This Holiday Season, Celebrate Our Wins With Us!

“I’m a DREAM Act eligible youth, also queer, and I’m thinking this was an amazing experience for me. It was a concrete way I could link Reproductive Justice to the work I do in immigration.” -Felipe Matos

Felipe’s testimony about the training we piloted in Miami on LGBTQ issues as a matter of reproductive justice is just one example of the strides National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health (NLIRH) made in 2011. No doubt the past 12 months were also wrought with non-stop attacks on low-income and immigrant women’s comprehensive health care and access. But December is a time of celebration. We hope you will join us in reflecting on a few of the many milestones that, with your help, we marked over the year.

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Growing NLIRH’s activist base through e-LOLA training

On November 1st, NLIRH ended its 3 session long inaugural e-LOLA Training. Twenty-three  young Latina activists between the ages of 18-26 from 12 states throughout the United States graduated from NLIRH’s newest Latinas Organizing for Leadership and Advocacy (LOLA) training, the e-LOLA. The three sessions, mirrored after the traditional weekend-long LOLA trainings, focused on Latina reproductive health, rights, and justice; abortion access; and grassroots advocacy.

The participants were able to interact and engage in conversations with each other in a variety of ways including by watching video clips and PowerPoint presentations together, an on-going conference call, instant chat, and various other webinar features. They discussed at length issues stemming from the way Latin@s and abortion are portrayed by mainstream media and society and within our own cultures.  They shared ideas for advocating and reaching out to Latin@s about reproductive justice while keeping in mind the obstacles faced by our communities. The training was an overall success, and our activists mentioned feeling excited, motivated, invigorated and ready to continue the fight for reproductive justice. They will maintain contact with each other and with NLIRH through the NLIRH Alumni Network. The Alumni Network consists of current and former interns and e-LOLA graduates, providing them with exclusive resources for career development and serving as a means to help maintain relationships and foster new connections with other young activists throughout the United States. NLIRH will offer the e-LOLA a few times next year, so please stay tuned for more information.

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Latinas Organizing for Leadership and Advocacy (LOLA) training goes virtual

We are excited to introduce our newest initiative, the e-LOLA!

Our Latinas Organizing for Leadership and Advocacy (LOLA) trainings have been carried out in 11 cities across the country since 2003, and the new e-LOLA has been designed to accommodate the lives of busy young adults by allowing them access to the materials presented at our traditional, rigorous two and a half day LOLA Reproductive Justice Institutes.

This webinar training will provide Latina activists, ages 18-25, with sessions on: the history of the reproductive rights movement, community organizing models and specific skills building tools to prepare participants with the knowledge and resources for launching a campaign. After the training, e-LOLA graduates will continue to be part of NLIRH’s larger network of Latina advocates and become part of the Alumni Network as well as become leaders on reproductive health issues in their communities.

The e-LOLA webinar series will occur on October 25th, October 27th, and November 1st at 7pm EST and is free of charge. More information on how to apply is here.

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Connecting with new activists in Wisconsin and NYC

NLIRH staff with JoCasta Zamarripa

NLIRH’s signature training, Latinas Organizing for Leadership and Advocacy (LOLA), went to two new cities this past year. Our first stop was in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in late September where the wonderful people from Proyecto Salud and Planned Parenthood of WI hosted us and co-sponsored the weekend-long training. We kicked off the training with a wonderful reception with keynote speaker, JoCasta Zamarripa, the first Latina to serve in the state legislature representing Assembly District 8 in Milwaukee, WI. A total of 22 participants attended the training, one of which described it to be “more than just an educational training, but a life changing experience”. The fierce women who attended our training did not wait long to organize a mini- LOLA of their own a month later, where they had 35 people attend. We are very excited to continue to see the development of our WI Latina Advocacy Network and expect nothing but more success and fierce activism.

Wisconsin LOLA graduates!

 

Our second destination brought us back to our roots in NYC, where the first LOLA training was held back in 2005. We were back in NYC for the second time around in order to jumpstart our Latina Advocacy Network back into action. On an early cold December morning we had the privilege to host Part 1 of our LOLA training at Queens Pride House. We had a smaller and more intimate setting in comparison to our WI LOLA, which proved to be instrumental and brought lots of rich dialogue and shared experiences. We look forward to Part 2 of the LOLA training coming up in January to prepare our next generation of activists for our National Advocacy Weekend scheduled for March 2011.

