Tagged With "University of Alaska Anchorage"
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(Free!) Epigenetics webinar with Dr. Courtney Griffin
Alaska Children's Trust is sponsoring this training called “What is the science of epigenetics teaching us about multi-generational transmission of trauma?” for the second time because Dr. Griffin's first training was so incredibly informative, clear, and visually-engaging.
September 22, 2016 @ 12:00 PM
https://global.gotomeeting.com/join/583399901
and/or +1 (408) 650-3123 Access Code: 583-399-901
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Greetings & introduction!
Hello Alaska ACEs Action members! I want to introduce myself, as I am the new Program Director for the Alaska Resilience Initiative and will be working to enliven this ACEs Connection group and make it an active and useful space for us to learn and organize together. The picture is of me with my now two-year-old daughter, Ida Luna. I am mama to her and to a baby boy due in late July. I just began at the Alaska Children's Trust a few weeks ago as the Program Director for the Alaska Resilience...
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Guidance from Alaska Native & Native American Gathering on Trauma & Resilience in Alaska
In May, the Alaska Resilience Initiative partnered w/ First Alaskans Institute & the Native Village of Chickaloon to convene a gathering of Alaska Native and Native American people from every region of Alaska who work on issues of child & intergenerational trauma. The goal was to seek input that would be used to guide the Alaska Resilience Initiative, the training-of-ACEs/Resilience trainers and the curriculum used to present on ACEs, and the overall framing & approach to this work.
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HCR 21 in the Alaska State House
I am reporting, with mixed feelings, what I heard about the fate of HCR 21, the Alaska ACE Resolution introduced by Representative Geran Tarr. The Resolution is sitting in the House Finance Committee, and I am told that it is, to use the words of veterans in the legislative process, "dead." It will apparently not surface this year, although stranger things have happened. So I am disappointed (and prepared to be elated if it does resurface). However it ends, Representative Tarr was able to...
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He gives working opportunities for Palmer's at-risk youth; when his shop caught fire his neighbors chipped in (KTUU)
By Derek Minemyer, Oct 20, 2019, for KTUU PALMER, Alaska (KTUU) - A Palmer business providing employment opportunities for at-risk youth burned in a structure fire early Tuesday. Now, the owner is receiving support from the community he's helped to improve. Jim Beach was visiting family in Kansas City when he says he got a call from the Palmer Police Department telling him his business, an auto detailing service called Car Deets, had caught fire. "My first thought was I was just glad it...
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Healing our Relatives: Webinar on Trauma-Informed Approaches in Indian Country
The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Tribal Technical Assistance (TTA) Center is hosting a series of webinars on the impact of trauma and trauma-informed approaches in the American Indian and Native Alaskan cultural...
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Healing the Helpers: Why Workplace Wellness for Child Protection Workers Matters [ktuu.com]
By Jill Burke, May 3, 2019, KTUU ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) — The Alaska Citizen Review Panel — a voluntary body with non-enforcement oversight of the Office of Children's Services — says the agency is making some much-needed internal improvements. OCS employees are "people who have some of the hardest, some of the most thankless jobs in the state — there's no sense of self care, there's no sense of helping each other, or that awareness that 'We have a hard job and it's killing us'," CRP Chair...
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Homework: Moving Toward Compassionate, Trauma-Informed Schools
It was the little red trauma-informed schoolhouse. Katherine Wickersham-Wade, the Nay’dini’aa Na’ Kayax (Chickaloon Village) clan grandmother who started the Ya Ne Dah Ah School , Alaska’s first Tribally operated school in 1992, might not have used that language. But she did envision a school that would wrap its students in Native ancestral traditions and Ahtna language, instill self-confidence and repair some of the damage inflicted by historical trauma—the disruptions to culture and...
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How ACEs Play Out In Small Town Alaska [sewardcitynews.com]
Seward is a thriving and warm community, full of people who care and want to nurture one another. Even so, the fact remains that we don’t all start with the same opportunities and that early childhood trauma can have a lasting impact on people’s lives. This is the concept that has broken into the field of child development over the last few years. The new way of talking about this concept of unequal starts is known as ACES. According to the national Prevention Institute “Adverse Childhood...
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How an indoor farm in Midtown Anchorage could help at-risk youth [ADN.com]
To help disadvantaged teens and young adults land jobs, an Anchorage mental health provider is staking out ground in the high-tech farming fields of hydroponics and vertical gardening. Inside a warehouse off Arctic Boulevard last month, violet light bathed rows of tall white columns. Leafy greens poked out in vertical rows, marked with handwritten labels for romaine lettuce and parsley. Michael Sobocinski, the chief operating officer of Anchorage Community Mental Health Services, gestured to...
