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The impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs)— childhood experiences of abuse, neglect and family dysfunction—on the health and wellbeing of college students nationwide is relatively unknown. And yet, approximately two-thirds of University of Minnesota students experience at least one adverse childhood experience before entering college. On Friday, Dec. 2, the U of M will host a one-day conference that brings together college administrators, educators, students, public health...

When the University of North Texas designed and planned their new 130 million dollar student union, all possible options and ideas were on the table. And why not? You only get one chance to build a facility like UNT’s new union, so you better get it right. As the master plan evolved, one idea that made the cut was a dedicated space for introspection. The process was student driven, and the students had spoken. They wanted a meditation room. As unusual as that request may have sounded to...

Our nation’s college campuses are experiencing a surge in demand for mental health services. About 1 in 10 incoming freshmen reports feeling depressed frequently . The 2015 Annual Report for the Center for Collegiate Mental Health states that the use of college counseling centers grew by 30 percent , even though enrollment only increased by 5 percent. In addition, students’ concerns are increasingly complex. The percentage of students visiting college counseling centers who have a serious...

“What happened to you?” isn’t just a question for therapists to ask their troubled clients. It’s a question that should inform the work of physicians, nurses, lawyers, educators, social workers and public health advocates from the time they are learning their professions to each real-world encounter. That’s the hope of the Philadelphia ACE Task Force (PATF) , whose workforce development group released a toolkit to help faculty across a range of disciplines weave content on adverse childhood...

GK note: This article below was shared by Andrew Anastasia from Harper College in Illinois who is part of a campus group to figure out how to address ACEs at Harper College. This article below, from 2016, describes findings from a survey of ACEs among college students in Universities in Minnesota. IT would be great to contact folks in MINN to see what else has happened since 2016! Jeremiah Dean had a tough childhood. He grew up without a father around. He was bullied. He struggled in school.

SPARC and the Transitions RTC at the University of Massachusetts Medical School’s Department of Psychiatry are offering the following webinar on Wednesday, November 8 th , from 12 PM to 1 PM: DREAMers Study: Undocumented College Students, Social Exclusion, and Psychological Distress Presenter: Rosalie Torres Stone, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, SPARC Date & Time: November 8, 2017 – 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM EDT In 2008, it was estimated that 11.9 million undocumented immigrants...

Dear UC Davis community member, Research shows that the majority (62%) of Californians have experienced at least one type of childhood trauma as identified in the groundbreaking Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study. Further, a significant percentage of Californians have experienced as children more than two (23%) and more than four (16.7%) of the identified traumas. The data paint a sobering picture for the UC Davis community – a significant percentage of students, staff, and faculty...

In a florescent-lit, nondescript classroom at the UC San Diego School of Medicine , medical students sketch live nude models. Later in the quarter, the students sketch real human skeletons. By the end of the class, they head down to the bottom floor of the school to draw cadavers. The med school's drawing class is part of the artist-in-residence program, which was launched by San Diego artist Joyce Cutler-Shaw in 1992. Cutler-Shaw and the Klines said the goal of the drawing class is not to...

When I started graduate school, I did not realize that I was a student with mental illness. I knew that I suffered near-daily migraines and sought out disability services. What I did not understand was that my migraines were a physical manifestation of a mental illness, and that the way I felt my entire life was called "anxiety" because the experiences I had as a kid were called "trauma." Graduate school severely exacerbated my anxiety. Whether you are a student or a professor, keep in mind...

The UC Davis School of Education is hosting an evening lecture on October 19 at 5:00pm that might be of interest. Dr. Carol Lee from Northwestern University will be giving a talk on the Davis campus titled Re-Thinking Race, Identity, and Opportunity to Learn: Foundation for Transformative Justice. If you’d like to join you just need to RSVP here: https://education.ucdavis.edu/tje/Lee Feel free to share with anyone you think may be interested! Hope to see you there!

Located in Davis, herSpace offers private sessions and small group interoceptive yoga classes as a healing modality for the treatment of trauma, secondary trauma for caregivers and general well-being for all. A guided meditation and intention setting class is also on the weekly schedule. The practice of yoga from a trauma-informed perspective, is an empirically validated method of bringing your body into the healing process, to integrate and transcend the effects of trauma. The concept of...

What are ACEs and Why Do They Matter? In 2016 1 , nearly half of U.S. children – 34 million kids – had at least one Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) and more than 20 percent experienced two or more. The new brain sciences and science of human development explain how ACEs can have devastating, long-lasting effects on children’s health and wellbeing. These events resonate well beyond the individual child to have far-reaching consequences for families, neighborhoods, and communities. ACEs...