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By Cara Anthony, Kaiser Health News, June 18, 2020 Speak in short sentences. Be clear. Direct but not rude. Stay calm, even if you’re shaking inside. Never put your hands in your pockets. Make sure people can always see your hands. Try not to hunch your shoulders. Listen to their directions. Darnell Hill, a pastor and a mental health caseworker, offers black teenagers these emotional and physical coping strategies every time a black person is fatally shot by a police officer. That’s when...

By KQED Science, KQED, June 14, 2020 The coronavirus pandemic and the recent killing of George Floyd have brought longstanding racial inequities into sharp focus. One of those disparities concerns the high rate of coronavirus transmission among people of color. To talk about the intersection of race and health, KQED's Brian Watt spoke last week with California Surgeon General Dr. Nadine Burke Harris, who is known for her pioneering work on the role that childhood stress and trauma play on...

Get Trained and Get Paid. Medi-Cal Providers Must Attest by July 1 to Continue Receiving ACE Screening Payments! Have you taken the ACEs Aware training on ACE screening? Starting July 1, 2020, you must self-attest to completing the training to continue receiving Medi-Cal payment for ACE screening. Attestation is simple and takes one quick form. Beginning July 1, 2020, providers must attest to completing a certified core ACEs Aware provider training to continue receiving reimbursement for...

By Matthias Gafni, San Francisco Chronicle, June 17, 2020 Surely, Rafael Arias thought, it must have been the spicy fish and rice he’d eaten the day before. The 42-year-old Oakland restaurant worker could think of no other reason for suddenly feeling ill. It was late March, and the novel coronavirus had begun to take hold in the Bay Area. On March 22, the day after Arias felt those first symptoms, California postponed jury trials, Hayward opened a free drive-by testing site, and Alameda...

Please join us for the ongoing community discussion of A Better Normal, our ongoing series in which we envision the future as trauma-informed. LGBTQ+ Identity and Race in the US: An Intersectional Discussion On Historical and Generational Trauma With Panelists Rev. Dr. D. Mark Wilson and Alexander Cho, Ph.D., Moderated by ACEs Connection staff members Jenna Quinn and Alison Cebulla Friday, June 19th, 2020 Noon to 1pm, PT (3pm to 4pm ET) >>Click here to register<< Please join us...

On June 16, 2020, the California Essentials for Childhood (EfC) Initiative held a webinar entitled, “Fostering HOPE (Healthy Outcomes from Positive Experiences) during COVID-19" and heard from special guest speakers, Drs. Robert Sege and Dina Burstein from the HOPE Project at Tufts Medical Center . Drs. Sege and Burstein presented research and data supporting the benefits and importance of Positive Childhood Experiences (PCEs), background on the HOPE Project, and the relevance to ACEs...

By Dakota Smith, Los Angeles Times, June 16, 2020 Several Los Angeles City Council members called Tuesday for a new emergency-response model that uses trained specialists, rather than LAPD officers, to render aid to homeless people and those suffering from mental health and substance abuse issues. A motion submitted by City Council members Nury Martinez, Herb Wesson, Marqueece Harris-Dawson, Curren Price and Bob Blumenfield asks city departments to work with the Los Angeles Police Department...

By Olga Rodriguez, Public Policy Institute of California, June 17, 2020 Mental health is the biggest issue students at California community colleges say they are facing during the pandemic. That is, 67% of students report higher levels of anxiety, stress, depression, or other mental distress. The sudden transition to an online learning environment drives some of this stress, as do struggles with job and income loss or paying for housing and utilities. For some students, the loss of income...

ACEs Aware in Action Welcome to the first issue of the ACEs Aware monthly newsletter, ACEs Aware in Action . Our goal is to keep you up to date on all the important work being done by providers, ACEs Aware partners, and the community to make sure everyone is ACEs Aware. Please share this with your colleagues and constituents and encourage them to visit www.ACEsAware.org to join the mailing list. Like many of you, we have watched as the events of the last weeks have brought renewed attention...

On June 11, 2020, the California Essentials for Childhood (EfC) Initiative held a webinar entitled, “California’s Budget & Legislative Landscape Impact of a Pandemic on Child Wellbeing” and heard from special guest speaker, Kelly Hardy, Senior Managing Director of Health & Research for Children Now . This interactive webinar provided an overview of the current legislative and budget situation in California, with a focus on child wellbeing. The state has quickly moved from an expected...

California legislative leaders on Tuesday announced that statues of Christopher Columbus and Queen Isabella would be removed from the Capitol rotunda, saying that they have no place in the halls of state government today. "Christopher Columbus is a deeply polarizing historical figure given the deadly impact his arrival in this hemisphere had on indigenous populations," Senate President Pro Tempore Toni Atkins (D), Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D) and Assembly Rules Chairman Ken Cooley (D)...

This joint presentation is in partnership with the California Department of Education, the California Department of Social Services, California State PTA, and California Teachers Association. The purpose of this webinar is to provide education professionals with considerations for innovative ways they can help to keep children safe by recognizing and reporting signs of suspected child abuse and neglect through distance learning. This video is 45 minutes and 22 seconds in length.