Blog

By Matt Levin, Nigel Duara, and Erica Yee, Cal Matters, August 11, 2020 Like any parent, Jamie Burson didn’t want her 11-year-old son to discover how frightened she really was about the novel coronavirus. But it’s hard to mask anxiety when you’re living and sleeping together in the same car. After Burson was evicted from her two bedroom apartment in Vacaville the second week of April, she heeded Gov. Gavin Newsom’s order to shelter in place by cooping up in a two-door sedan near her Walmart...

By Kevin Rector, Los Angeles Times, August 12, 2020 After weeks of protests in the wake of George Floyd’s death, a new poll shows that a majority of Californians support sweeping reforms to law enforcement — including measures that would make it easier to prosecute and sue police officers, limit the negotiating power of police unions and shift police funding to social workers and mental health providers. The backing for such measures comes amid growing concern about race relations in the...

By Maria Zate, Noozhawk, August 13, 2020 Pediatric Resiliency Collaborative (PeRC) and KIDS Network of Santa Barbara County have received a total of $350,000 in grant funds from the Office of the California Surgeon General and the Department of Health Care Services to participate in the state’s Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) Aware initiative. ACEs Aware grants are funding the organizations to design and implement training and education activities for providers and organizations that...

By Esther Landhuis, California Healthline, August 12, 2020 As the coronavirus swept into Detroit this spring, Wayne State University junior Skye Taylor noticed something striking. On social media, many of her fellow Black classmates who live or grew up in the city were “posting about death, like, ‘Oh, I lost this family member to COVID-19,’” said Taylor. The picture was different in Beverly Hills, a mostly white suburb 20 miles away. “People I went to high school with aren’t posting anything...

By Samantha Michaels, Mother Jones, October 2020 In August 2018, a few weeks after he was shot eight times at a party in Oakland, Andre Reed was recovering at his mom’s house, his wounds still open, when he got a message on Instagram. It was an old friend from his school days. She said some people were looking for him and wanted to talk. Reed, then 35, had recently been released from federal prison, after years of bouncing in and out of the criminal justice system. “Is this the police?” he...

By Mark É. Czeisler, Rashon I. Lane, Emiko Petrosky, et al., Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, August 14, 2020 What is already known about this topic? Communities have faced mental health challenges related to COVID-19–associated morbidity, mortality, and mitigation activities. What is added by this report? During June 24–30, 2020, U.S. adults reported considerably elevated adverse mental health conditions associated with COVID-19. Younger adults, racial/ethnic minorities,...

As the COVID-19 pandemic began its devastating sweep through African American communities in April, Andre Chapman, CEO of the San Jose, California-based Unity Care , saw a glaring need for developing a COVID-19 prevention campaign that spoke directly to African Americans. “Many of our young folks and families really didn't understand the impact of this virus, nor did they believe much of the information that was coming through the media,” says Chapman. His organization provides housing and...

Robin is a brilliant, passionate, and vocal school nurse with almost two decades of experience as a New Jersey school nurse in the Camden City School District. She is the Legislative Co-Chair for the New Jersey State School Nurses Association and she joined us last week for A Better Normal community discussion about back-to-school (or not) plans families are facing this school year. Robin serves as faculty in the School Nurse Certificate Program at Rutgers University-Camden School of Nursing...

As the school year begins, access to technology, including suitable devices for schoolwork and a sufficient broadband internet connection, is both a requirement for effective learning and a source of division in this new mode of mass education. Educational inequities become more acute when some children lack a dedicated device or have an inadequate internet connection. This digital divide compounds inequities and may have long-term consequences on educational outcomes. Kidsdata.org now...

Register to view "No Small Matter" anytime, and then join the Facebook Live discussion panel on August 12 at 6pm.

Tuesday, August 18th, 12-1pm PT Register HERE Culture is at the heart of a trauma-informed approach but can often feel abstract or hard to operationalize. In this one-hour interactive A Better Normal session, we will explore the role of culture in a trauma-informed approach, work through an exercise to apply these concepts, and discuss what culture looks like in our own communities and organizations. Participants will walk away with practical action steps to help lead the development of a...

Greetings! My name is Severine Hollingsworth, I am the Community Liaison for BAART Programs and MedMark Treatment Centers. We offer outpatient opioid medication assisted treatment (MAT) in three convenient locations in the greater Sacramento area (see attached flyer). We provide counseling, ease of access, continuum of care and community referrals to benefit our patients. We are collaborative in all aspect of our communities from mental health, drug and alcohol rehab to reentry programs. Our...