Veteran's Affairs Plus W/ David L. Washington

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Unknown Speaker 0:28
Good morning, Las Vegas. This is Veterans Affairs plus on 91.5 Jazz and I'm Dave Washington, your host. I have a colleague of mine is sitting in the he'll be taking some some of the shows, hopefully in the near future for me when I'm away, but he also has some issues going on. But that will be worked out. And also we know that gene Campbell will be coming in from time to time as well. Start out with some announcements, birthdays, my art Georgie Grayson, she's deceased, but she was one of the matriarch of the family. Joe Watkins, my good uncle, he's still around doing his thing. And then my grandmother, Rena, we just call them Misurina. And then, of course, our eldest grandchild, Destiny, Washington, her birthday this month as well. Condolences. Oh, and I must not forget, which I did forget last week. It's Mother's day, month. And I should say Happy belated Mother's Day to all the mothers out there. I want to acknowledge our friend who was going to be on today, Mr. Ross, Brian, he's having some medical issues which I will not go into detail on because I don't have the authority to do so. But let's pray for this brother. He's a good man. He runs the veterans a program out here at UNLV and doing an outstanding job. In fact, I had Dr. Wheatfield on the show a couple of months ago, and he had nothing but raving words to say about brother Ross, because he does a great work in terms of getting veterans set up for the education. And today we have in our midst, Jeff Dietrich, he's going to give us some background on the program that he has. However, before we get to that, I want to also acknowledge condolences to the goings family. Miss goings recently passed away her services, in fact is today, the 18th. So we are expressing again, condolences to that entire family. They are a very political family. In fact, her daughter and now is the mayor of the city of Las Vegas, Miss Pamela goings brown. So again, condolences to that family, we have an event coming up is called the butterfly girls and they are going to have a sneaker and counter smoke a cigar. We will have Miss Tracy on in the next segment to talk about what they're doing. So with that, how are you doing, Brian?

Unknown Speaker 2:57
I'm doing just dandy. I don't care what you heard.

Unknown Speaker 3:01
I am pleased that you're here to order to hopefully fill in for me at some point, as needed. And I know you got some things going on as well. But my final thoughts on Dr. Whitfield. I am so pleased with the work that they've done, you know, all the skirmishes that are going on with the best wrestlers, they have had a very, very mouse situation here. And I think that Dr. Witt, Whitfield. I think that due to your leadership, so we want to thank you for that. Because the last thing that we want to be doing is crumbling down on people, even though as I said in the last show, when you do wrong, you got to pay a price if you're willing to pay the price. I mean, America, a service guys, we went to, to, to the service, so we can, you know, have those rights preserved for people. But if you break the law, and as I said, in the last show, I had some trouble when I was in the military. I got caught martial. I made a mistake. Guess what? I said, How do I make up this bad time? He said, You make up them 100 days you spent in a stockade, I got out with my honorable fella so y'all can give me that smile because I made an absolutely In fact, I met Brian at Las Vegas Fire and Rescue. As I mentioned, he came in actually doing a lot of training for us and did some wonderful work with our positive discipline blueprint program. So I'm pleased that Brian will be here with us from time to time. And I know that this is easy pickings. You know, he was a video guy. He was like a producer director get in people's face, including all those politicians would come down and act like they were hot stuff. Say what Brian? Well, you

Unknown Speaker 4:38
know that I like to talk. I will die of cancer of the tongue.

Unknown Speaker 4:45
Well, great to have you here. Our first guest Las Vegas. Again, this is Veterans Affairs plus on a 1.5 Jazz and more. Jeff Dietrich. This young man has an outstanding program. So first of all, give us a little bit of background on your military sir Robots etc. Yes, sir.

