December 2023

Families are essential in supporting student mental health. Learn seven family engagement strategies that ParentPowered recommends educators employ for student well-being

Benchmarks’ Center for Quality Integration (CQi) prioritizes continuous learning of new skills and enhancing current staff skills to keep its staff at the forefront of the human services workforce. We take this acquired knowledge and skills and integrate them into the day-to-day work we do in our own agency as well as outside of it. We have learned and applied many lessons from Brene Brown’s " Dare to Lead", including the lesson that everyone is a leader, no matter their position in an...

Click here to make your donation today. PACEs Connection is a social network that recognizes the impact of a wide variety of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in shaping adult behavior and health, and that promotes trauma-informed, healing-centered and resilience-building practices and policies in all families, organizations, systems, and communities. We support communities to accelerate the science of positive and adverse childhood experiences to solve our most intractable problems.

This week's episode focuses on how grief and mental health issues can be exacerbated by the holiday season. As we are emerging from the collective trauma of the COVID-19 pandemic, many have lost loved ones. And, even pre-pandemic, the holiday season was often a time of grief, loss and sadness. Our host Ingrid Cockhren will welcome former PACEs Connection team member and Grief & Wellness consultant, Gail Kennedy, and Yolo Cares for Kids Grief Specialist, Elisa Stone to discuss effective...

[Editor's note: Dr. Harise Stein at Stanford University edits a web site — abuseresearch.info — that focuses on the effects of abuse, and includes research articles on PACEs. Every month, she posts the summaries of the abstracts and links to research articles that address only ACEs, PCEs and PACEs. Thank you, Harise!! — Rafael Maravilla] Child Abuse Rebbe R, Reddy J, Kuelbs CL, Huang J, Putnam-Hornstein E. The Impact of COVID-19 on Infant Maltreatment Emergency Department and Inpatient...

As Texas leads the nation in Black growth, Tiara Dawson, a newcomer, acknowledges that many lack the survival skills needed for the state's increasing number of climate disasters. Credit: Riot Muse By Adam Mahoney, Inside Climate News, December 15, 2023 Stephanie Roberson wasn’t expecting this phone call from her husband, Corey. “I can’t do this anymore,” she remembers him saying. Do what? Her mind went racing. He was stuck on a mountain over 400 miles away from his family in Cincinnati, his...

By Andrea Bonior, Image: Unsplash, Psychology Today, December 17, 2023 It has long been understood that people who have experienced trauma have a different relationship to those memories than they would to memories of typical, everyday events. Even memories with negative emotional connotations, like sadness, still seem to be in a different category than memories of trauma—where shock and helplessness force the body into an extreme threat response. The intrusion that comes with...

Aja Johnson holds a photo of herself and her mother Lenene Muldrow in their former Woodlawn apartment. Muldrow's husband was shot and killed on the South Side, and Johnson left Woodlawn due to frequent gun violence there. Carolina Sanchez for The Trace By Justin Agrelo, The Trace, December 15, 2023 This fall, I attended a support group for parents who’ve lost children, mostly to gun violence. The monthly gathering is hosted by Elizabeth Ramirez with Parents for Peace and Justice and Rincon...

Shakima Tozay, of Stanwood, Wash., held a portrait of her son, Jaxson, who died in the womb and was delivered via cesarean section.Credit...Chona Kasinger for The New York Times By Rony Carin Rabin, The New York Times, December 12, 2023 Shakima Tozay was 37 years old and six months pregnant when a nurse, checking the fetal heart rate of the baby boy she was carrying, referred to him as “a hoodlum.” Ms. Tozay, a social worker, froze. She had just been hospitalized at Providence Regional...

‘A panel of medical experts has recommended that doctors screen all patients under 65, including children and teenagers, for what the panel calls “anxiety disorders”.’ Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA By Robert Reich, The Guardian, December 11, 2023 I want to talk about an uncomfortable topic that needs much more open discussion than it’s receiving: the United States’ extraordinarily high level of anxiety. A panel of medical experts has recommended that doctors screen all patients under 65,...

One of the more inspiring examples of reducing and addressing ACEs (and increasing positive experiences) is the extraordinary (but replicable) work of Restore Hope Arkansas. On December 19, there will be a webinar sharing how they are elevating collective impact with a collaborative case management platform, HopeHub (which is affordable due to their non-profit model) and a system thinking strategy. Even if you can't attend live, you'll be able to view the recording if you register. ...

We are very excited to share that registration for the new Maternal Health Innovation & Reproductive Health ECHO series is open. The ECHO will be on Tuesdays from 8:00 am – 9:00 am on Zoom (starting 1/9/24) and CEs are available. Please register for the ECHO series here: https://bit.ly/MHI-RH-ECHO You can find more information (such as the series curriculum and dates) on our website here: https://projectecho.rutgers.edu/echo/maternal-health-innovation-mhi/ In addition to the ECHO...