Our Gang, MAD Group end

Kahnawa’kehró:non of all ages have spent the last 30 years receiving services from the Whitehouse in Kahnawake. From elementary school to high school, children have attended after-school programs Onkwanen:ra/Our Gang and Ase: Tahonatehiarontie/MAD Group ensuring that every student had a trustworthy environment to head to after school.

“It was a safe place for children to come after school, but also a place where we were able to have the children learn life skills and social skills and enhance their ability to be a healthier, more engaged community member,” said Kateri Oesterreich, a former Our Gang facilitator.

“While I can only speak for myself, I believe that Our Gang had a huge impact during the years in which I worked here.”

Kahnawake Shakotiia’takehnhas Community Services (KSCS) hosted the “30 on 30” at the Whitehouse this past Tuesday, where community members of all ages were invited to show up to celebrate, reflect, and say goodbye to programming that lasted decades.

“When I worked here, these kids were my kids, and even though I had my own daughter at the time, I invested everything into this program,” said Oesterreich.

“For me, it wasn’t just a nine-to-five job. This was my mornings, my afternoons, my evenings, and my weekends because these kids needed to have a safe, fun place to go.”

KSCS will no longer offer its own after-school programs, instead working with the Kahnawake Youth Centre (KYC) and the Kahnawake Education Centre (KEC) to bring

prevention lessons directly to the schools, from grades four through eight, where they will be incorporating some of the lessons taught in the MAD group.

“We had to ask ourselves where our resources can be best used,” said manager of prevention services Rebecca D’Amico, speaking on the decision to close the after-school programs.

“We really wanted to expand and reach more youth and more families as we felt like we were getting only a subset of the community with the after-school programs. We feel like by having the services directly in the schools, we’ll have a lot more impact.”

Our Gang educated Kahnawa’kehró:non children in grades one through six about

group inclusion, self-awareness, understanding relationships, social skills, and culture awareness, while the MAD group built on and expanded those lessons.

“Our goal was planting those seeds and getting the kids to be able to come to a point where when they got to adolescence, they would feel like they had the skills to make healthy decisionsW we never expected them to abstain from alcohol use or drug use or experimenting, but giving them the equipment to make a healthier decision and understanding how those life choices can affect their life in the long run,” said Oesterreich.

At the “30 on 30” event, community members were able to eat free hamburgers and fries provided by Dilallo Burger as they came together to look at old photographs from the past 30 years.

“MAD Group was the place where I met my baby’s father,” said Karonhionn:i Diabo, a community member who attended the event with her children, reflecting back over how attending the group has impacted her.

As numbers for the after-school programs offered by the Whitehouse began to dwindle over the years, KSCS made the tough decision to close its doors. It is set to transition into a KSCS Prevention workspace, allowing the Prevention team to work together under one roof.

“I can only hope that there was some influence from Our Gang and their years here that made a difference and helped them become the person that they are today,” said Oesterreich

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