New Mexico community outreach to include “Un León en Casa y en el Pueblo y en el Hogan”
Hearing “Your child has cancer” profoundly changes a family’s life, plunging members into a world of uncertainty, emotional upheaval and excruciating decisions. Every year in the United States, approximately 12,500 children and adolescents are diagnosed with the disease.
“A Lion in the House,” an intimate, intense and ultimately inspiring documentary about families facing childhood cancer is featured on the two-part program, a presentation of “Independent Lens” airing on Wednesday and Thursday, June 21-22 from 9 to 11 p.m. on KNME-TV 5.
In New Mexico, public television station KNME-TV (Albuquerque/Santa Fe) was one of only 11 PBS station nationwide to receive a grant from the ITVS (Independent Television Service) Community Engagement Campaign and the Lance Armstrong Foundation to deliver effective community outreach in conjunction with local partners around the “A Lion in the House” mini-series. The ITVS community engagement campaign seeks to build bridges between families in need and communities of support.
KNME’s Lion project is also called “Un León en Casa y en el Pueblo y en el Hogan,” because New Mexico has many houses and communities – the Spanish casa, the American Indian Pueblo and the Navajo hogan, to name a few. The project will reach out to underserved Spanish and Native American speaking communities in New Mexico, focusing on health disparities due to language, differences in cultural context and poverty.
With the “A Lion in the House” series and online resources as a catalyst, KNME and its partners use multilingual approaches to raise awareness and promote the use of resources available to underserved New Mexico children with cancer.
The Lion in the House collaboration between KNME and the community partners will include producing multilingual public service announcements, distributing a children’s book, “The Jester Has Lost His Jingle,” by David Saltzman; and a phone bank, available at 1-800-593-1845, during the airing of “Lion” to answer viewer questions. Additionally, the UNM Center for Native American Health received a variety of multicultural children’s books.
Media Contact: Carolyn Gonzales, (505) 277-5920; e-mail: cgonzal@unm.edu
Posted by scarr at June 20, 2006 05:22 PM