Unknown Speaker 5:01
So thank you for having me. I was an Army for 12 years, I was a medic. So it was in Iraq and Afghanistan. And then when I got out of the Army, came here to Las Vegas will real quick. My dad was an Army. Mom is an army. That's how they met. They retired here in Las Vegas instead of Southern California, we had family. And so outside of Southern California, Vegas was my only home I had that was not in the military, military related. So when I got back, my wife had this awesome idea was like, Hey, let's go to Las Vegas, and I started my education career here. Got my Bachelor's here at UNLV. Then working with Ross Bryant since 2013, has been a mentor of mine was a student worker, president of the rebel vets president of the Alumni Club that we have for veterans. So I've been here at the University working professionally, since 2016, when I graduated with my bachelor's, and then I got my master's here as well.

Unknown Speaker 5:55
So what discipline about so

Unknown Speaker 5:57
I got my bachelor's in psychology, initially, I thought I was going to do pre med because I was a Mexican army. So when I got out and like, well, I'll do medicine and got here and decided I didn't want to do anymore. As much as I love it. I didn't want to go down that route. I wanted to do something different. So I dropped pre med, and I was dual majoring in psychology. So I was like, well just finish it up in psychology. And then that's when I got involved with a ton of things here at you know, the, with veteran leaders, student veteran stuff here on campus through Ross and some other people and just had fantastic time. You know, he gave me a mission outside the army again, that's kind of lost in the sauce and everything. So and then here I am, I found out how much I love, profit, you know, higher education, I think you would, you know, find myself working on a campus. I love UNLV. And I love higher education. So when I found myself working in this field, through fortuitous moments, so yeah,

Unknown Speaker 6:51
so how long have you programmed in? Okay,

Unknown Speaker 6:53
so we got the veterans Upper Bound Program is a federal program out of the Department of Ed. So we got it awarded to us fall of 2022. Yeah, so we're going into our second year of the program. So when we got the program awarded to us, they made me the director of the Center for Academic Enrichment and Outreach adult education services, because also have another adult program called the Education Opportunity Center that's out of the Department of Ed. And there, there are only two adult education programs that are all under the Department of Ed that fall under the trio umbrella. And so when we got both adult ed programs there, like I was fortunate enough where they made me the director of the adult education

Unknown Speaker 7:34
services. So So do you have a staff?

Unknown Speaker 7:37
I do. I do have five academic coordinators that work to programs. And then I have a student worker, a graduate assistant. And then I have a public service intern who is a National Guard soldier, and she is going to school here. And she was one of our veterans upper bound first participants

Unknown Speaker 7:53
to questions. So what kind of numbers are we talking about in terms of the people you're being served by this program.

Unknown Speaker 8:00
So in my Veterans Program, we have to serve 125 veterans a year. So as of today, we serve just a little over 200. And each year, so because they're under grants, their five year grants, so at the end of each year, it starts over again. So the year is from one September to 31, August, and then the year restarts itself in September again, and it goes that way for five years. So each year we have to serve 125 veterans, 67% of them have to be low income and first generation veterans. So that means mom and dad don't have a bachelor's degree. That's what's considered first generation. So my parents didn't have a bachelor's degree. So I found out my brother and I were first gen, I'm like, Okay, this is what

Unknown Speaker 8:41
this means. So, in addition to this program, how do you get the word out?

Unknown Speaker 8:45
So we've just through just very aggressive community outreach, because of the stuff I was involved with on campus in my undergrad, I just built us robust veteran network. And Vegas has a really robust veterans network, as I'm sure you guys are aware of it. We're in a big city, but it's got a really tight veteran community. And so just through my contacts and my network, it's just pushing the veteran program out that way. And then just really aggressive with any community outreach program or events they have, we always go to him just to set up a table and say, Hey, this is what our veteran program does. This is how we can help veterans that are pursuing their education that can be anything they want to go work on Harley's or be a truck driver, or they want to go to university and be an engineer. They want to be a teacher. And because we're federal, even though we're located here at UNLV, for administrative purposes, we don't recruit for you NaVi. So if Mr. Washington said I want to go to Nevada State or I want to be a truck driver, cool, we'll help you get there. And our services are free. So they're free to the veteran because it's a taxpayer funded program. They paid no money,

