Evaluating the strengths and challenges of PAX dream makers approach to mental health promotion: perspectives of youth and community members in indigenous communities in Manitoba, Canada

Figures & data

Figure 1. Focus of each dream makers gathering.

Table 1. Summary of major themes and sub-themes.

Dream Makers Approach has a positive influence on youth, their schools and communities	Dream Makers Approach provides support and encouragement to the youth.
	Youth are learning to be resilient to overcome hardships, to be more confident and open.
	Youth have a vision for their communities and are involved in many DM initiatives in their schools and communities.
	Dream Makers youth are role models for younger children.
Dream Makers Gathering: Strengths	Gatherings are fun.
	Connecting with other communities
	Planned activities were relevant.
	Structure and punctuality are important.
	Supportive PAX team
Dream Makers Gathering: Suggestions	More skill building for youth and mentors
	Increased supervision of youth
	Structural changes due to the amount and nature of the material covered
	Greater flexibility for northern travel challenges
Qualities of a Good Adult Mentor	Dedication and commitment
	Good relationship with youth
	Empowering youth to be autonomous
Implementing Dream Makers Approach: Challenges	Adult Mentors’ availability
	Youth are busy with other activities
	Dream Maker meetings are not occurring as often as needed.
	School and community support are not always felt.
Implementing Dream Makers Approach: Recommendations	Greater promotion of Dream Makers initiatives
	Recruit more youth
Empowerment through culture	Identity, culture and language
	Teachings from Elders
Community Context	Community ties are important to its members
	Youth contend with challenges in their families and communities.
PAX -GBGis being implemented with positive effects in schools but has challenges.	Dream Makers are supporting PAX-GBG in the schools
	PAX-GBG is working in the schools
	Community and leadership support not always felt.
	Lack of consistency of PAX in school because not all teachers are implementing
	Staff turnover
	Sharing experiences with other communities would strengthen PAX-GBG implementation.

Table 2. Positive influence of PAX dream makers approach on youth.

Positive Influences of Dream Makers	Participant Statements
Support and encouragement	“Helping others, its good to help others ‘cause you never know who’s struggling out there”. (youth I2) “I’ve got four different kids with me and seeing them work together and get along with one another and get along with other kids and network, make friends, you know build their support group or circle, whatever you want to call it is very precious. And then they can come back and give some of that back to those students that don’t have that opportunity”. (adult I4)
Youth are learning to be resilient to overcome hardships, to be more confident and open.	“I used to be, how would I put that? I used to be really really sad before … And I went through lots of stuff, until ‘X’ asked me join this and I just felt happier”. (youth I5) “It made me come out of my bubble that I built when I came in”. (youth-I6) “And then when they come out of each classroom I have noticed that they felt more confident, I noticed that about them right away”. (adult FG13)
Youth have a vision for their communities and are involved in many Dream Maker initiatives in their schools and communities.	The young people, they seem to know what’s happening in the communities and they want to see the changes that they would like to see happen, but in that process there’s work that needs to be done and identifying which, which areas that they can work on. (adult I15) “We spoke about littering and, and every Friday the teachers take the kids to the parking lot and clean up the parking lot and the classrooms”.. (youth FG12)
Dream Makers youth are role models for younger children.	“Because more kids will listen because they think they’re making an impact on the younger kids on how to act”. (youth FG12)

Table 3. Strengths and suggestions to the dream makers gathering.

