Rooted in Relationships Holds First All-Coaches Meeting

Posted on June 4, 2025 by Nebraska Children — Leave a comment

Every year, Rooted in Relationships holds meetings for coaches and coordinators, but these meetings are more insular. Christen Million, who is Assistant Vice President of Early Childhood Mental Health for the Nebraska Children and Families Foundation initiative, explains that Rooted usually brings lead coaches together virtually every other month and meets with coordinators once per quarter. Once a year, they gather in person with all the Rooted lead-coaches and coordinators.

Valuable information is shared in these meetings, including data and coaching strategies. But, Million says, “the feedback we get from them is one of the most valuable parts.” That time to share allows the opportunity to discuss strategies they are struggling with and to be put in touch with another community where the strategy has worked.

Because it was clear that the cross-community connections were so important, the Rooted team decided to hold their first-ever statewide meeting of all Rooted coaches and coordinators. As Million describes it, “we wanted to have time when we could share information and initiative updates, but we really wanted to make a concerted effort to have everyone collaborate, talk to each other, get to know each other.”

While there were opportunities to learn strategies around collecting data, used from evaluations, reviews and celebrations around 2024 data collection, a discussion of applying for Rooted social-emotional enhancement grants, and breakout sessions tailored for both coaches and coordinators, responses suggest it was the interactive parts of the day that were a hit. At one point, participants were asked to be creative in sharing a success story from their community. They could put together skits, make a poster, or even sing a song. Million says, “it was really impactful hearing everybody’s stories.” Responses to the exercise would suggest other attendees agree: “Love the groups who did skits or sang. Brave souls!”; “Shout out to the group who sang a song”; “Thank you for all the fun activities and brain breaks!”

And these moments of sharing paid off for participants. One group, for example, commented on how much they liked the Week of the Young Child set up North Platte used, an idea they can take back to their community and utilize. Even outside the event, groups made connections, with one attendee commenting, “we had great bonding on the drive down!”

For Million, one of the most interesting moments of the day was during a movement break when they asked attendees to line up from the participant longest involved in Rooted to the most recently involved. Saline County’s Arlene Albert was part of the very first cohort that started over 10 years ago and the newest coach, Tiffany Kane, only started with Rooted 2 months prior to the event. Both started their involvement with Rooted as child care providers going through the initiative, eventually becoming Rooted coaches themselves. . In that single visual, the 10 years of Rooted work was represented as a unified whole, something that can be forgotten when work is isolated to individual communities. This first ever statewide gathering gave, according to Million, “an opportunity to hear highlights in every community and elevate the important work they’re all doing!”