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There is a an old story dating approximately 4,000 years ago about how God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son Issac on an altar. Abraham and his wife Sarah waited decades for their only son together and since human sacrifice was prohibited, this request seemed unusual. The story talks of the faith that Abraham had as he placed his son on the altar only to find that God had given him a lamb in replacement. With great relief, the lamb was sacrificed instead. [For more of this story, written by...

It’s been a busy five years for Ava DuVernay. Since winning the Best Director Award at Sundance Film Festival in 2012, she has accrued many “firsts”: becoming the first black female director to have a movie (Selma) nominated for a Best Picture Oscar, to be nominated for a Golden Globe Award, and now to helm a film with a $100 million budget (Disney’s A Wrinkle in Time). DuVernay’s work goes beyond feature movies, to include 13th, the award-winning documentary on mass incarceration, a...

Compared to whites, African Americans are more likely to suffer from a constellation of health problems referred to as “cardiovascular and metabolic diseases:” high blood pressure , diabetes , and stroke. Things like diet, exercise, and smoking contribute to those conditions, but when researchers control for those behaviors, the disparity persists. Now scientists are examining an unexpected factor that could be driving these disparities in heart disease: sleep. [For more of this story,...

The Chronicle of Social Change is highlighting each of the policy recommendations made this summer by the participants of the Foster Youth Internship Program (FYI), a group of 12 former foster youths who have completed congressional internships. The program is overseen each summer by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute. Each of the FYI participants crafted a policy recommendation during their time in Washington, D.C. Today we highlight the recommendation of Justin Abbasi, a...

New research has found growing up in a disadvantaged neighbourhood may have negative effects on children’s brain development. But for males, at least, positive parenting negated these negative effects, providing some good lessons for parents. Living in a disadvantaged neighbourhood (where there are more people who have low income jobs or are unemployed, are less educated, and have less access to resources) can cause stress, and has been linked with psychological and social problems in...

Ankara - Digital platforms can help refugee children to better assimilate into a new society, helping with language and education, and also in addressing the mental health issues that inevitably accompany the traumas of escape. A new study, from New York University, has looked at Syrian refugees children in Turkey. The children, sometimes with their families, have experienced the plight of fleeing a war-torn area and many experience post-traumatic stress disorder. Add to this, few of the...

Data and maps from the 2017 County Health Rankings are now available on Community Commons. Search the Map Room for the term “CHR 2017” to view the full list of County Health Rankings data. What are County Health Rankings? The County Health Rankings & Roadmaps program is a collaboration between the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute . These organizations work together to produce annual rankings for 30+ indicators. County Health...

The thought of going to a funeral used to be a terrifying prospect for me. Walking into a room filled with sadness and grief evoked — well — an intense desire not to go. Anxiety was all I could feel. It obscured the emotions I wanted to have like sadness and compassion. And, I secretly felt ashamed that I didn’t have “the right feelings." It was not death itself that bothered me--it was being in the presence of grief. Why did sadness make me so anxious? Why did it turn me into a vibrating,...

As Jack Kornfield describes how mindfulness practices empower you to carry on through difficulties in “ Guided Meditations for Difficult Times: A Lamp in the Darkness ,” he includes a wonderful quote from Michael Jordan: “I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my basketball career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life but I still keep going out on the court. And that is why I...

Juvenile justice reform advocates are turning their attention to a House and Senate conference committee after a key bill, a decade-plus in the making, passed yet another legislative hurdle. The Senate passed a reauthorization of the Juvenile Justice Delinquency and Prevention Act ( S 860 ) on Tuesday by a voice vote. The act hadn't been reauthorized since 2002 and was badly in need of an update, juvenile justice advocates have long argued. The bill now heads to a conference committee to be...

Solitary confinement in juvenile facilities remains too widespread, is unnecessary and counterproductive, is unfairly applied and is harmful, a new report says. In addition, experts lament the fact that there’s “a desperate need for better data on disparate treatment within facilities,” said Jessica Feierman, associate director of the Juvenile Law Center and one of the report’s authors. In the report, which aims to bridge the information gap, the center presents raw testimony from people who...

In 2015, a quarter of renter households in the U.S. paid more than half their income toward their rent. That’s just one of the figures that define the affordable housing crisis, a slow-motion catastrophe that, by 2025, may consume more than 15 million Americans. The Senate Finance Committee just held a hearing to figure out what to do about it. “Several people mentioned the 25 percent increase in renters over the last 10 years, which is the largest on record,” said Senator Maria Cantwell of...