March 2018

At Calvary Women’s Services in Anacostia, Courtney has been trying to catch up on what the rest of the world has been doing in the last few years. She has battled addiction and housing instability. She left an abusive relationship. Now, she reads, writes, watches Netflix — she just finished “Bloodlines” — and has dreams of starting a career as a tattoo artist and shop owner. Courtney has been homeless in Kentucky, Ohio, and the District. While she was living in Kentucky in 2016, the man she...

After wildfires and hurricanes ravaged the country last year, we saw devastating human impact, but also soon came to understand the huge financial costs to communities needing to rebuild. Reports are calling 2017 the most costly disaster year on record, with estimates of over $306 billion in damage to housing, transit, infrastructure and businesses. We know that a $1 investment of federal funds in resilient infrastructure can yield $6 in savings, and we also know that community voice is...

As the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination approaches and people across the country seek to celebrate his memory, it is a key time to reflect on what King’s legacy was ― and wasn’t ― and what it might look like to really honor him today. Time and again, educators and activists, including King’s daughter Bernice , have pointed to how King’s words have been whitewashed and mischaracterized over time, with children taught a sanitized version of King’s activism in schools,...

For one week in February, students at D’lberville High School in Mississippi roamed the hallways before and between classes, greeting fellow students with a simple hello. They encouraged other students to do the same, to write their names on badges pinned to their clothing and to try to meet a new person each day. But what may have seemed like overly friendly gestures was something more profound—part of a broader initiative aimed at preventing the next school shooting. The D’lberville...

CINCINNATI , March 21, 2018 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Researchers at Cincinnati Children's report in the journal Pediatrics a link between parents impacted by adverse childhood experiences and increased risk for delayed development of their children at age two. The retrospective study reviewed the data of 311 mother-child pairs and 122 father-child pairs treated at a large pediatric primary care practice (study collaborators The Children's Clinic, Portland, Ore. ) The children were born...

This is the first in a three-part series exploring the effects of Adverse Childhood Experiences on children’s health. “If one in eight children suffered from an unknown but debilitating virus outrage would boil, editorials would harangue public officials and agencies would mobilize to counter the threat. The CDC would scramble resources to develop and share effective preventive measures while searching for a safe, effective vaccine. We would fight the scourge as we would a war of national...

Depressive symptoms in girls shot up by 50 percent from 2010 to 2015, a rate more than double that for boys. As social media, college admissions and body image ideals become more ruthless, adolescent girls find themselves increasingly pressured to overachieve. In "Enough As She Is," Rachel Simmons explores how effortless perfection became the expectation for girls and how parents and society can "dispense with the myth of the so-called amazing girl." Guests: Rachel Simmons, author, "Enough...

ACEs, Adversity's Impact Oprah reports on childhood trauma's long-term effects Exposure to childhood violence linked to psychiatric disorders Poverty, criminal justice involvement, biggest risk factors for emergency department use among youth Our children's fear: Immigration policy's effects on young children Childhood trauma link offers treatment hope for people with schizophrenia Disorder, disability or result of adverse childhood experience? Report: Five states where kids suffer high...

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Division of Violence Prevention (DVP) is working to increase awareness, understanding, and commitment to violence prevention in a new “Tell Us About Your Hero” video series. The series will highlight people performing extraordinary acts of heroism in an effort to shift the culture and change the context in which violence occurs. Stories may focus on preventing violence types such as suicide, child abuse and neglect, sexual violence, intimate...

Shawn “ Jay-Z ” Carter, who has promoted criminal justice reform in prose and on screen , is putting his financial weight behind a start-up company that aims to use technology to reform bail and sentencing practices. TechCrunch reported yesterday (March 19) that Roc Nation , the MC ’s management company, invested in a first round of fundraising for Promise . The company joined venture capital groups like Kapor Capital , 8VC and First Round Capital to raise a total of $3 million for the new...

On February 14, a mass shooting occurred at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida that resulted in the deaths of 17 people and the wounding of 17 others. It became one of the world's deadliest school massacres on record, and just the latest in a continuum of school tragedies that have burned names like Sandy Hook and Columbine into the consciousness of America. As she watched the events unfold on television and social media over the next few days, Winden Rowe, M.S., a...

FRANKFORT – State Rep. Will Coursey’s effort to increase the number of mental-health professionals in Kentucky’s schools took a step closer to becoming law this morning when the Kentucky House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly for his House Bill 604. “In the days after that January 23 rd tragedy at Marshall County High School, I began meeting with mental health professionals, law enforcement, educators, and others to see what steps they might recommend,” Rep. Coursey said. “I wanted to...