To ease into the school year, we recently opened the Clubhouse for a family night. Families gathered over pizza. Kids painted murals about what family means to them. They made turtles inspired by the Turtle Island story they learned over the summer, returning to something they'd built together months earlier.

Nights like this are part of how we work. Our kids have one mentor who stays with them for 12+ years, and that relationship reaches their whole family. Parents, grandparents, and siblings are part of it too. When families know each other and know us, kids have more people in their corner.

Max and his mom presented to the group, walking everyone through Crow teepee traditions and the values behind them. Then they helped the kids build their own. Seeing a peer share his own culture does something for the other kids that an adult presenting the same material cannot.

We're grateful to Max and his family for being such good relatives to all of us.