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'In my childhood the monsters were very real' — Lt. Gov. Valerie Davidson talks about childhood trauma [KTUU]
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) — Valerie Davidson is Alaska's version of a rock star. Well-liked and respected, she's often stopped in public by people for a hug or chat. The 51-year-old Yup-ik from Southwest Alaska first made headlines when she was just an 18-year-old college student who spoke out against alcohol abuse in villages. These days, she's serving as the state's first woman Alaska Native lieutenant governor. She's also a sexual abuse survivor "Even though it's really hard to talk about,...
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Investigating historical trauma endured by Native Americans, Alaska Natives [AlaskaPublic.org]
An Ojibwe woman and independent journalist Mary Annette Pember recently visited Alaska for a series of stories on historical trauma and Native American mental health practices. Pember says the troubled lives of Native Americans reflect their troubled...
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Investing in Prevention: Working Together in Early Childhood for Healthy Alaskan Children, Families, and Communities 2015
An Alaska interagency workgroup began meeting in 2013 to put together this report , which has a large section on the effect of ACEs on Alaska's citizens to demonstrate the urgency for resilience-building programs. The state departments that...
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ITRC calls for Universal Resilience Education and Skills Training for Climate Trauma
Sneak Preview for ITRC ACEs Connection Members! Next Tuesday, Jan. 8, the ITRC will release a major report Preparing People on the West Coast for Climate Change. The media release about the report is below (and attached). It includes a link to the webpage for the report, where people can download the full report, and find a link to the webpage with examples of resilience programs across the west coast. You can connect with the ITRC CA and PNW Facebook page:...
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Jill Burke: Cuts to early childhood care will deepen Alaska's fiscal crisis [ADN.com]
As the state grapples with a $3.5 billion budget deficit, we must not lose sight of slowly acquired gains, those that require continued investment now before they pay off in the future. If we dont, the dollars the state might think it is saving now will be lost later when we have to spend more as we try to undo trauma-based harm to our states future workforce. This presents a crucial intersection of social and economic policy that should not be overlooked. In a bare-bones fiscal era, we need...
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Join a webinar on Friday (Jan. 11) featuring Alaska’s new statute directing state policy to incorporate principles of brain development
Please join ACEs Connection and the Campaign for Trauma-Informed Policy and Practice (CTIPP) for a free 60-minute webinar this Friday (Jan. 11) starting 8:00am AK/ 9:00am PT/ 12:00pm ET that features a new Alaskan statute directing state policy to incorporate principles of brain development. Hear the story first hand from the champion of the bill in the Alaska legislature, Rep. Geran Tarr, and the lead advocacy group—the Alaska Resilience Initiative —executive director, Laura Norton-Cruz.
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Kindness for children with an incarcerated parent [juneauempire.com]
11.2 percent. More than 1 in 10. This is the number of adults in Alaska, that had experienced having a family member in jail at some point during their childhood. Seventy percent of those reporting an incarcerated family member grew up with four or more adverse childhood experiences (i.e. witnessed or experienced domestic violence, substance abuse in the household, sexual abuse, neglect, emotional abuse, household mental illness). These ACEs can lead to physical and mental health issues...
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Losing A Generation [AnchoragePress.com]
“There’s an old saying in the medical community,” Dr. Jay Butler says, “statistics are people without the tears attached.” He’d know. He’s Chief Medical Officer and Director of the Division of Public Health at the Alaska Department of Health and Human Services and Chairman of the Alaska Opioid Policy Task Force. In the case of that second job description, sad stories are what drive his work. [For more of this story, written by Aurora Ford, go to ...
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Lunch & Learn: Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), Resilience and Trauma-Informed Policy-Making
Join me in Juneau to learn about the impact of ACEs on our communities, workplaces and state. ACEs are a significant contributor to all the issues we struggle with, and cost Alaskan an estimated $866 million per year. Learn examples of trauma-informed approaches to business and policy-making. For those not in Juneau, the Lunch and Learn will be broadcast live and archived at www.360north.org/watch . When: Wednesday, March 13, 2019 at 12 PM – 12:45 PM Where: Capitol Building in Juneau,...
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MARC Booklet 2016: Features Alaska
Please find attached the 2016 booklet for the Mobilizing Action for Resilient Communities (MARC) project, including Alaska and the other 13 communities that have been selected to participate in this 2 year learning collaborative. This is a great summary of the work happening in all 14 communities across the country. I look forward to working with you all in Alaska!
