you