Sue Budde introduced our speaker, Jasmine Martier, Sue learned of Simply Smiles after her son had a life-changing service trip in Oaxaca, Mexico through the organization and learned of all the wonderful things that they do.
Jasmine shared that Simply Smiles is a nonprofit organization that is dedicated to providing bright futures for children, their families, and their communities. The organization has many different projects in North America including projects in Oaxaca Mexico, Cheyenne River, and Reservation, USA.
Jasmine touched upon the home and volunteer work in Oaxaca that serves children. There is a holistic approach to meet each child's needs and they rely heavily on volunteers.
Jasmine then discussed the Cheyenne River Reservation Sioux Tribe. The Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe (CRST) Reservation in South Dakota is an autonomous nation within the borders of the United States. It is home to four bands of Lakota Indians. In an area of 1.45 million acres (roughly the size of Connecticut), the CRST Reservation is home to approximately 10,000 residents. The poverty here is staggering. The reasons are many and complex. But Simply Smiles has been welcomed into this community and that real change is beginning to take hold.
On the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Reservation in South Dakota, an overwhelming number of Lakota children are unsafe in their homes.
This has left the tribal, state, and non-governmental social services infrastructure, by their own admission, insufficient to respond to the demands and complexities of this dire situation.
Simply Smiles offers summer programs, camps, and leadership opportunities to children on the reservation. Girls have been flown to visit Ms. Porter's School and attend leadership camps. Paid opportunities to maintain national parks are also offered to teens on the reservation. Volunteers are present year-round at the reservation to provide support. They have also built homes for families in need on the reservation.
To protect Lakota children at risk, and to help them to overcome an unspeakably difficult start in life, Simply Smiles has begun the process of building and managing the first-of-its-kind Simply Smiles Children’s Village in the Reservation town of La Plant.
South Dakota has licensed the Children's Village as a child welfare agency and will fund the operations of the agency. The physical buildings are funded through donors and grants. Rotary is funding interior furnishings. There will be 6 homes in the villages and 6 children in each home for a total of 36 children. They have 1 native foster parent signed up and hope to have more.
The children that live in the homes will have individualized, trauma informed care that is culturally specific.
