December 2017

For years I have sought out with fierce determination conversations, books and articles such as this. Articles with titles like “5 Steps To Wellness,” “7 Must-Have self-care Tips” or “10 Ways for a Healthier You.” From peer-reviewed articles to O Magazine, I sift through pages with critical eyes looking for that aha moment where I find something new to share with teachers, administrators, students and other caring professionals. I usually ignore the introductions and skip ahead to the bullet...

On Dec. 7, 2017 , the California Department of Education published the California School Dashboard for schools and districts. The dashboard shows progress, or lack of it, on multiple measures. This database shows indicators of progress on five measures, in color codes selected by the state. (See below for details.) Other indicators will be will be added later as the state develops them, or collects the data needed to populate this database. To find indicators from a school or district, enter...

Earlier this year, a representative of a California advocacy and civil-rights organization asked me if the California Collaborative for Educational Excellence , the new state agency that I head, has a “genuine sense of urgency” about its work in getting the right kind of help and assistance to districts, charters and county offices of education. I told him that the very first meeting that we had in the very first district that we agreed to take on was at Ironwood State Prison, which is...

Walk around the Kern River Valley, Oildale and parts of Bakersfield any day and you’ll see hopelessness. There’s the homeless wandering the streets, junkies searching for a fix and punishing poverty that lurks in almost every neighborhood. For years, we’ve known there’s something cyclical about poverty, chronic drug abuse and intergenerational despair. When I learned about a study performed by the California Department of Public Health that found Kern County mothers experienced more...

Local public schools suspended and expelled far fewer students last year as they continued to shift away from punishment and toward prevention and positive reinforcement, according to the latest figures from the California Department of Education. Sacramento County school districts issued about 27,000 suspensions during the 2016-17 school year, down by 18,000, or 40 percent, from the 2011-12 school year. Districts expelled 160 students, down by 108, or 40 percent, from 2011-12. Despite the...

California education officials on Tuesday released school-level data that shows that last year more than 1 in 10 students were chronically absent, defined as missing at least 10 percent of school days for any reason. The data, which the state released for the first time, reveals that 1 in 4 foster children was chronically absent from California schools last year, as were about 1 in 5 homeless, Native American and African-American students. By tracking and releasing the data, California joins...

Please join us for a three -part learning series hosted by the California Campaign to Counter Childhood Adversity ( 4CAkids.org ) and ACEs Connection Network ( acesconnection.com ). Stay tuned for details on signing up for the webinars. We'll hear from states that are making great strides towards adopting trauma-informed policies and practices. Three-Part Learning Series: Webinar 1: National Landscape and State Level Efforts to Address Childhood Adversity Date: January 10th, 10AM PST...

Mark your calendars: On January 16, 2018 My Sister's House hosts event at Sac State, on trauma informed interventions for human trafficking victims.

CAREgivers film will be airing on most public television stations around the US beginning this month in Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Orlando, Cleveland, Spokane, Boise, Springfield-Holyoke, Youngstown, Idaho Falls, Twin Falls, Fairbanks, ETC. Please check your local public TV stations for future dates and times. Broadcast times will also be posted in advance whenever possible at: http://caregiversfilm.com/screenings/see-the-film/ This documentary addresses secondary trauma (aka...

Genentech is excited to launch a new philanthropic initiative, The Resilience Effect , to address childhood adversity and its long-term effects on health. For more than 40 years, our company has pursued groundbreaking science to improve the lives of people facing serious and life-threatening diseases. That’s why, when we learned about the emerging science behind the effects of toxic stress and the connection between early adverse childhood experiences and diseases later in life, we knew we...

California leaders are calling on U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to release an estimated 200 Cambodian and Vietnamese immigrants who advocates say were recently detained in the Bay Area and beyond in never-before-seen roundups. Their contributions are particularly critical to California, they argue, the state with the largest Asian-American and Pacific Islander populations, including the largest Cambodian and Vietnamese communities. “Many Southeast Asian Americans are survivors of...

When I was 16, I was incarcerated in juvenile hall. Whenever I was moved within the facility, I was shackled. They would chain my ankles and handcuff my wrists to a belly-chain. I was bound like this anytime I went to see the nurse, the psychiatrist and whenever I went outside. Twenty years later, I still have scars where the cuffs carved into my ankles. Policies in California’s youth prisons, including the use of shackles, cause serious harm to our children. The vast majority of...