By Eric Jayne

In August 2008 I started working for a nonprofit agency that administers a federally funded early childhood education program serving low-income families with children 3 and 4 years old. I have the pleasure to work with families from all kinds of different cultural backgrounds including many Somali Muslims.

The early childhood education program I work under mandates that monthly family events and education classes need to be offered to families enrolled throughout the year (nutrition workshop, financial literacy, dinner, stories, etc.). The families look forward to these events because there is valuable information, activities for kids, and socializing opportunities. However, many of the Somali Muslim families I work with are conspicuously missing when these events are held in churches.

When I had brought this to the attention of one of the staff members in charge of coordinating the events she seemed unable to make the connection between the sparse Somali Muslim turnout and the Christian church venue. She said that the agency has always held family events in churches and nobody has ever complained to her. Needless to say, I was unsatisfied with her response.

I felt that I needed to gain support so I mentioned it to one of the more empathetic, well-respected, and veteran associates that works in the same department as me. She saw merit in my assertion and agreed that these events should no longer be held in churches so that we foster a welcoming environment for all of our families of all religious faith backgrounds, including those of us with no religious faith.

The following week we both personally asked a few of our Somali Muslim families if they are comfortable with recent family events being held in churches. A few said they have learned to acclimate, but others said they have refused to go. One of the classroom teachers told me that some of the Somali Muslim children cry because their parent's decide not to go citing churches as the reason why.

After a month of discussions and building support in our department, the topic was brought to the attention of the Program Director, who is ultimately in charge of decision making. Once she heard that some of our Somali Muslim families didn't feel comfortable in churches and don't attend for that reason, she became convinced that the monthly events should not be held in churches. Therefore, she argued, in order to serve the cultural needs of all of the families, only secular locations will be selected for future events. In spite of a couple mild protests from agency staff, the new policy, I'm very proud to say, is that churches will no longer be used for the program's monthly family events; and since the discussion took place at a well attended meeting a lot of the agency staff came to understand and agree with the rationale.

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