BUILD EXITO Scholar Alice Tausaga returns to American Samoa for INSPIRE Research Symposium

In addition to giving the current BUILD EXITO students at ASCC the opportunity to talk about the program and their individual aspirations, the Coalition provided funding for Alice Tausaga, an ASCC alumnus and current BUILD EXITO scholar at PSU, to return to American Samoa and speak at the symposium about her current research project.

Tausaga, 23, names both Fagatogo and Vatia as her home villages.  She currently pursues a Psychology major with a minor in Child, Youth, and Family Studies at PSU.

At the symposium, she shared her work to date on her area of research: Exploring the Parenting Needs of Fathers Exposed to Domestic Violence in Childhood.

“This research benefits the parenting needs and mental health of fathers exposed to domestic violence as children,” she explained. “I focus on whether or not fathers who experienced domestic violence as children parent their own offspring children the same way they were parented, or if they intentionally break the cycle of exposing children to domestic violence.”

Read more at Talanei News.