Ascensions Community Services in the United States
Children of the Sacadas
Off the Streets and Into School
Healthy Little Mouths
Mina in India
Genet in Ethiopia
Cynthia in Paraguay
Clarence in the United States
Elvia in the Dominican Republic
Felipe in Paraguay
Shanthi in India
Abdul in Senegal

Lifting Others As They Climb

Grantee Partner:
Ascensions Community Services

Location:
Washington, DC, United States

According to the African proverb, it takes a village to raise a child. Dr. Satira Streeter would agree—adding that a healthy, supported family is the crucial but often missing link between a village and its children.

Streeter works in the low-income neighborhoods east of the Anacostia River in Washington, DC. There, children and families face the daunting challenges of poverty, violence, drug use, delinquency, and school failure. Despite the need, access to community-based mental health services is extremely limited. Streeter is the only licensed clinical psychologist practicing in the city’s Seventh Ward.

In 2004, she founded Ascensions Community Services, the only free, comprehensive community mental health provider in the area. Offering individual and group therapy, parenting groups, clinical evaluations, home and school visits, and other interventions, Ascensions helps clients improve their self-concept and interpersonal relationships and make positive contributions to their community.

“I have to do this work,” Streeter says simply. “I’m from a community very similar to this one and have dealt with many of the same issues. I know the importance of having a few strategically placed people that care.”

Ascensions serves about 375 families, 85 percent of which are headed by single mothers. The Global Fund for Children supports the Ascending Families Program, which uses a “therapy without walls” approach to decrease the incidence of child abuse, academic failure, and substance abuse. The idea is that healing a child requires the involvement of the whole family unit and close partnerships with “village” institutions like schools, workplaces, and churches.

Teresa, a sixth grader, attends a school-based girls’ leadership group as part of the program. Her mother—who has a teenage son in juvenile detention—goes to therapy at Ascensions. “My mom says she feels less stressed out when she has another grown-up to talk to,” says Teresa. “Dr. Streeter is also helping my mom put a plan together to help my brother so he won’t end up going back to ‘juvie’ when he gets out. We all have to work together.”

By providing effective and culturally relevant services, Ascensions has lessened the stigma sometimes associated with therapy in the African American community. The organization’s Anacostia office is a warm converted home filled with African art and comfortable furnishings—a setting that promotes reflection, relaxation, and wellness.

As mothers gain self-esteem through therapy, they are encouraged to “lift others up as they climb,” explains Streeter. “Once a mother starts thinking of herself in better terms, she can think of her children in better terms and believe that she and they can amount to something.”

Last year, Ascensions was honored by the Catalogue for Philanthropy as one of the best small nonprofits in Washington, DC.

Click on the links at the top to read other success stories, or click here to read more about GFC’s Grantmaking Program.