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Mat-Su Valley Faith Leaders
Mat-Su Valley faith leaders and all those in faith communtiies who work with children, families, and communities: On April 5th, the Mat-Su Faith Leaders Forum on "Safe Children, Healthy Families" will be held, from 6:30 - 8:30 pm at Turkey Red restaurant in Palmer. This is an opportunity to learn about the research on trauma and resilience, hear examples of how other faith communities have applied this research to their services and approaches, and brainstorm with your peer ... s about what...
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Mining the “lessons learned” from trauma legislation successes
L to R: Afomeia Tesfai, Rep. Geran Tarr, Jeff Hild _____________________________________________________________________ The planned agenda for the “Learning Series: Policy Approaches to Childhood Adversity” workshop at the 2018 ACEs Conference: Action to Access went out the window when an unexpected guest— California Assemblymember Joaquin Arambula, MD —was invited to open the session and join the other participants in lively exchanges about their advocacy experiences and perspectives on...
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Mobilizing Action for Resilient Communities (MARC) Represented at California ACEs Conference
(L to R) Teri Barila from Children's Resilience Initiative in Walla Walla, WA along with Dr. Ariane Marie-Mitchell from San Bernardino County, CA ACEs Task Force share their ACEs journey in their communities Representatives from several MARC communities were among the 450 people who attended the 2016 Adverse Childhood Experiences Conference in San Francisco, CA on October 19th and 20th. This is the third CA ACEs conference sponsored by the Center for Youth Wellness (CYW), and it was also the...
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National article on Rose Domnick of Bethel, AK -- brilliant Yup'ik trauma prevention and healing expert
"[Domnick] owes her progress to learning traditional Yup’ik ways of healing and dealing with life. 'Our ancestors gave us tools to navigate through the tough times of life. They taught us to take bad experiences and turn them inside out, examine them, talk about them and understand how they have affected us.' In her work with Calricaraq, she and her team help guide others through this process and gain more insight into their own lives. 'We are also finding that our elders are recalling old...
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Native American Children’s Safety Act (NACSA)
President Obama signed a new act to amend the Indian Child Protection and Family Violence Prevention Act by enacting certain requirements for foster care placements in Indian Country. Known as the Native American Children’s Safety Act [ LINK HERE ], the new law places some stringent requirements that may actually harm tribal efforts to implement the Indian Child Welfare Act. It’s tough to argue against efforts to protect our children, and the imposition of tough requirements for that...
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New Alaska ACEs data reinforces importance of investment in early childhood
Pat Sidmore, our expert for all things data and ACEs and a planner for the Alaska Mental Health Board, Advisory Board on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse, has collected new data that outlines when Alaska's children (0-17) acquire their ACEs. The slide below paints a pretty grim picture showing that our children are accumulating 50 percent of their ACEs before the age of 3, and more than 26% of them before the age of 1. Please feel free to share this slide as you see fit.
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New Alaskan training on healthcare and domestic violence available online for 3.25 free CME/CEs!
An engaging, multimedia training series on healthcare and domestic violence eligible for 3.25 free CME/CEs is now available online! The title of the training series is “Domestic and Sexual Violence (DV/SV), The Impact on...
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New Alaskan Youth Healthy Relationships Community Toolkit
A Step-by-Step Guide to Using the ANTHC Healthy Youth Relationships Community Toolkit The Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium has collaborated with rural and urban communities to make locally and culturally-relevant resources...
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New Data Paint Fresh Picture of Alaska’s Health Challenges [StateofReform.com]
The Alaska Department of Health and Human Services recently released a new batch of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) indicator reports , and the latest findings offer the closest look to date at how the state is coping with childhood trauma in its cities and boroughs. Taken together, the 12 indicator reports focus on a broad range of traumatic experiences, from neglect to abuse to mental illness. Research has shown that the presence of ACEs in households contributes to serious health...
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'No More Silence': Her kidnapping, sexual assault and murder stunned a town, and started a movement [Islander]
N ine months and a long Arctic winter have come and gone since the abduction, sexual assault and murder of 10-year-old Ashley Johnson-Barr in the northwest Alaska hub community of Kotzebue. Signs of Ashley can be found everywhere in this town of 3,200. At the cemetery, groups of kids gather at the purple-painted wooden cross marking her grave. They leave trinkets, teddy bears, necklaces, even sports medals. People slip bouquets of artificial flowers through the chain link fence at Rainbow...
