YWU Online

Building the Health and Healing of our Communities

From a collaborative apprenticeship to making sure our sisters are, “SET”
Kalpuli Izkalli and Young Women United have collaborated over the past two years in creating an intergenerational model Apprenticeship Program for young women of color ages 15 and up. Both organizations saw the need to build the leadership of the women in our organizations, women that held the desire to approach social change work from the spirit, and with a readiness to learn and share knowledge around traditional methods of healing and health for all our communities.

We come together to provide continuity to and expand the collective of learners and teachers known as Promotoras Tradicionales, who promote and practice traditional medicine. Both organizations have expanded our leadership and formalized programs for our organizations. Kalpulli Izkalli apprentices are taking on new lead roles in The Cihuapahtli (Women’s Medicine) Apprenticeship Program which provides opportunity for intergenerational learning and mentoring to develop young women as leaders in traditional medicine and practices. YWU apprentices are taking on lead roles in the implementation of our new all encompassing SET – Sister Education Training Series.

For more information on Kalpulli Izkalli and their services visit their website at www.kalpulliizkalli.org.

More about SET – Sister Education Trainings.

Educating Ourselves, Each Other and Our Communities!
Eight of YWU’s women were active over the past two years in the Kalpulli Izkalli and YWU’s collaborative apprenticeship program. Please congratulate the eight following YWU members who completed the first level of apprenticeship with The Cihuapahtli (Women’s Medicine) Apprenticeship Program; Jessica Arranda, Adriann Barboa, Micaela Cadena, Mireya Cadena, Seryna Estrada, Andrea Garza, and Dominique Pierson. These women have committed to sharing and making use of the knowledge we have gained in our collaboration with Kalpulli Izkalli and expand that to our larger membership and constituencies. These women will be organizing, facilitating, and sharing their skills and inviting others to share in our monthly SET series.

SET encompasses all the things that YWU has been and continues to strive to be. Over the years we have held popular education workshops, led organizing trainings, mobilized our communities to action, developed ways to bring spirituality into our organizing, and built a sense of sisterhood and solidarity among a diverse group of Young women of Color in Albuquerque. SET is our way of bringing it all together and making sure our sistas are “set”. Join us monthly as we grow through spirituality, healing, and build our power through political education and organizing.

Contact our Community Organizer, Elizabeth Silva at esilva@youngwomenunited.org or 505-831-8930 for more info.