Feed the Parents and the Teachers, So the Children Don’t Starve
Written by Tim Buckley, January 2025
Gravity assures that whatever just fell will hit the dirt, unless there is some stronger levitating force to counteract it. Gravity also guarantees that toxic stress will fall on our children unless there is relief, something to make it more tolerable or even healthy.
The title of CBEL’s January Collaborative was intentionally provocative. It’s important to acknowledge that you can’t expect children to thrive if the adults feeding them are unwell. Likewise, it’s logical to assume that adding “protective factors” into children’s lives – from a variety of collaborative sources, will be the levitating effect needed to build strong families and strong neighborhoods.
Two questions were posed by emcee Jim Seymour, first to a panel of three, and then the audience:
How did stress manifest in your family? Was it toxic, tolerable or healthy?
How did your parents manage stress and how has that affected your life?
Whitney Contreras (mother, business owner and facilitator), Kyla Fussell (Behavioral Health student at CTEC), and Andy Kronser, (father and Principal at Cummings Elementary) took turns telling the audience personal stories of their upbringing and dealing with stress.
Whitney Contreras said that both of her parents handled stress in a positive way. “They both got involved in church and relied on friends for help. But when they got overwhelmed with toxic stress, we got spanked. I remember one specific time when I could hear through a window one of my siblings getting spanked.” And this impacted her a lot.
Kyla Fussell with her dad
Kyla Fussell said that her mom managed her mental health issues, and “never let her stuff affect me and my brother.” She said that her dad was “the jokester, always quick with a smile, but it was a façade to hide his true emotions.”
Andy Kronser said that both his parents were teachers. His mother “put herself second” when it came to the family, whereas his father “was isolated, distant and not present a lot of the time.”
Taking a lesson from their family and experience, each of the panelists then talked about applying them to their current lives. Things they shared are part of what CBEL calls the Protective Factors that Strengthen Families:
Knowledge of Parenting and Child Development
Social Connections
Concrete Support in Times of Need
Social & Emotional Competence of Children
Parental Resilience
See if, in the following quotes, you can identify the five protective factors at work.
Whitney Contreras (bottom left in pink) with her parents and siblings
Whitney Contreras: “I look very similar to my mom” Contreras added. “My parents taught me to have positive connections. I have immersed myself in a learning culture. I get connected and stay resourced with my family. I have lots of positive social connections and church helps with that and a spiritual dimension as well.”
She went on to say that “Taking parenting classes years ago was super helpful for me as a young mother, keeping the stress from becoming toxic. I’m happy to be involved with the Infant Toddler Play Group (Highland Neighbor Family Council and Salem Evangelical Church) where I see families relax, have a meal together, play, laugh, and help each other with crafts.”
Kyla Fussell: “There’s a lot of stress on me as a senior in high school, with my own and others’ expectations on me to succeed,” she said. “When I start to get overwhelmed, I step back, I journal, and I tell myself that I’m okay, that I’m enough. That generally helps me feel better.”
“My greatest lesson though has been this Behavioral Health experience at CTEC,” she added. “I’ve learned so many skills here, things that college students wouldn’t learn until graduate school.”
“The other gift has been my experience as an intern in elementary school classrooms,” Fussell said. “Witnessing a little boy on his first day of school, showing up agitated and causing trouble, and the second day, he lit up and came gave me a hug. Our being there for teachers who are burned out is also very special; we give them support and hope. One teacher told me, ‘Thank God you’re here!’”
Andy Kronser (left) with his parents
Andy Kronser: “Being a parent is really hard. My mom and dad didn’t talk about their day with us kids and generally didn’t ask us how our day was going either,” he said. “But as parents, we regularly ask our kids, and they ask us too.”
“As a principal, and with my wife being a counselor, we’re metabolizers of the stress of others! So, we’ve gotten better making boundaries in our lives, helping people around us but also taking care of ourselves and prioritizing our family life.”
“At Cummings Elementary, a combination of our Wellness Center and the RULER program have helped staff and students to be aware of where they’re at emotionally during the day and to make decisions in favor of better self-care.”
In small groups, each person then shared likewise: our personal history with stress and what things we employ to keep stress from becoming toxic. One woman shared that with four children, working almost full time, and dealing with menopause, life gets very stressful. “The things that I count on to relieve it are my deep faith, my loving husband, and getting a lot of exercise outdoors.”
Another person, a young man, said that he prioritizes his own emotional health in order to then have enough bandwidth to help others. “Being centered myself, I can make more room for the kids and their families I work with to better express themselves, too.”
CBEL’s work in five neighborhoods (soon to expand to seven) is also part of the levitating effect. The magic of each Collaborative gathering has three components:
CBEL’s strategic position between grass tops and grass roots organizations is intentional. The gatherings demonstrate the synergistic effect of collaboration.
When “grass tops” community leaders socialize and learn together with “grassroots” neighborhood leaders, a new awareness of “us” takes root.
Neighborhood Family Councils (NFC) facilitate growth opportunities like the Infant Toddler Play Groups, the Marion/Polk Early Learning Hub, and closer working relationships with elementary school staff.
January’s Collaborative focused on CBEL’s approach to education. The collaborative effort is having equally levitating effect in the areas of public safety and housing security.
