As First Deputy of our SAFEty Programming, Dawnya Underwood builds systems that provide safe, educational, equitable outcomes for populations and communities that have faced extreme traumas. Her programs provide housing, education, and clinical services to refugees, immigrants, asylees, justice-involved youth, survivors of trafficking, and survivors of community and family violence – and the work is ever changing. For vulnerable populations, the impacts of structural racism can have an even more powerful effect. Her team of social workers and human rights advocates find the best way to address these barriers is through human connection.
In your work, where do you see racial inequities or barriers?
Our Saura Center and Reentry programs provide alternatives to justice-involved youth – specifically, an alternative to juvenile detention. Every day, we provide clinical services, comprehensive case management, and educational services to children who would otherwise be placed into the criminal justice system.
Every day, my team sees how punitive the juvenile justice system is for children of color. We see children of color receive harsher sanctions at every stage of the system – from surveillance and racial profiling, to trial and sentencing, to differences in length of incarceration.
This impacts children throughout the rest of their lives. It has a huge impact on understanding where a person belongs in their communities and society. And even worse, their past follows them throughout their lives. Our Saura Center and Reentry programs believe that one’s past does not predict one’s future. It’s a matter of ensuring equitable access to resources to help find the right path, and we do that best on an individual level. It all comes back to basic human dignity and respect, and crossing beyond those barriers requires that we provide dignity for all young people.
How does your work address these barriers?
We do this work by creating therapeutic spaces upon arrival. Many of the children we serve have not been able to be kids in a long time. From having to deal with displacement, or with gang violence, or even just trying to find a doctor or healthy food, the things these kids face on a daily basis force them into many traumas.
Our work is dedicated to allowing them be kids, and to gain skills in a space that doesn’t expose them to such incredible stress. I think the beauty of working with so many human rights workers is that our staff reflects our populations. These are people dedicated to the best interest of children, and are great role models for the children we work with. Kids see themselves in our staff.
I was just recently at our Saura Center, and we had a young person suspended from school. I simply asked, from a place of concern and interest, what happened. This young person looked at me and said, “Ms. Dawnya, have a seat, this is going to take a little while.”
She was able to share her perspective, and we were able to talk about strategies for how to deal with problems next time. More importantly, we were able to connect her with services during her time out of school and ongoing supports like educational components, group sessions, and the like. The simple act of being engaged with young people, of showing that you care, is critical. We have to show that people care for their wellbeing, and that there are opportunities to grow despite your past. This is all about being relational.
Who do you look up to as a foundation for your work?
I’m a social worker, and it is every fabric of my being. You have to partner with people, listen to them to find the right solutions for people in their own lives. I think often of two life-long social workers, Thyra J. Edwards and Dorothy Height – two amazing African American women that inspired and changed social services throughout decades. On a personal level, the two amazing women in my own life were my mother and my grandmother. My mom is one of 13 children, and so my grandmother was the first social worker I ever knew. She built us up, she built us through strong relationships. I don’t know how she did it, and I don’t know how all of the strong women in my family do it. Sometimes I don’t know how I do it.
We’re neighbors, and if we are to address barriers and racial inequities, we have to do it just like social workers – we have to do this relationally. All things are steeped in relationships, and we can get through difficult conversations and concepts if we are relational. In social work, I try not to see a survivor or a participant, I try to see a person. That will allow us to learn from one another.
What makes you hopeful for your work in this space? Do you see potential for true racial equity in this sphere?
You know, I believe that there are a lot of people out there who are social workers. They may not have MSWs, but they are out their building relationships that help people grow. They’re starting block clubs, they’re building community gardens, and they are building the relationships that people need to thrive. From that, people continue to form different collaboratives and task forces to discuss components of racial injustice, like how to reduce barriers and the permanent punishments that continue to impact the justice-involved even after they serve their time.
What I’m inspired by is our reentry program. It’s a pilot that we launched in 2018, and it’s built to partner with kids exiting detention. We built a community-based program that allows for alternative therapies to engage youth and keep their attention. We have these pilot projects, and people are talking about these issues. We’re also bringing them to various policy makers and spaces where we can prove they work so there can be legislative and systemic change.