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Now available: recording of Chris Blodgett's talk on trauma-informed communities
Dr. Chris Blodgett spoke on Thursday, Nov 3rd at the Anchorage Loussac Library to a room of nearly 140 people and 60 more online. His talk "From ACEs to Action: How Communities Can Improve Well-Being and Resilience" was approximately two hours long. Access the webinar video, audio file, and slides here.
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"Paper Tigers" April 5th, 6-9PM, University of Alaska Anchorage
As part of National Public Health week there will be a public showing of "Paper Tigers" at the University of Alaska Anchorage. Admission is free. Light refreshments will be provided. Thank you to Kate Wright, ACEs Connection member, for creating this opportunity for students and other community members to see this important film.
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“Paper Tigers” Makes an Impact at University of Alaska, Anchorage
On Tuesday evening students, staff, and community members attended a showing of “Paper Tigers” on campus at UAA. The showing was a joint effort of Alaska Children’s Trust, Prevent Child Abuse America, and UAA Residence Life in recognition of National Public Health Week. The room was packed and there was an animated discussion after the film. “Paper Tigers’ clearly had a strong impact on everyone who attended. In the written evaluations everyone indicated that they would recommend the film to...
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Patrick Anderson ’75: Breaking the Cycle [Princeton Alumni Weekly]
How a troubled childhood led to bettering outcomes for Alaskan Native children If only for a short time, there was some happiness in Patrick Anderson ’75’s childhood: swimming in a slough off Alaska’s Prince William Sound, eating fresh herring eggs, and picking berries for his large extended family and placing them into empty 3-quart cans. It was a traditional life of Tlingit and Aleut peoples in Cordova, Alaska, in the early 1960s. But when Anderson was 8, his family moved to Seattle, where...
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Premera Blue Cross Blue Shield donates to Alaska Children’s Trust [newsminer.com]
By Erin Granger egranger@newsminer.com FAIRBANKS — Premera Blue Cross Blue Shield, Alaska’s only individual health care company, announced will donate a grant of $220,000 to Alaska Children’s Trust, a state nonprofit program working to prevent issues related to child abuse in Alaska. The grant was part of eight donations Premera gave to eight total organizations across Alaska and Washington, finishing its first year of donations directed toward organizations that support behavioral health...
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Principal Progress: Trauma-Informed Efforts at One Alaska Elementary School
Before Deanna Beck had ever heard of the 1998 ACE study, before she became principal of Northwood ABC Elementary School in Anchorage, she was a special education teacher who saw the ways trauma scrawled through her students’ lives.
On the one-minute reading tests Beck administered, she would notice steady progress—40 words a minute, then 50—followed by dramatic drops; a child would suddenly be stumbling along at three or four words a minute.
She began to ask the kids what had happened.
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Program increases awareness of effects of childhood trauma [JuneauEmpire.com]
Posted January 14, 2018 06:24 am - Updated January 14, 2018 05:44 pm By ALEX McCARTHY Those running CLEAR hope to help students who have suffered from trauma to perform better in school and society. As Natalie Turner walked into a fourth-grade classroom at Glacier Valley Elementary on Friday, the fingers started wiggling. The fourth-graders greeted her silently, holding up their index fingers and bending them up and down. Turner returned the gesture, which they call the “one-finger wave,”...
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Putting Alaska Native hopes, voices at center of state’s ACEs movement (socialjusticesolutions.org)
Before the Alaska Resilience Initiative could push forward on any of its goals—to grow a sustainable statewide network; to educate all Alaskans on brain development, adverse childhood experiences , and resilience-building; and to support organizational, policy and practice change to address trauma—its leaders had to start by listening. Specifically, they had to listen to Alaska Native people. That’s why Laura Norton-Cruz, program director of the Alaska Resilience Initiative, partnered with...
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Reading the Signs of Trauma
I lived in Kotzebue, AK, for four months. One reason I was attracted to the community was an opportunity to introduce the concept of childhood trauma and ACEs. I did that. The Northwest Arctic School District had a wonderful and compassionate superintendent, Dr. Norm Eck. I had a few conversations with Dr. Eck about ACEs and how it affects children as they become adults. Dr. Eck accepted the information and had plans to examine it more deeply, but eventually retired and the spread of...