Unknown Speaker 9:50
services so the veterans as far as tuition and stuff that is under the grant program are

Unknown Speaker 9:56
no sir what we do with that we don't have we don't offer fun funding to pay for any type of programming, but we do do is the veterans transitioning out, we help them apply for the VA benefits, explain to them how they work. What kind of programs are they looking to do with this Veterans Upward Bound program to another one is is, you know, you've been out of school for 15 years, because you were serving, you haven't touched math in a really long time, we do a placement test on you to see where you're at in your math and your reading. And then based on those plate, those test scores, if you're not up to the standard of college math, or writing, or whatever, we prepare you to get to that level through tutoring and workshops and stuff like that, I help you, again, apply for your GI Bill benefits, but also help you do financial aid and do some basic scholarship research. We offer workshops, so we're in the process of building this program. So these are all the things that we need to do to keep you know, to serve our participants, or serve our student veterans that are coming in. So that's just the stuff we've been doing. So we had a workshop here not too long ago, on how your GI Bill benefits work. And it doesn't matter what institution you go to sounds

Unknown Speaker 11:03
like that. It's a lot of juggling going on with all that. And also sounds very rewarding. It is two parts. What's the best part of this? And what's the worst part of this for you?

Unknown Speaker 11:13
The best part of it for me is when I got out started using my GI Bill, the army didn't tell me what I needed to do to use it. And I shot from the hip, I actually I don't want to say wasted, right. But I did go through a semester to at least two that I could have used in a more productive manner if I knew what program I really wanted to settle on and how the GI Bill benefits work. Because when I got out in 2011, after I got back from Afghanistan, you know, they were like, here's your GI Bill. Awesome. Have fun, two bags full and move out. And so I kind of got pulled into a predatory school. I was like, oh, okay, this is how this works. And so for me, taking my learning lessons that I had, when I had that transition going into into school pursuing my higher education is passing on to the veterans now and letting them know, okay, this is how it really works. Yes, some people are telling you, you can't get scholarships because you have a GI Bill. And that's not the case. Because I've had veterans tell me Well, I was told when I got out I couldn't write for scholarships. No, no, no, you can. It's a matter of fact, my senior year, I had close to $20,000 in scholarships and grants.

Unknown Speaker 12:19
You know, one thing I believe in, me and Brian have talked about this over equity. God puts you where you need to be at a given point in time, because it seems to me is Brian asked you about how do you feel about it? Man, I see your face lighten up again. And and for you to have the experience to tell people that no, this ain't theory, this is what I did. This is part of my experience in this and you were able to get some things done that you can share it with others. So that's a great thing. Yeah.

Unknown Speaker 12:44
And it's, it's, it's it's awesome. Getting to we get a lot of good positive feedback from our veteran participants, you know, because we're telling them information that not necessarily they get the correct information, you know, so that's one thing that I really enjoy about the job. Do you have sufficient staff? I do. Okay, I do. Yes. So, radio. So I do, it's just, it's fun and how to a lot that time properly, because we're only a lot, it's so much funding in a perfect world, I'd love to have additional stuff. But that's not the world we live in. So I'm able to supplement that through having graduate assistants that we pull on board as student workers to help us out the backfill, the little stuff that myself and my academic coordinators, because our two programs are actually separate. So I have one Academic Coordinator from veterans upper bound and then for from my other two programs, because they're much larger in scope of, of adults, we have to serve and those services are free. But yeah, in a perfect world, in new awesome infinite funding, you know, and infinite support, but I have an awesome staff. I couldn't been really more blessed with the staff.

Unknown Speaker 13:56
Well, I saw West give me the science. So we got a couple of minutes to go Look, sir, tell us how the audience can get in, get a hold of you.

