As the ACE Task Force of Shelby County was preparing to launch in early 2014, a task force member told this story to The Commercial Appeal's editorial board:
A group of citizens, who lived and worked next to a river, were constantly having to rescue drowning children from the river. Finally someone decided it was time to travel upstream to find out why so many children were falling into the river.
Finding concrete solutions to the "why" is the goal of the ACE Task Force. ACE stands for Adverse Childhood Experiences, a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Kaiser Permanente in San Diego. The long-term research found that "toxic stress" of childhood experiences of neglect, abuse and family dysfunction are major risk factors for leading causes of illness, death and a poor quality of life.
Educators and health officials also are realizing more and more how adverse life experiences impact how well a child performs in the classroom or how those experiences can negatively impact the health outcomes of children and their families.
[For more of this story go to http://www.commercialappeal.co...feeac-394901831.html]
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