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At New York City’s Harvest Collegiate High School on Monday, social studies teacher Andy del Calvo did what educators often do: He adapted his lesson for the times. He shared news stories about the massacre of 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue and about last week’s shooting of two African-Americans at a Kentucky supermarket, and urged his students to think. Del Calvo hoped that examining America’s latest heartbreaking moments would give his students a chance to process their feelings,...

Epigenetics refers to the study of a natural phenomenon and to the phenomenon itself. Epigenetics is the study of the mechanisms that turn on and off the expression of our genes without altering the DNA sequence. Epigenetics is also used to refer to the changes in expression of our genes. Factors such as age, nutritional habits, psychological stress, physical activity, working habits and substance abuse can trigger changes in gene expression (Alegría-Torres, 2011). These changes in gene...

The world’s oceans have been soaking up far more excess heat in recent decades than scientists realized, suggesting that Earth could be set to warm even faster than predicted in the years ahead, according to new research published Wednesday. Over the past quarter-century, Earth’s oceans have retained 60 percent more heat each year than scientists previously had thought, said Laure Resplandy, a geoscientist at Princeton University who led the startling study published Wednesday in the journal...

There are many reasons why the opioid crisis is so hard to confront. One of them is social stigma. It often extends beyond users themselves, to their families. Hope and Pete Troxell live in Frederick, Maryland. Last year, their 34-year-old daughter Alicia died after overdosing on fentanyl – a synthetic form of heroin. She was seven months pregnant. Hope says before Alicia's death, they often felt the weight of judgment. "So many people look at these [people] that are addicted to drugs, they...

Behavioral risk factors including smoking, obesity, limited physical activity and a less healthy diet strongly predict the likelihood of depression—and that likelihood increases with each additional risk factor a person possesses. Additionally, the risk factors most strongly linked to depression change with age. Previous studies had identified behavioral risk factors for depression , but it was unclear how these variables changed across the lifespan. This study sought to identify how the...

Hi ACEs Connection folks! The Wrestling Ghosts team is proud to announce that we premiered at the LA Film Festival to a standing ovation - and were met with a second standing ovation at our Oakland premiere days later. We are so excited about all the positive feedback Kim's story is getting, and we want to keep you all updated with future screenings. Wrestling Ghosts is coming to NYC this November 11th. We will make our tri-state area debut at DOC NYC, at the Cinepolis Chelsea, at 5:30pm. If...

Editor’s Note : Although foster care placement is sometimes necessary to ensure the safety and well-being of children, research indicates that keeping families together is generally a better for children, parents, and the community. Working with the Corporation for Supportive Housing, RWJF launched Keeping Families Together in 2007. The program helps vulnerable families like Irma’s grow stronger, safer and healthier so that children—and their parents—might thrive. We are resurfacing this...

Xocheezy* is an 18-year-old foster youth who came of age in California’s juvenile justice system. That might have been avoided had her family ever been connected to housing support. It is not rare for justice-involved youth to have this kind of history with the child welfare system. A recent study in Los Angeles County found that four out of five probation-involved youth had at least one report of child abuse or neglect on file. Today, Xocheezy is a sociology student at a community college...

This was just posted by Harvard. I thought all of us could use access to it, for use in our schools and the settings we work in. The full image is on the attached PDF.

Wednesday, October 31, 2018 When a pregnant mother has a drug or alcohol problem, or there is spousal abuse taking place, the effect that has on a child can be devastating. While making our documentary film License to Parent , we interviewed Cathy Friend and her husband who have fostered 32 newborns over the years from mothers on drugs, alcohol, or in abusive relationships. As Cathy says, “The damage starts in utero, and there's scientific proof of that. You and I, as parents, did damage to...

On a late-October morning two years ago, Robin Steinberg stood barefoot in her apartment, on the Upper West Side, preparing to uproot her life. Her suitcases were stacked by the door, her winter coats piled in the hallway. Steinberg, a fifty-nine-year-old native New Yorker, had decided to move to Tulsa, Oklahoma, to launch a legal startup. She laced up her sneakers and said goodbye to the bedrooms of her grown children, which she called “the shrines.” As she dragged her bags to her car, she...

A new study published by University of Alabama at Birmingham researchers shows that community health workers and peer support can help those suffering from depression and diabetes. Many studies have shown that people with diabetes have a greater risk of depression. The stress of daily diabetes management can build. Diabetes complications such as nerve damage or difficulty managing blood sugar levels can at times make those suffering feel overwhelmed and trapped. Published in Diabetes Care ,...