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Recording: Trauma-Informed Policy Making presentation at Alaska State Capitol
Last Wednesday, March 13th, I had the opportunity to present a Legislative Lunch and Learn to legislators, legislative staff, administrative staff, and the public in the Alaska State Capitol Building. To a room of ~ 30 - 40 people munching on lunch provided by the Alaska Children's Trust , and broadcast live via Gavel to Gavel (now archived here ), I had the honor to premiere the policymaker version of our History and Hope curriculum. This curriculum, and the policy-maker version, was...
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Research commission examines mental health issues in the Arctic [AlaskaDispatchNews.com]
When Alaska Health and Social Services Commissioner Valerie Davidson parked her car in downtown Anchorage Monday and walked to the swanky Hotel Captain Cook for a meeting with prominent policymakers, she did what she...
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Resilient, Period: Trauma, Healing, Equity, and the Alaska Resilience Initiative
This visually-engaging short film shows what roles the Alaska Resilience Initiative plays in the trauma and resilience field and the ways in which we prioritize equity, a comprehensive understanding of trauma, and indigenous worldviews and resilience practices in our work.
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"Stalking the Bogeyman" at UAA April 1 - April 24
"Every year, approximately 8,000 Alaskan children are physically or sexually abused. More often than not, that abuse isn’t at the hands of some stranger on the street in a trench coat, but someone the victim already knows and is familiar with." David Holthouse's play "Stalking the Bogeyman" confronts this situation through his Holthouse's own powerful story. The play, produced by UAA, runs Friday, Apr. 1 – Sunday, Apr. 24 at Harper Studio Theatre in the UAA Fine Arts Building (3700 Alumni...
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State Health Boards Support Findings On Adverse Health Effects To LGBTQ Alaskans [KYUK.org]
When they met this week in Bethel, the state behavioral health boards took a look at the Alaska Mental Health Board (AMHB) and Advisory Board on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse (ABADA) report about the adverse effects of discrimination against Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Alaskans. The boards decided to endorse the report's findings that discrimination brings a higher risk of drug and alcohol abuse and other risk behaviors. The boards think that more access to health and community...
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State of Alaska Playing Catch Up
As one who has been advocating for change in addressing childhood trauma for many years now, I have learned that change is extremely difficult for most people. There needs to be a reason for it. When Dr. Felitti was in Juneau last week, his planned testimony before the House Health & Social Services Committee was cancelled. The Legislative leadership mandated no hearings could be held unless they dealt with the state budget deficit. It was odd because what Dr. Felitti has to say is of...
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States Produce a Bumper Crop of ACEs bills in 2017—nearly 40 bills in 18 states
A scan done in March by the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) through StateNet of bills introduced in 2017 that specifically include adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) in the text produced a surprising volume of bills (close of 40) in a large number of states (18). A scan done a year ago produced less than a handful. NCSL is a bipartisan organization that serves both state legislators and their staffs. The shear volume of bills in so many states represents a promising...
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Stemming the tide of childhood trauma [ADN.com]
As parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, neighbors and community members, we all know children and care about their well-being. Likely all of us know at least one child who struggles in school, who acts out in class or shuts down and withdraws, who often goes to the nurse or goes home sick, and who shows up at school late many days — if at all. Perhaps we find ourselves wondering what is the most likely cause of all these different problems and what we can possibly do to help. The good...
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Stopping the flow of childhood trauma from one generation to the next [JuneauEmpire.com]
During opening remarks for the Juneau Suicide Prevention Coalition’s conference, “Adverse Childhood Experiences and Suicide,” Alaska Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott talked about the challenging and traumatic experiences he and his family experienced. “My mother — a full-blooded Tlingit lady — her entire experience of life was that of adversity. Her mother was born, and living at the time that missionaries came to our community and changed our world forever,” he said to an audience of more than 200...
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Story about the Aleut Community of St. Paul in The Guardian
This story, told compellingly for The Guardian by Alaskan journalists Jill Burke and Ash Adams , shows the power that communities, tribes, and individuals hold for healing from child maltreatment and intergenerational trauma, and the importance of funding community-led solutions. This story was made possible in part through travel support from the Alaska Resilience Initiative , via funding from the Health Federation of Philadelphia Mobilizing Action for Resilient Communities project. ...
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Suicide Rates Rise in the U.S.
I became extremely interested in suicide prevention after two of my young cousins committed suicide within six months of each other. I began to study the current state of suicide prevention in 2008 and began to envision what I refer to as a future state in about 2009. I wrote a very quick paper summarizing my research because two of my dear friends were deeply engaged in suicide prevention, one as chair of a prevention task force and the other as a teacher, coach and mentor. I gave three...