The KIDS COUNT Data Book is an annual publication that assesses child well-being nationally and across the 50 states, as well as in the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Using an index of 16 indicators, the report ranks states on overall...
As the list of African Americans who’ve died or were maimed in police custody grows , plenty of groups have come forward with ideas and strategies for reform. One idea: How about letting African-American...
At the start of the year, a group of 57 Native Americans students from the Lakota tribe were taken to a minor league hockey match in Rapid City, South Dakota to celebrate their academic achievements. But what started as a field trip...
School’s out for the summer. But that apparent distinction – school versus no school – is not so distinct. All year long, what happens in neighborhoods affects schools, which in turns affects what happens in...
The upholding of the Fair Housing Act’s “disparate impact” standard was one of many major victories for social justice dispatched by the Supreme Court this June. But the road to equal rights and opportunities...
When I trace back the genesis of my National Health Journalism Fellowship project, I always start in a law office in Russellville, Ark., a big town along Interstate 40 known for a relatively robust state university and a large public...
Gun control's weary warriors have been searching for a way to appeal to Republicans and give the issue a pulse in Congress. A couple of Midwestern women Democrats may have found a way to do it, by tying it to domestic violence. Minnesota...
When Teresa Njeri got pregnant in 2001 in Kiambu, a suburb of Nairobi, it was the end of the world. She was joyous about the pregnancy — but an AIDS test showed she was H.I.V.-positive. A clinician told her:...
A walk in the park may soothe the mind and, in the process, change the workings of our brains in ways that improve our mental health, according to an interesting new study of the physical effects on the brain of visiting nature. Most of us...
We are in the middle of a mindfulness revolution. According to Time , The Huffington Post and a host of other media outlets, mindfulness and meditation are having their moment in the spotlight. From hospitals to corporate...
If this isn't an honest-to-goodness crystal ball, it's close. Neurobiologist Nina Kraus believes she and her team at Northwestern University have found a way — a half-hour test — to predict kids' literacy skill long...
Dear ACES Connection members: Time to alert you to yet another groundbreaking conference - this time a national forum on trauma-informed schools. In March of this year, Echo Parenting & Education gathered together the Titans of Trauma, including Dr. Bessel van der Kolk. On March 16 &17 of 2016, we will be deepening our knowledge of childhood trauma, building resilience through body-based therapies (such as dance, yoga, theatre, art), collecting stories and best...
I had lived thirty good years before enduring my first food poisoning — odds quite fortunate in the grand scheme of things, but miserably unfortunate in the immediate experience of it. I found myself completely incapacitated to erect the...
Life is a day-to-day proposition for Davida Gomez and her three children. They sleep at friends houses. The kids attend the Mustard Seed School at the Loaves & Fishes homeless services charity downtown. Gomez, 31, has been homeless for five months, ever since she left her former boyfriend. She would like to find a place to live and enroll the children in regular public school again. But first she needs official birth certificates that she can use with potential employers,...
The Navajo Nation covers 27,413 square miles. Serving that entire area, the territory has just 10 grocery stores. This means that, in order to get fresh, affordable produce, some Navajo Nation residents must drive at least 155 miles round-trip,...