“Rooted Together” to provide cultural support for caregivers of Muscogee children

Written By: Rachael Schuit

(OKLAHOMA) Catalyst News is proud to launch our new project “Rooted Together”. The goal of this project is to provide support for caregivers of Muscogee children that want to connect them to their Indigenous culture.

Our team will be creating a toolkit to help provide culturally disconnected Native parents as well as non-Native parents with the resources they need to ensure their Indigenous children are culturally connected. 

This project has been made possible because of a grant from Oklahoma Clearinghouse. 

“Establishing and growing the culture of Native Americans, and no matter what family they're growing up in, or that they're being raised in is important,” said Sarah Yanez, a member of the Kaw Nation and recently appointed Treasurer for Catalyst News. 

After decades of forced assimilation and cultural erasure, many parents and caregivers do not have the support or the connections to integrate their Indigenous child’s culture into their daily lives. 

Catalyst News will also seek input from both Native and non-Native parents through surveys and events about what cultural learning to prioritize, the challenges they face when integrating culture into their children’s lives and what type of support they are looking for. The Catalyst News team will then incorporate that feedback into the toolkit, which will be developed for families of children aged 0 to 5 years old. 

By helping Indigenous blended families connect children with their culture, it will also help Native children develop a sense of belonging and cultural identity from a young age, regardless of what type of family they are raised in.

Yanez herself is part of an Indigenous blended family. Her four children are Indigenous and Hispanic. She says a toolkit like this will be helpful for families like hers. 

While she has taken her children to several powwows and other cultural events over the years, Yanez says having a toolkit will still be really helpful. 

“Even as a Native mother, I didn't grow up, quote ‘on reservation’,” said Yanez. “I am excited about what Catalyst is doing and for myself, being a Native, to have a toolkit, have some resources at hand for me to use with my children, because I didn't get that when I was young.”

Catalyst News is partnering with the Muscogee Nation Cultural Department and Muscogee Nation Child and Family Services to create the informative hands on cultural guide. It will include several different elements ranging from storytelling, hands-on-activities, language learning, and tribal traditions.

In-person outreach events for this project will take place in September and October.

“Everybody needs to have some engagement in their community and I'm super excited to be on the Catalyst board to see what they can deliver for these blended families,” said Yanez.

The work will not stop when this project is complete. Though this toolkit is being developed to support Muscogee children, it will also be designed in a way that other tribes who wish to create a toolkit for parents and caregivers of children in their tribe can adapt it to their own cultural teachings.

The toolkit will be released in the spring of 2026.