Unknown Speaker 14:04
So etc. Yes, sir. So we have an Instagram account and it's called UNLV Vu B so vetch or Victor uncle, Bravo UNLV, V, UB. And then we also have our office number, which is 702-774-4200. And then we're on Facebook, our my EOC program and view pre program are combined on Facebook under the UNLV, Adult Education Services CEO. So if they just do get on Facebook and put in UNLV, AES or adult education services, our Facebook page will pop up and then there's interest links in there for our applications and stuff. So they're free program or anything else. warnbro. Just

Unknown Speaker 14:47
it's an impressive program, and you're an impressive person representing that program.

Unknown Speaker 14:52
I appreciate that. Gentlemen, thank you so much.

Unknown Speaker 14:54
Any further closing remarks? We got about a 90 seconds

Unknown Speaker 14:59
now Um, if you need your education with just assistant sometimes adults just need a non biased party to bounce some ideas off of. And that's what these programs do is really to get the adult learner pointed in the right direction with proper correct information. We're not here to fund any programs. But we're here to assist you along that path. And make sure you're on your rudder gets pointed in a proper direction needs to go instead of you just kind of go into circles trying to figure out well, what do I do? How do I do this? So we look forward to serving Clark County residents. And so one quick alibi. These are geographically written programs, meaning you have to have a Clark County address for us to serve you. If you're a veteran and you live somewhere else in a state like up north. My colleague Robert Hernandez is the director of the Veterans Upward Bound program and Truckee Meadows Community College up in Reno, and he's a great individual. So you

Unknown Speaker 15:48
got to get the state covered. Yes, sir. We do. Well, we say God bless you, man, because Veterans Affairs and I know that we have an audience that we're constantly growing for you to come with this information will get you back on again. Yes, sir. Does I think it's important to share with others, and we certainly will continue to pray for our friend Ross, that he has a quick recovery after he goes through his medical issue. So thank you, sir. Appreciate you coming in. You are a good? Yes. Thank you. We love them when they can talk. Exactly.

Unknown Speaker 16:20
Anytime you guys. I'll be back on and love to continue the conversation.

Unknown Speaker 16:24
Well, listen, listening is an is an underrated skill, and you make it easy.

Unknown Speaker 16:28
Oh, I appreciate that. Thank you, gentlemen. Thank you so much. All right. This

Unknown Speaker 16:31
is Veterans Affairs, plus on any 1.5 chairs, and more on the other side, we have Miss Tracy with the program. That's for young ladies to discuss that. Thank you, sir. Thank you, gentlemen. Appreciate you.

Unknown Speaker 16:50
Once again, Las Vegas this is Veterans Affairs plus on 91.5 jazz. And as I mentioned, we would have Miss Tracy on and I'm gonna have Tracy to give her background and including her last name. I know they got a dynamic program. Coming up a fundraiser that we can't get into the monetary details of that. But I think the work that you guys are doing is just absolutely outstanding. So give us a little background our listening audience. Miss Tracy.

Unknown Speaker 17:18
Well, thank you for having me cheap. Again. My name is Tracy Ballard. Well, it's my last name. And I'm the founder and chairperson of a newly formed nonprofit organization called butterfly girls. A little history about myself is I'm a was born and raised in California. And my parents moved here. And I can't recall what year but they wanted their grandchildren to be closer to them. So I moved to Vegas to be closer to my parents. I've been here for 32 years in Vegas and raised two sons here. I was hired at the City of Las Vegas at the time, it was the Department of detention and enforcement. And I retired about three years ago under the new name of City of Las Vegas Department of Public Safety.

