December 2017

When it comes to law enforcement in America, there are two culture wars under way. One has been championed at the federal level by the Trump administration: an effort to rigorously defend police and shift public policy away from punishing officer misconduct. But the second, less visible—and, in some ways, opposite—war has been ongoing at the local level for over a half-century, with African American officers working to mitigate racial bias and abuse of power from within the profession.

Parents who believe in “spare the rod, spoil the child” might be setting their children up to become violent toward future partners, according to a study published Tuesday in the Journal of Pediatrics . “We asked 758 kids between 19 and 20 years old how often they had been spanked, slapped or struck with an object as form of punishment when they were younger,” said the study’s lead author, Jeff Temple, an associate professor at the University of Texas Medical Branch. “Kids who said they had...

During the past two decades, more and more scientists have studied mindfulness —a Buddhist-inspired collection of practices aimed at helping us to cultivate moment-to-moment awareness of ourselves and our environment. Their early findings triggered an enormous amount of enthusiasm for meditation. Sometimes, however, journalists and even scientists (who should know better) have overstated the physical and mental health benefits, which has fed growing skepticism about mindfulness. Indeed, the...

BALTIMORE — Keyonta Parnell has had asthma most of his young life, but it wasn’t until his family moved to the 140-year-old house here on Lemmon Street two years ago that he became one of the health-care system’s frequent customers. “I call 911 so much since I’ve been living here, they know my name,” said the 9-year-old’s mother, Darlene Summerville, who calls the emergency medical system her “best friend.” Summerville and her family live in the worst asthma hot spot in Baltimore: Zip code...

The tax bill passed by Republican senators on Friday represents the most substantial overhaul to the U.S. tax code since the Reagan era. That legislative process in 1986 unfolded over six months, and involved more than a dozen public hearings. This measure was rushed through in weeks, with zero hearings in Congress. Last-minute changes were hand-written in the margins right up until a dead-of-night vote. Few of those who voted on it had fully read the text. Political imperative won the day.

This map of the San Francisco Bay Area shows the violent, very strong and strong shaking that will occur in a major earthquake that will happen sometime in the next 30 years. Before some smart geologists figured out plate tectonics and seismologists integrated that knowledge, we couldn’t predict this. But, to coin a phrase that you may have heard before: What is predictable is preventable, in this case, injury and death from earthquakes. So, in California, this knowledge changed everything:...

Can stress or trauma cause chronic illness? Or trigger onset? Answers are still hard to find despite links between stress, trauma and chronic illness that have been observed for millenia. For example, people have been sharing their stories for almost 2000 years about how type 1 diabetes (T1D), the less common autoimmune form of the disease, started after a serious life event. Research from the past 40 years has also suggested that severe life events can induce the disease and is not just a...

Are LGBT people regular victims of discrimination, or are they a well-funded political force bent on persecuting Christians? Those are the competing ideas at work in a host of briefs filed in a blockbuster case the Supreme Court will hear Tuesday that has huge implications for the future of civil rights protections. The case, Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission , pits a Colorado baker, Jack Phillips, against Charlie Craig and David Mullins, a gay couple who asked...

In a small back room at Victory in Praise, a predominantly African American church in this Central Valley city, community organizer Arturo Palato assessed his troops. The gathering included a teacher, a social worker, a salesman and a student -- about a dozen in all. Palato's mission: Convince this disparate crew that they have a crucial role to play when immigration authorities come to round up their neighbors. Take notes. Take photos. And provide key eyewitness accounts if something goes...

Is your organization facing increased community, school, and domestic violence? Does your team feel challenged by the complex needs of the people they serve? Is the impact of the opioid epidemic overwhelming? Is diminished funding compromising your workforce? If you want to rise above these forces and develop skills to address trauma and nurture resilience, join the National Council’s 8 th annual Trauma-Informed, Resilience-Oriented Approaches Learning Community . Over the course of this...

Consider two American children, one rich and one poor, both brilliant. The rich one is much more likely to become an inventor, creating products that help improve America’s quality of life. The poor child probably will not. That’s the conclusion of a new study by the Equality of Opportunity project, a team of researchers led by the Stanford economist Raj Chetty. Chetty and his team look at who becomes inventors in the United States, a career path that can contribute to vast improvements in...

This is part one of a two-part series. The number of delinquent youth remanded to the Arkansas Division of Youth Services during the fiscal year that ended in July was the lowest in at least two decades, according to figures recently released by the DYS. Juvenile judges committed 451 youth to state custody in fiscal year 2017 — a 14 percent decrease from 2015, when commitments to the DYS reached 526. The commitment rate does not reflect every youth confined in a facility in Arkansas. It...