STRENGTHS	Participant Statements
Connecting with other communities	“It was great that we all get to connect throughout the whole thing so that was really great … definitely gotten me out of my comfort zone”. (youth I7)
Gatherings are enjoyable	“And they, and the fact that they talked about it for a long time, they go home and they share their experience with the other kids. And the last gathering I connected with a teacher from Yakama through ‘N’, we’re pen pals, so we got that started, so that was pretty exciting for my, with the rest of my students. And they’re all excited looking forward to, they started their writing last week and I’m excited too”. (adult mentor FG14-2)
Planned activities were relevant	“And it (Blanket Exercise) was something, that exercise was so powerful because it was, as First Nations people we’re visual people. We need to see what you’re talking about instead of giving us a handbook, read it”. (adult mentor I10) “One thing I liked is looking back on our old stuff (action plans)”. (youth I2)
Structure and Punctuality is important	“But so far I find its, its well-organized and we’re keeping with the script which is very important because a lot of kids are not used to that. Because often there’s no script. We practice them to follow structure, that’s very important and they have to know that people have expectations of them and they have to rise to those expectations to the best of their abilities, that’s big”. (adult mentor I4)
Supportive PAX-GBG team	“Like the welcome was really good, I never felt more welcome in a conference”. (youth) “It’s the positive attitude, seeing people that don’t know my kids,do everything they can to make their lives better, so you can’t buy that, to me that’s priceless … .with you guys it’s easy to see it means something, you know like the kids are the priority, bettering the communities is a priority”. (adult mentor I4)
SUGGESTIONS
More skill building	“But maybe the kids could benefit from just a small little workshop on like Toastmasters or you know giving speeches or presentations”. (adult mentors FG14-3)
Increased supervision of youth	“most of the kids that come here are, are responsible kids but there’s always the ones that might cause the programme to lose a lot of value or face amongst communities if something happens”. (adult mentor I4)
Structural changes	“the second day its, it’s very lengthy, very lengthy.[…] ‘Cause the, the kids start feeling restless and they start putting their heads down because they, they, they’re, they’re so overwhelmed with all the information and all the presentation because they don’t have that, that skill yet you know to keep standing up and talking about themselves or talking about their community, its, it, it becomes overwhelming to them and they want to shy out into the corner and just huddle together right (chuckle). I, I find that, its, its lengthy and if its like broken down to maybe extended to maybe three days with ending at 4:00 or so”. (adult mentor I10) “I’d like to see more punctuality”. (adult mentor FG14)
Greater understanding of travel in the North	“I know that people have to travel, like for instance for us we have to travel such a long distance and then you’re tired, we’re tired when we have to drive and the kids too you know they’re anxious (chuckle) they’re kind of anxious sitting in there for so many hours and then leaving home”. (adult mentor I10)

Table 4. Challenges and suggestions to the dream makers approach.

CHALLENGE	Participant Statements
Adult Mentors’ availability	“I wear many hats in the office, I’m assistant co-band manager to the band manager, and then I’m assistant to Chief and Counsel and I sit on various boards, on top of being the health director and developing programmes and services for the reserve. So I’m very busy and usually I’m gone a lot to the meetings, board meetings, CFS (Child Welfare Agency) meeting”. (adult mentor I10)
Youth are busy with other activities	“it’s just been difficult getting organized and having meetings, because we’re finding these kids are so busy with their sports”. (adult mentor FG14-3) “Commitment. One thing I noticed with young people you commit to something and then all of a sudden something comes up and you, you have to choose which one are you going to go to. Say you have basketball but you have a PAX meeting”. (adult mentor FG13)
Dream Maker meetings are not occurring as often as needed	“So I’ll try to go in the morning and let them know because we had a hard time finding a time to meet. And sometimes it would be just that day and we realized, oh we can meet at lunchtime”. (adult mentor FG13) “We should have more meetings … because we don’t even know what we’re doing when we don’t have meetings”. (youth FG11)
School and community support are not always felt.	“The challenges is often you’re alone, so that’s one of the things you’ve got to realize. If you don’t do it there’s nobody else there to do it for you, so then kids end up losing So it’s very important for you to understand that often you’ll be left alone to do things, and I don’t mean no support from you guys, I mean no community support”. (adult mentor I4) “it’s because if, it’s the kids that are running it and it’s not their idea. So that’s, I think that’s where its coming from. But I don’t think these kids are going to give up, I think they’re just going to go ahead and do it and do whatever they can”. (adult mentor FG14-2) “Just because sometimes adults aren’t used to kids taking leadership, taking roles on … those are the adults, like the crabs, the crabs in the bucket”. (adult mentor FG14-1)
SUGGESTIONS
Greater promotion of Dream Makers Initiatives	“Show some of the video sessions we do here (at the Dream Makers Gathering), of what we do here with the kids, … like what the young lady said and everything, so just like blurbs like this and seeing people from other communities would go a long way”. (adult mentor I4)
Recruit more youth	“Sixteen right now, so we’re trying to recruit younger but then we have four more older youth that have joined in and we, we brought in maybe four more adult mentors to help out with different ideas. So we’re just kind of basically trying to juggle how we’re going to do it and when we can go into the school, so we’re kind of leaning more towards the younger one ‘cause they’ve got older ones … ” (adult mentor FG14-4)

Table 5. Strengths and challenges to PAX implementations.

