Roots for Change Cooperative (R4C) is a cooperative founded by Latina and Indigenous women to address maternal/paternal and child health inequities in Dane County by promoting community mobilization and providing community-based wellness services to immigrant families. R4C has supported over 400 dyads/triads since 2021 and has a team of Doulas trained in trauma-informed care, breastfeeding, traditional healing practices, prenatal yoga, among others. They also specialize in data collection, community-informed research, and adult education strategies using antiracist, feminist, and anti-colonialist approaches.

R4C members began their role as community leaders in 2017 with the “Imagine Madison” program where they taught focus workshops with Latino families in Madison. Now, as R4C is growing its number of members, we view this opportunity as the beginning of another cycle.

In the last four years R4C has established local and international collaborations creating safe spaces to:

• Address mental health online through certified mental health professionals in Latin America.
• Access to food and support for local farmers with the program “Resilient Food Bags for Latino/Indigenous Families in Dane County” in collaboration with REAP Food Group where more than 1,000 families have benefited.
• Promoting education on traditional practices, sexual and reproductive health, maternal-child health, cultural identity and food sovereignty through more than 50 free virtual and in-person talks and workshops.
• Community members and health professionals could share their experiences regarding the health system and design culturally appropriate educational and perinatal services for Latino and Indigenous families with the “Jardines de Espacios” Project.
• Training of 12 Spanish-speaking community doulas.
• The organization of “Somos Raíces: Primera Conferencia Latinoamericana de Salud Materna Infantil” (We Are Roots: First Latin American Conference on Maternal and Child Health), a Spanish-language event that addressed topics such as obstetric history, reproductive health from a decolonial perspective, and the demystification of motherhood, bringing together experts from Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, North Carolina, among others.

The R4C team is bilingual and brings valuable knowledge about the challenges of the Latino community and can help the city of Madison make its initiatives inclusive and culturally appropriate.