In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Eddie Harris Interviewed by Tshepo Morongwa Chéry Tshepo Morongwa Chéry: This is an interview with Mr. Eddie Harris from REAL Dads.1 Can you please describe how you got involved with the [REAL Dads] program? Eddie Harris: Well, actually I got involved with REAL Dads when I was facing a criminal situation and I needed a job. I was working at a carpet-cleaning place doing some telemarketing, and a friend of mine suggested [that I] contact the folks at Children, Youth & Family Services. They were doing some outreach in our community, and they felt like because I know the community so well that that would be a pretty good fit for me, so I started off actually working on the Parenting Mobile, doing outreach in different communities, and then we got here. We started to shape and form and talk about forming a program that would serve men incarcerated or men with incarcerated type of lifestyles, you know, high-risk, low-income fathers that don’t seem to get the type of support. So that’s pretty much how I got involved in it. TMC: REAL Dads, where did the idea come from? EH: The idea came from myself, along with my supervisor Hilary Nagle and a gentleman that still works here—his name is Josh Stewart. We got together and started like bouncing some ideas off of each other, and we went to other staff people, other people in the community. I did about two months’ worth of interviews with people and just asking them about their view of fatherhood, what would they like to see in a program, and just getting a feel from the people that I probably wouldn’t be serving or outreaching to, and we put all of that together and we’re still like shaping and molding it. So it was something that was created here at Children, Youth & Family Services by us, by myself. Interview 291 My supervisor plays a really big part in it. We reached out to the people at the jail, got involved with that, and it’s been molding and shaping since then pretty much. TMC: How does the program function? EH: REAL Dads is really an acronym. REAL means Responsible Evolving Available Loving men in the lives of their children, and the way it works is that I first was going to the jail. I felt like, you know, well, we felt like that’s an underserved group of people, fathers, almost like the forgotten father. You go to jail, the only thing you can look forward to is having a high child-support bill when you come out. Nothing like support or anything like that was available, so we started really looking at that, and we got in touch with the jail people, Colonel Mathews and Phyllis, who’s the program director over there, and they were very good about letting us come in and they’ve been good about us doing— We did a little short DVD film of the fathers to send to their children, so the way it works is that guys get in my group in the jail or guys have been in my program out here in the community, and I serve them. It’s not like a 120day program. It’s like a lifetime program if you’re going to stay involved in it, and I see guys in the community once a week. I go to the jail on Mondays. We do a group, a six-man group, so it doesn’t get all big and bulky and people get lost in it. We want to keep it intimate for trust issues so guys can speak freely about some issues that might be bothering them and, at the same time, learn to trust other individuals with some of their stuff, so I mean, it works like that. When they transition out, if they want to remain a part of REAL Dads, I continue to outreach them, continue to see them; even if they don’t want to formally be in the program, I will stay in touch with them. I will keep reaching out to them, and it’s just something that’s going to tie into the rest of the things that are going on in the community with Second Chance, peer support network, and different things that’s going to be in place to help guys who are transitioning back to be a part of...

Share