STRENGTHS	Participant Statements
Dream Makers are supporting PAX-GBG in the schools	“We’re just going in there and doing some presentations and games” (youth) “The road thing with the hallways. […]I find it neat when all the kids like walk in straight lines and they’re not running around”. (youth I5)
PAX-GBG is working in the schools	“The whole chaos has calmed down a bit, because the harmonicas were introduced So I think PAX has been really good to our school”. (youth) “We have a Tootles board, we have Tootle Tuesdays. You do them throughout the week and we announce them every Tuesday”. (youth I5)
CHALLENGES
Lack of consistency – not all teachers are implementing.	“And PAX is a culture, you really can’t deliver that programme in isolation. So it’s not going to work if it’s going to be in like one or two classrooms, your staff need to be onboard, they need to know the PAX language, they, we need to be, everybody should be using that in the school so there’s some consistency there. And the kids know that those same rules apply in the whole school, not just in your classroom. They’re SPLEEMING outside the school, outside the classroom as well”. (adult FG 14-3) “There’s not much changes in our school because we didn’t, we aren’t sticking to our plan”. (adult FG 14-1)
Staff turnover	“We just had that new principal last week. So we’ve been changing principals and we’ve been changing directors, so there’s been a lot of changes, so we can’t really get anybody onboard”. (adult FG14-3) “Last year I sent two different teachers for this and this year they happened to have left us which is very common in the north, although I was able to maintain all the staff which is very rare for two straight years, the same staff which pays huge dividends you know, but last year I lost the two that were the PAX Dream-Makers, so this is new for me.[…] But it’s something I don’t want to see our community lose, so hopefully I can get somebody else to take care of this, I’ll do it for this year and hopefully I can find somebody that’s willing to replace me and do a good job at it so. […]Yes, it’s the greatest challenge for any programme in northern communities”. (adult I4)
SUGGESTION
Sharing experiences with other communities	“It’s the outer influence that, in our people, for a sad story to be told, it seems like someone from outside has to come in and wake us up before we start doing things. Is that true for you guys? It seems like, oh we have these good ideas at home, but if someone else came and gave the same idea, all of sudden it’s a good idea”. (adult FG14-1) “I think there’d be more resources, more open things to look into and more ideas being bounced off different groups and to be knowing what other schools are doing so we could implement into our schools”. (youth I7) “Keeping in touch with everyone and a little bit of reminders of what have you done lately or it just gives us a little push in our busy schedules, okay, we cannot forget PAX, we have to promote PAX”. (adult I10)

Table

Strategies	Description
PAX Vision	Teachers and students create a large chart of what they would like to see, hear, do and feel more of in their classroom. They also write down what they would see, hear, do and feel less of. These charts are posted in the classroom to remind students of their vision.
PAX Leader	A lesson that allows students to reflect on and name positive qualities of a PAX Leader. Teacher engage with students by asking “What would a PAX Leader do?”.
OK/Not OK	Cards or posters to remind students of “OK” behaviours (Do more of) and “Not OK” behaviours (Do less of).
PAX Game	Teachers ask teams of children to avoid activities that are “not OK” (or spleems) for a short time. Examples of spleems are shouting, pushing classmates or not doing their school work. Teams that have less than 3 spleems get a Granny’s Wacky Prize. This encourages students to gradually have more control over their behaviour.
Granny’s Wacky Prizes	These prizes are fun activities that children enjoy but are not usually done in the classroom. Example are jumping like a frog, making funny faces or dancing on their chairs – for a minute or two.
Beat the Timer	Teachers set a timer and ask students to complete a school task before the timer rings. This helps students to stay focused on the task at hand.
Tootle Notes	Written notes of thanks and recognition for good actions are given out. These notes can be given to anyone, for example, student-to-student, or teacher-to-student.
PAX Stix	Children have their names of PAX stix. Teachers pick a PAX stix when they call on a student to answer a question or help with an activity.
PAX Hands & Feet	A strategy that teaches students acceptable ways to hold their hands and feet when walking in the hallways of the school and during assemblies.
PAX Quiet	When the harmonica is gently played, children stop their activity, look at the teacher and make the peace sign with their hands. This strategy helps teachers to change activities in a calm environment. It also helps the overall loss of productivity in the classroom.
PAX Voices	A tool that lets students know how loud their voice should be for the activity at hand.