Unknown Speaker 18:04
Okay, cool, cool. So you have, you know, I feel so very blessed. My wife Marsha, and I, because all of our children or grandchildren are here in the city. And when when they're around, and you get to go and sometimes I won't even go golfing. I love to golf, but I tell you guys, I income and my grandchildren are coming to the house. So we got 11 and one on the way. And I think all the ovens will be shut down after that. So so I can, I can only imagine how your parents feel because I can tell you that. We me and Marcia have talked about it before you kind of dread and I know that it's an adjustment that you would have to make as a grandparent if your children decide to not live in the city where you live. And just seeing those grandchildren, man because we go and visit our son in laws with a father just passed away. Late, mid last year. We go down to Cape Town, South Africa, man, you can see Miss Doreen and how her her eyes just light up. When she sees her other grandchildren. She's got three there, and three over here in the United States. So go ahead, Sister Fran, tell us about your program because I think it's great work. I did get to read some of what Gene chief Eugene Campbell had sent me thinking that we may have to have him to sit in on the show. If one of you guys wanted the officers couldn't make it so you have a some background on it. And I trust our audience would love to hear about it because I think it's great work that you do.

Unknown Speaker 19:35
Okay, like I said, I worked for the city of Las Vegas detention enforcement for 28 years. There. I spent two years in dispatch and 26 years as a corrections officer. And a little bit of background about that as I was a field training coordinator. I did a lot of recruiting for the city of Las Vegas in that capacity. And I was also a Union officer so saying that to there's little things that happened in your life along the way that guide you into the place that you are now. And so I look at all that on my background I didn't know at the time, but I think it was preparing me for this program. And over the 28 year career in law enforcement, I was to witness and interacted with many women who found themselves in the judicial system because of circumstances that were mostly out of their control when they were young girls, right. And as a result of that, they grew up without the support they needed to guide them in the right direction. I've always been a service oriented person to have volunteered and giving back to the community in many ways for decades. But after I retired, I decided I want to make a long term impact on the lives of those who need it most, which was our youth. So that's how I found it. Butterfly girls. And what we do is we meet is a nine month program that meets twice a month during the school year. And we meet on Saturdays, and we teach the girls social and emotional learning skills. And we focus our recruitment on girls to elementary school from ages eight through 11 in areas that are labeled as underserved or under resourced. So currently, we are focused in Ward five on the historic Westside. We know we know that growing up is tough and growing up without resources and support is even tougher. We know that potential is distributed equally, but opportunity is not. And we know that inequities in the education system hinders traditional academic success, so everybody doesn't learn traditionally. So we think if we focus on social emotional learning, self esteem, self management, self love, self awareness, responsible decision making, then this will help the girls get on track academically, right. And you know, that learn that zip code that they come from, and reside and doesn't determine should not determine the access to their opportunities. So we just want to let them know that the trajectory trajectory of their life in their future is not determined by where they come from.

Unknown Speaker 22:26
You know, it's something Tracy, how you mentioned that you felt you were late. In fact, we talked about it in the last segment with Jeff Dietrich, who runs a Veterans Program out here at UNLV. Along with my other my, well, we're doing some hosting for me, Brian Willett, one of my fire service colleagues, we talked about how sometimes God puts you in a place where you need to be, and it just is so rewarding, because you know that there will be success based upon you know, why am I doing this? But but but when you look back, it was something that you were working toward anyway. So tell me as far as your your Saturdays, what's the hours that you guys? And you do it once a month, you say?

Unknown Speaker 23:07
We do it twice a month, twice a week? Yes, every second and fourth Saturday, from 1030 to 1230. Depending on the subject matter and how long they may need to be in the class. And currently, we're holding our assessments at Doolittle community central Center, which is central to most of the schools that we're recruiting from.

Unknown Speaker 23:34
Okay. So I would imagine, go ahead. I'm

Unknown Speaker 23:39
gonna say we start in September, right after school starts. We do our recruiting, and then we end in May, this may 25, will be our last session for this season. This is our second season we're completing. Well,

Unknown Speaker 23:51
that's you know, that's excellent planning, because you just run it right along with the regular school year. Yes. And you do this, would you say eight to 11 year old young ladies?

