Blog

By Jenalee Doom, Psychology Today, April 21, 2021 Several national and state-level organizations have led efforts to increase awareness about the negative impacts of adverse childhood experiences on mental and physical health from childhood through adulthood. These adverse childhood experiences are profoundly negative experiences children can have that include childhood abuse, neglect, witnessing domestic violence , or having a caregiver with severe mental illness or who is in prison, for...

Thursday, May 13, 2021 | 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm (PT) Our multidisciplinary team has developed a training program to help health care trainees learn how to better address the sequelae of childhood trauma in their adult patients. We will describe the history of this program and our experiences from over 800 simulated patient encounters. ○ Describe development of an ACEs training program for health trainees caring for adult patients ○ Describe the components of the Professional ACEs Informed...

There are many theories about childhood trauma and how it affects the bodies and minds of children and how these experiences shape adults. One of the most interesting of all of them is what is called the polyvagal theory. First described in 1994 by Stephen W. Porges, a distinguished university scientist, the polyvagal theory has caught the attention of millions including therapists and theorists of all types. This is the first of a series on the polyvagal theory and this piece will focus on...

By Jennifer Hays-Grudo and Amanda Sheffield Morris, The Good Men Project, April 19, 2021 Adversity, such as abuse, neglect, and poverty, damages children. But protective experiences can build resilience against adversity and promote positive development. We identified 10 relationships and resources proven to counter the impact of adverse experiences. They have hidden magic that can transform an otherwise miserable childhood. Perhaps a child has been abused and has an alcoholic or depressed...

By Treva Lind, The Spokesman-Reveiw, April 19, 2021 Lessons learned in the garden can grow immeasurably for children as a portal into the natural world. Take it from a Spokane gardener who has helped kids harvest plant-based knowledge for 15 years. Sue Malm, a WSU Master Gardener since 2006, leads the program’s youth committee. She’s visited many school gardens, science fairs and classrooms, gaining tips on how to lead children toward a love of gardening. And she’s witnessed much learning...

By Alison Giovanelli and Arthur J. Reynolds, Preventive Medicine, July 2021 Abstract Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) have been definitively linked with cross-domain life course well-being. While scales measuring the ten “Conventional” ACEs (ACEs-C; intrafamilial experiences of abuse, neglect, and household dysfunction) are parsimonious, use of such scales alone may fail to capture crucial information about adversity, particularly in youth growing up in underresourced areas. Patterns and...

By Bethany Ao, The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 13, 2021 As a student at Central High School, Andre Pak felt like it wasn’t possible to talk honestly about his feelings and emotions with his peers in a supportive environment. So during his senior year, he joined Creative Resilient Youth (CRY), a collective of 10 teens who use art to address the gaps in mental health dialogues at schools in the Philadelphia area. Last year, Pak, now a 20-year-old sophomore at Drexel University, completed a...

Join us for our second episode in a new series called "PACEs Connection Reacts" where we will be viewing the world through a PACEs science and trauma-informed lens. For this PACEs Connection Reacts, join PACEs Connection's Race & Equity Workgroup as we react to the trial of Derek Chauvin , an American former police officer who was convicted of the murder of George Floyd. The murder of George Floyd, along with a string of other murders of Black Americans in 2020 , spurred international...

By John Fensterwald, EdSource, April 16, 2021 Typically, many scholarships and accolades come at the end of the senior year to recognize outstanding performance of top students. Imagine instead a series of “micro-scholarships” for a different purpose targeted toward students at low-income high schools. Spread out like bread crumbs over four years, they would build students’ confidence, their resumés and plans for the future, and would end at graduation with as much as $5,000 in the bank for...

Join the Children’s Bureau on Tuesday April 27, 2021 at 2-3:30 p.m., as they recognize National Child Abuse Prevention Month. Meet the new Children’s Bureau Associate Commissioner Aysha Schomburg and hear her vision for the Children’s Bureau’s prevention agenda. This will include a dialogue with practitioners at the national, state, and local level about how we can concretely bring a race equity lens to our prevention work. For more information and to register, please follow this link.

From Center for the Developing Child, Harvard University, April 2021 This update to our 2017 paper, which proposes three basic principles that are grounded in science and can help guide policymakers and program developers, now calls out more explicitly the growing body of evidence of a link between disparities in health and education outcomes and the ways in which public structures, systems, and services deny opportunity to people of color. Other updates reflect our own journey of listening...

Hi Friends! We are moving our Better Normal- Education Upended series back to 12 pm PST every 2nd and 4th Thursday. Join us this Thursday via Zoom, 4/22, at 12pm PST. Special guest Emily Read Daniels from Here This Now will join me today to discuss cultivating a felt sense of safety in our return to school. To register click here