Blog

By Rahil D. Briggs, Psychology Today, October 19, 2021 World Mental Health Day was October 10 and the American Academy of Pediatrics, alongside the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and the Children’s Hospital Association, just declared a national state of emergency in child and adolescent mental health. These kinds of public acknowledgments about the importance of mental health suggest we have come a long way toward recognizing its impact. Yet, infant and early childhood...

By Adaeze Umeukeje, Tennessean., October 19, 2021 As conversations on racial disparities in physical health have emerged all over the country, the disproportionate burden of mental health disparities on Black children and adolescents is a topic that is worth being widely discussed. Alarmingly high suicide and depression rates among Black youth, as documented by the American Psychological Associatio n in 2020, led pediatricians and child psychologists to question if early experiences of...

From Number Story, October 14, 2021 What happens when two powerhouse leaders team up to address one of the most pressing issues of our time? Find out here in this dynamic conversation between Oprah Winfrey and Dr. Nadine Burke Harris. Here are a few highlights … [ OPRAH ] “The realization of what happened to you literally colors your entire worldview … Your childhood experiences don’t define you, but they do leave an imprint. You need to be aware of what that imprint is.” [ Please click here...

Over the course of 15 years of research, I and my team at Sharpen have created a comprehensive system to help school districts accomplish all of the recommendations released in yesterday's report from Dept of Ed; including: enhancing mental health literacy, reducing stigma about mental disorders, implementing evidence-based prevention practices and establishing an Integrated Framework of social, emotional and behavioral health support.

Aligning Resources Across Georgia To Support Resiliency To Our Resilient Georgia Partners and Stakeholders: Please join us along with storyteller Chrishaunda Lee Perez for our two-year anniversary virtual celebration an intimate discussion about mental wellness, resilience, and perseverance with Georgia native, World Class Track and Field Athlete, and 2021 Olympian Kenny Selmon on Thu, October 28th from 11 am to 12:30 pm ET. We are so proud of athletes across the board who are speaking up...

By Mariel Padilla, The 19th*, October 15, 2021 In his early career as a law enforcement officer, Vernon Stanforth, the president of the National Sheriffs’ Association, said he often saw arrests of grandfathers, fathers and sons of the same family — a generational cycle of incarceration. Now, he’s also seeing grandmothers, mothers and daughters enter the cycle. “Many of our children are being raised by grandparents, and I think today we’re even seeing some of our small children being raised...

By Eleanor Cummins, The Atlantic, October 18, 2021 Nothing about The Body Keeps the Score screams “best seller.” Written by the psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk, the book is a graphic account of his decades-long career treating survivors of traumatic experiences such as rape, incest, and war. Page after page, readers are asked to wrestle with van der Kolk’s theory that trauma can sever the connection between the mind, which wants to forget what happened, and the body, which can’t. The book...

By Carolyn Jones, October 19, 2021 F ormerly incarcerated students who wrote letters to their teachers — describing their hopes and dreams, asking for a second chance — were less than half as likely as their peers to return to jail, a Stanford University study found. Researchers spent two years working with about 50 students in Oakland Unified who had spent time in the county’s juvenile justice system and had recently returned to their regular schools. Researchers asked the students to write...

Trauma Informed Care Practioners, Dr. Warren Larkin of the United Kingdom and Becky Haas of the United States are teaming up to host a third session of the Global Resiliency Accelerator. Past events have been attended by ACEs community builders from as many as 14 countries. In this meeting, Warren and Becky will present on the topic Addressing Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES) - Using Enquiry, Assessment or a Universal Precaution Approach based on their experiences working with...

There's a lot of talk about policies and understanding ACES, but there doesn't seem to be enough talk about how a person behaves in a trauma informed fashion. Like: "What do I have to do to be trauma informed?"

Tifanie Petro, director of advocacy and prevention at the Children's Home Child Advocacy Center, said the findings align with past research. She added the state is doing more to raise awareness about the long-term effects of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs).

By Margaret Coker and Hannah Knowles, The Washington Post, October 17, 2021 The weekend before the trial of three White men accused of killing a Black man in what some have called a modern-day lynching, civil rights lawyer Gerald A. Griggs stood outside the county courthouse here and reminded the mostly Black crowd of what they have already accomplished. “We no longer intend to beg for justice. We demand it. We expect it,” he said Saturday, more than a year and a half after Ahmaud Arbery was...