Blog

The ACEs Connection Cooperative of Communities launches today. We want to continue to contribute to the ACEs movement for as long as it takes to create a worldwide healing-centered culture based on ACEs science. We want that to take hold in this world in the same way electricity has — we only notice it if it isn’t there. First, a clarification: Nothing on ACEsConnection.com changes! Membership remains free! Everything our current 300+ communities use stays free, and remains free for new ones.

By Rachel Burt, NNY360, November 9, 2019 During the summer of 1992, while hanging out with her friends at a local mall, the same one she had been visiting with her family for years, Holly Austin Gibbs first made contact with one of the men who would turn her world upside down. Weeks later, the 14-year-old would find herself miles away from her hometown of Tuckerton, N.J., and thrust into the dark world of child sex trafficking. Now, 27 years later, Mrs. Gibbs is an advocate working to...

We developed ACEs Connection's Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Tool — called the Inclusion Tool, for short — to ensure that ACEs initiatives across the world focus on being inclusive when forming a steering committee, recruiting leaders, providing education about ACEs science, recruiting members, or providing resources and services within their communities. The more inclusive your ACEs initiative is, the more diverse it will be, giving your initiative a real shot at achieving equity and...

Lilo Stainton, Oct 2, 2019, Health Care A school-based program of early intervention has worked in other states. Health advocates and others argue for its widespread adoption in New Jersey To tamp down the epidemic of behavioral problems among young people, New Jersey should ensure schools systematically screen all students for mental health and drug use issues. That’s the recommendation of a group of lawmakers, health advocates and educators in a report released Tuesday, which also urged...

By Lilo Stainton, October 7< 2019 Health Care Study, published today, focuses on residents of Burlington, Camden, Cumberland, Gloucester and Salem counties South Jersey residents who feel socially isolated are twice as likely to experience heart disease as those who are more connected to their community, three times more likely to report mental health issues and four times more likely to misuse drugs, according to new research from Rutgers University in Camden. The findings are part of a...

This is one of the best documentaries I've ever seen, not just because it addresses ACEs, but because the storytelling is stupendous! Darrell Hammond and filmmaker Michelle Esrick will do Q&A’s after the 7:25 pm shows on Sept. 13th and 14th. There are three showtimes daily from September 13th through Sept. 19th. Dr. Bessel van der Kolk will join them for the Q & A on September 13.

By Dino Flammia, New Jersey 101.5, August 14, 2019 New Jersey isn't as knowledgeable as it could be on the lasting health and well-being effects of stressful or traumatic childhood events experienced by children in the state, according to a new report. But statistics suggest hundreds of thousands of New Jersey children have dealt with one of these events, or more than one, at some point in their lives. "What is missing in New Jersey is a comprehensive look at this, at how we can maximize...

In 2017, two youth-focused Camden, NJ, organizations were angling for the same pot of grant money—funding for a youth-led initiative to learn about community health concerns and develop projects to address them. But instead of scrabbling for the grant as rivals, Hopeworks and UrbanPromise became one another’s cheerleaders. In phone conferences with funders, representatives of both organizations noted their history of collaboration and stressed the importance of taking a trauma-informed...

By PR Newswire, Yahoo Finance, July 30, 2019 NEWARK, N.J., July 30, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- A new report released today details the challenges New Jersey faces in addressing Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and sets forth opportunities and actions for a coordinated statewide response to mitigate their lasting effects on children's health and well-being. ACEs are stressful or traumatic events, including abuse, neglect, domestic violence, household mental illness, household substance misuse,...

With a lot of discussion nationally surrounding the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study (ACES), trauma and resilience it is certainly a topic that still needs to reach educators and parents alike. A recent survey showed that only 10% of early childhood educators had ever heard of ACES, yet 100% reported wanting more information about how trauma impacts children’s behaviors. While teachers certainly notice behaviors in the classroom, they often feel overwhelmed or unsure of the best way to...

ACEs Connection presents, "Starting & Growing Resilient Communities: Online & In Real Life (IRL)", an interactive webinar training series focused on developing existing and potential online community managers and IRL ACEs champions. This series is dedicated to providing insight into creating sustainable and effective online & IRL ACEs initiatives. In this fifth session, we’ll talk about why it's so critical to tell your story far and wide. This incudes how to blog and share...

Even though I have excelled in practically all endeavors that I set out to do and have succeeded in new learning, I continued to have flash backs of certain events from my past and residual anger on certain things. I was first introduced to Trauma theory when I was working in an Outpatient clinic for Men in 2001. The Trauma Recovery Empowerment Model TREM was the philosophy practiced in conjunction with Boston model of psychiatric rehabilitation at the clinic. The concept of recovery made...