Texas has more prisoners than any other state and one of the highest incarceration rates in the world — but when it comes to juvenile justice, the state has become an unlikely exemplar of meaningful reform. After examining a wide range of...
Social workers, law enforcement officers and two School Board members were among those who filled the room for the inaugural public meeting of Peace4Gainesville, a new initiative aimed at tackling childhood trauma and the many social problems that...
This is the third toddler shooting that I've written about recently. A three year old Albuquerque NM boy shot and wounded both his parents with his pregnant mothers loaded hand gun last Saturday. His two year old...
It started with a profound connection to the words of one wise Dutchman addressing a room full of therapists. The ah-ha moment when Bessel van der Kolk linked childhood trauma to attachment. Exciting, because at Echo Parenting & Education we train parents and professionals how to create the kind of safe, stable relationships that allow a child to flourish. Instinctively, we had always known that the lack of such attachment was traumatic to a child - after all, if your survival depends...
Last week, Dave Davies, sitting in for Terry Gross on NPR's Fresh Air, interviewed journalist David Morris who, while embedded with troops in Iraq, witnessed horrific violence, injury and death and was nearly killed when a vehicle he was riding...
At Children Can Thrive , the first California ACEs summit, in November 2014, students from Leadership High School profoundly moved the audience with their views and experiences of ACEs and toxic stress.
I was delighted to learn a concept from a reader of my post on Kaizen vs. Kaikaku. Dr. Hahn coined the phrase Pink Ocean—apparently a reference to making progress. I do see plenty of movement towards a greater understanding of the role...
Children born into dysfunctional families without access to crisis nurseries, quality daycare, or other early childhood programs rarely do well in school, learn how to read at grade level, or graduate. Limited vocabulary skills, high incidence...
My thinking about ACEs is informed by a systems approach I learned while adopting and implementing a management concept called “ Lean Thinking .” There are two essential elements to Lean Thinking: respect for people and continuous...
Upon receipt of an email from a MN state legislator directing my attention to the cost of Governor Dayton’s trying to improve conditions for Minnesota's at-risk youth, I penned this response and would ask you to write something like it and send...
Dinner is served in the West Philadelphia neighborhood of Mantua. "You look like you're ready to have a great Dornsife neighborhood partnership meal! Am I right about it?" Rose Samuel-Evans asks the crowd at a free community dinner of chicken...
States seeking to develop or improve policies and practices that divert justice-involved youth with behavioral health disorders to appropriate community-based programs and services are encouraged to apply for the...
If you have to make a complex decision, will you do a better job if you absorb yourself in, say, a crossword puzzle instead of ruminating about your options? The idea that unconscious thought is sometimes more powerful than conscious thought is...
Danish author Askel Sandemose’s works are little read in his home country these days—except, that is, for a small fragment of one novel, A Fugitive Crosses His Tracks, published in 1933. The fragment of A...
Not long before Tony and April Davis met, he was facing up to 60 years in prison for robbery and drug charges. April’s young children had been taken from her and placed in foster care. She was also facing jail time for drug use and child...