Unknown Speaker 24:02
Yes, at 11 year old, young ladies, we feel like the earlier you start trying to get them to recognize their potential and have them see strong female role models, strong female leadership and school in the community and in as their mentors, then that will help them establish a foundation in life while they are going into adolescence. Absolutely.

Unknown Speaker 24:37
Well, there's tremendous work. How can folks get a hold of you or you actually recruit from the schools but I would imagine that you want it broadly known about just what you guys are doing and what's your capacity in terms of number of students?

Unknown Speaker 24:53
Currently, we're our maximum is 20 students our first season we we have 18 applications And we had 11 girls to actually start at eight to complete. And this year, all eight that started Season One returned. And we are at our capacity with people who wanted to join, but were turned away because we have to have, you know, a certain amount of volunteers. So 20 currently is our capacity. And anyone who would like to know more about the program can go to our website, which is www butterfly girls with a Z butterlygirld.org. And learn more about the program. Well, I

Unknown Speaker 25:37
can tell you this is this is a great strategy, because I believe that if you wait too long, children, young people, male or female, they will get locked down into a mode of, of whatever they were were around versus some, some good program that will assist them to grow themselves. From a citizen standpoint, we want good citizens out there, as well, as you talked about some of the behavior and, and things that they can learn by modeling others and seeing others have success in life. And because you know, a part of my life, I grew up in a project right there at Owens and H Street. We just call it the circle. But you know what, one thing I refused to do was allow the projects to get into me. And I know, as you probably do, as well, that there are families that are second, third fourth generations of hanging around and living in the night trying to put anybody down. But there's more that one can do to assist themselves. And I think that your program is going to do awesome work. And we urge you to continue and and certainly we want to know what what can we do. So I know you got a big fundraiser coming up, we can't get into the dollars of it. But we can certainly get the location and kind of your purpose and what the theme is, etc.

Unknown Speaker 26:57
Yeah, well, you know, nonprofit is not for the week. Very true. We have to do some fundraising. And this Sunday on May 19, from 5pm to 9pm. We want to invite the Las Vegas to come out and support us. The theme is called sticks and kicks. It's our first fundraiser, and it's going to be held at tapping ash at 1606 South commerce. It is an outdoor event. But what we ask you for people to wear is cocktail attire with your favorite sneakers. And we're kind of doing this so the mag and get involved a lot of my mentors and girlfriends their husband smoked cigars, so I wanted to do something for the two guys to come out and enjoy us smoking cigars. If that's what you like to do is for the novice and the efficient models are smoking for camaraderie, dancing fun and some philanthropy for a great cause. Absolutely,

Unknown Speaker 27:58
I think that this will air on Saturday. So you will you get some play and hopefully you will get some response out of this because once again, I've been involved in a number of as well as chief Campbell and I have with a group called Camp brother and camp sisterhood for for young people, African Americans in particular from our community. And I can tell you the richness of their faces when you run some of the programs talking about hygiene, table etiquette, how to treat a woman that all these things were important particularly for our young men. And then it's just like it's it's rewarding, particularly when even even when you do sports and you run into some good a coach. It makes you feel so good, particularly when they've had some success in life as we close is any other remarks you'd like to make as we close out?

Unknown Speaker 28:51
No, I just want to thank you for having me and we know early exposure and intentional learning experience can shift the trajectory trajectory of a child's life. If you'd like to volunteer through our website if you'd like to make a denote donation, you can do that on the website as well. And the website again, www dot butterfly girls bu TT erflygirlz.org Butterfly girls go

Unknown Speaker 29:24
once again, Las Vegas this is business affairs plus on 91.5 Jazz and what we'll talk to you next week, but we're pleased that we had an opportunity to get Miss Tracy and to talk about her program and the ones who work with her the other officers, the butterfly girls. much appreciate it. And may you have Godspeed and success in your program. Thank you so very much for coming.

Unknown Speaker 29:47
Thank you

Transcribed by https://otter.ai