NYC LOLA participants during a timeline exercise

Completing two LOLA trainings in a matter of months was both challenging and rewarding. We provided a space where women could connect with each other and learn that their experiences and voices are valuable. They saw themselves in each other and in NLIRH, creating a sense of community and solidarity for reproductive justice. Salud! Dignidad! Y Justicia!

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LOLA Reproductive Justice Institute heads to Milwaukee!

It has been two years since our last LOLA Training took place in Washington DC. We took the two years to focus on our current groups and build with them, before reaching out to new cities and activists. Now we are pleased to announce that we’re starting our next phase of LOLA Reproductive Justice Institutes!

Our first LOLA Reproductive Justice Institute of 2010 will take place in Milwaukee this September.

Our LOLA RJ Institutes seek to build a group of Latina leaders, strengthen the voices of Latinas and enable them to be seen as a powerful group who can influence policy decisions that directly impact our lives, our families and our communities.

Our co-sponsors for this Spanish language LOLA RJ Institute are Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin and Proyecto Salud, a joint project of CORE-El Centro and Aurora Walker’s Point Community Clinic that  has been working in the Latino community since 2006. Proyecto Salud’s mission is to create new avenues for social change and foster a community that embraces spiritual, mental and physical health.  They work with an ecological approach to public health and their philosophy is one of collaboration and civic capacity building.

We are thrilled about working with the Latina immigrant community in Milwaukee and we anticipate nothing but success come September, when we return to Milwaukee to facilitate our LOLA RJ Institute. New beginnings always offer new opportunities and we are happy that we have found new connections with strong energized Latinas in Milwaukee.

Interested in learning more about our Milwaukee LOLA RJ Institute? Email stephanie@latinainstitute.org.

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Spotlight on the Washington DC LOLA training!

On May 2nd, 21 women from Washington, DC, Maryland, and Virginia came together to take part in NLIRH’s Latinas Organizing for Leadership and Advocacy (LOLA) training held at DC’s All Souls Unitarian Church. The training was made possible with the help of our dedicated partners in Washington DC, Mary’s Center and La Clinica Del Pueblo. This was our 10th LOLA training and the third to be done entirely in Spanish.

 

The two-day training provided women with an introduction to the history of feminism and the women’s movement, the legislative landscape of DC, and the basics of community organizing.  “Aborto Sin Pena,” a Mexican documentary about three women and their personal experience with abortion, was screened during the second day and inspired a lively discussion.  The end of the training was met with a graduation ceremony where all the LOLA graduates received certificates for completing the training.

 

The main goal of our LOLA trainings is to strengthen the voices of Latinas within the reproductive justice movement.  The trainings are designed to be a space where women can comfortably share their experiences as they learn new leadership skills and how to become part of our national reproductive justice campaigns. 

 

To view pictures of this and past LOLA trainings, please visit our newly updated photo gallery!

 

-Raquel Namuche

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Congratulations to Our Colleague Lucy Félix!

Lucy Félix, from the fantastic Migrant Health Promotion, is a recipient of the Ms. Foundation’s Women of Vision Award. She will receive the award tonight at the 20th Annual Gloria Awards.

A 2007 LOLA graduate and Houston LAN member, she began her career with Migrant Health Promotion (MHP) as a promotora de salud (health promoter) in 2000. Now, she is the community organizer and lead trainer of MHP’s La Voz Latina. La Voz Latina was initiated in 2001 to address reproductive health disparities within the marginalized and highly neglected communities along the Texan border (also known as colonias) through public education, community organizing and advocacy to increase access and public funding for reproductive healthcare services.

To read more about Lucy and her work, please click here.

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Pictures from our latest LOLA training: Minnesota

Thanks to Bonnie Watkins at the Minnesota Women’s Consortium for writing about our most recent Latinas Organizing for Leadership and Advocacy (LOLA) Training in St.Paul, Minnesota. Click here to see some pictures from the event, and also check out their blog.

Our LOLA trainings seek to bring together a diverse group of Latina women to discuss issues of reproductive health, rights and justice, along with skills-based components about advocacy, community organizing and leadership. This is the ninth LOLA training we have conducted, after which the participants organize their local Latina Advocacy Networks. For more information, click here.

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