OVW New Grantee Orientation

Written by: Jaiyah Saelua

The Fa’afafine Rural Program is 100% funded by the Office on Violence against Women, or OVW. Although the grant was awarded in 2021, the American Samoa Alliance needed to justify the need for creating this program, so the initial award became a planning grant. We are now in year 2 of the grant, finally able to move to the development stages of the program. A requirement for all grantees of the OVW grant is to attend a new grantee orientation. This year, on January 22 & 23, the OVW held a new grantee orientation in Reno, Nevada. The Alliance Executive Director, Jennifer Tofaeono, and the Rural Program Manager, Jaiyah Saelua, were able to attend the orientation.

Jaiyah Saelua recounts her experience at the FY2024 OVW orientation:

I’m extremely grateful to have been afforded the opportunity to attend this orientation. The panel of guest presenters each focused on different aspects of DVSA work, all very essential in their own right; topics that range from understanding root causes and the impact they have on violence in rural communities, recognizing the powers of oppressions that contribute to violent behaviors, the vital work of interpreters and the broader importance of making ‘language access’ a priority in the workforce, effective networking strategies for building community allyship, and the role criminal justice systems and public safety partners have in helping to make the work that non-profit service providers and prevention organization more efficient. There were also many informative workshops during the two breakout sessions, but I was only able to attend two workshops, as they were held concurrently with all the others. The first workshop was focused on resourcing useful tools for partners and allies to use for training, specifically healthcare providers, criminal investigators and prosecutors. The second workshop was a practical, hands-on session designed to help us understand the importance of connections as a part of healing, the importance of building boundaries (or helping victims build/rebuild their boundaries), and to help advocates develop our abilities to assist survivors. The other workshop topics were “Intergenerational Partnerships”, “Working with Rural Faith Leaders”, “Using VAWA to Maintain Safe Housing”, “Practices for Serving Immigrant Victims”, “Cultivating Well-being for Ourselves”, and “Tribal Victim Dynamics”. All of these workshops were focused on things our people, specifically the fa’afafine community in American Samoa, do not need help navigating. This is why I chose the workshops I went to; I was very intentional about recognizing what exactly the Rural Program needed. I look forward to using what I learned at the conference to better our work at Rural.