California's first ACEs summit -- Children Can Thrive -- starts Wednesday evening, Nov. 5. One of the summit’s organizers, CYW’s policy analyst Cecilia Chen, came up with a unique approach to have participants apply what they learn — an activity called “Follow a Child”. Each participant is assigned one of several fictional children who are “grappling with the impact of ACEs” as they move through the education, juvenile justice, health, or child welfare systems. On the last day of the summit, we'll break into groups of those who have the same child to discuss how to change the systems so they help, not further harm, the kids.
Here’s mine:
MICHELLE
Michelle is a 14-year-old girl living in an affluent community in Southern California. Her parents divorced four years ago and she now lives with her mother and 10-year-old brother. Although closer to her father, she only gets to see him a couple times a year because he moved to New York after the divorce.
Michelle’s mother is a lawyer and often works long hours. When her mother is at work, Michelle and her brother are looked after by her mother’s boyfriend and are often alone with him. When Michelle turned 13, her mother’s boyfriend began to sexually molest her. Michelle tried to tell her mother that she feels uncomfortable with the boyfriend, but her mother ignored Michelle and accused her of trying to ruin her relationship. The boyfriend continues to molest Michelle on a regular basis. After work, Michelle’s mother usually has several drinks to help her “unwind.” Her mother does not think that she has a drinking problem but, after drinking, she yells at Michelle and her brother, blaming them for “ruining her life.”
My first assignment: to identify how many ACEs Michelle has. How many do you say?