Tagged With "COVID-19 Black"
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Oakland, CA, trying out model used in Baltimore to reduce trauma, increase resilience
Oakland BSC activity: Photo/ Courtesy of Trauma Transformed/East Bay Agency for Children When a group of community organizations in Baltimore came together in 2015, they already knew trauma figured large in many lives. There was violence in the community, in schools, and in community members’ homes. Police brutality occurred. Many suffered the loss of loved ones to incarceration or death. There were house fires and homelessness. Much of the dysfunction was systemic and rooted in racism,...
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Oakland, CA, youth organization takes next step in systems change to heal trauma
In a room in East Oakland, Calif., photos of children are projected on a screen. “Who is that?” asks Briana Moore, a licensed clinical social worker in private practice and a master trainer for the East Bay Agency for Children’s Trauma Transformed program. “Bill Clinton,” responds one of the 20 employees of the East Oakland Youth Development Center (EOYDC).
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Positive Childhood Experiences offset ACEs: Q & A with Dr. Robert Sege about HOPE
Tufts University medical professor Dr. Robert Sege directs the Center for Community-Engaged Medicine and is nationally known for his research on effective health systems approaches that address social determinants of health. He is also the principal investigator for the HOPE framework (Healthy Outcomes from Positive Experiences).The HOPE framework is based on research that shows how positive childhood experiences can mitigate the effects of adverse childhood experiences. Sege and colleagues...
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Program offers hundreds of young men, boys safe space to heal from ACEs
Dennis McCollins recounts some of the experiences that caused him to harden against the world as a teenager. “There were times I went to more funerals than birthdays,” says McCollins, who is the clinical director of the School Based Health Center at Greenwood Academy in Richmond, Calif. And it took its toll: “I spent time homeless. I got expelled [from school]. I was so angry and upset and mad,” he says. Dennis McCollins Then a man that he met when he was sent to Job Corps as a teen turned...
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Report reveals how foster care, juvenile and adult justice systems traumatize youth, calls for policy shifts
YWFC sponsored Sister Warriors meeting When she was 15 years old, Lucero Herrera was put in a rehab program by San Francisco’s Juvenile Court because she was getting drunk regularly. And in doing so, the court failed to explore the root of her drinking. Had they done so, she said, they would have found that anger and trauma were lurking underneath, driven by her ACEs: adverse childhood experiences. Lucero Herrera "Why did they put me in a drug program when I had an anger problem? I went...
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RYSE Center's Listening Campaign: Young people in Richmond, CA help adults understand trauma, violence, coping, and healing
"My experience with violence is very brutal...I grew up with violence as if it were my sibling." - LC participant (youth) "We know we can't run the city- it's too complex- but our experience and our voices should count, especially because we're the most effected ." - LC participant (youth) "Our city's problems are shared by us all; we are all part of the problem AND the solution. Listening is a key component to healing." - LC Share Out partici pant (adult) Three years ago, RYSE Center in...
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RYSE gathering: To promote healing from trauma, institutions need to stop seeing youth as the problem
A young man told clinical therapist Marissa Snoddy recently that when she calls him a leader, she got it all wrong. “He said, ‘I just came from Juvenile Hall,’ I’m not a leader.” But, she said, “We just kept giving him love. And we said, ‘You’re courageous for showing up and being here,’” The very fact that he was there, she explained, showed he was a leader. Snoddy related the anecdote recently for 80 people attending the Trauma and Learning Series launch led by Rising Youth for Social...
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Solano County launches its ACEs and resilience initiative inviting all to take action
Elizabeth Huntley recalls the day when her family’s life was turned upside down. “One day my mom woke up and she packed up all of our clothes, all five of us…and she took me and my younger sister who had the same father… down to my paternal grandmother’s house…and she left us there. She took my middle sister to a town near Birmingham, Ala., and left her there. She took my only brother and an older sister back to Huntsville and left them at a sister’s house. Then she went back to that housing...
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Solano County's (CA) ACEs initiative, a robust community effort, makes room for input from all
In a house called “Johanna’s House” on a tree-lined side street in Vallejo, Calif., four women are filling out the adverse childhood experiences (ACE) survey given to them by Maria Guevara, the founder of Vallejo Together, an organization that serves homeless residents in Vallejo. The house was named for Johanna Dilag, a homeless woman who was found dead along with her dog.
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Sold-out Paper Tigers screening and panel in Berkeley, CA
Over 130 residents from across the San Francisco Bay Area representing education, health, and law enforcement attended the sold-out screening of Paper Tigers and panel on December 9 at the Brower Center in Berkeley, CA. The panel discussion was so involved it went 25 minutes longer than scheduled and spilled into the lobby where attendees talked until 10 pm! The documentary Paper Tigers follows six students during a school year at Lincoln High School in Walla Walla, WA. Lincoln is the...
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Toxic Stress, Behavioral Health, and the Next Major Era in Public Health by Mental Health America
To view the document, click on the following link: http://www.mentalhealthamerica.net/issues/toxic-stress-behavioral-health-and-next-major-era-public-health
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Trauma education and mindfulness help youth living amid gun violence
Armon Hurst, 2nd from left, first row, Teens on Target, courtesy of YouthAlive! Eighteen-year-old Armon Hurst serves as vice president of the student body at Castlemont High School in Oakland, Calif. He has a 4.0 grade point average, is an avid baseball player, and is slated to go to college next year. But until a few years ago, Hurst would find himself waking from nightmares in the middle of the night. It was difficult to concentrate at school, and he wasn’t eating well. Armon Hurst “There...
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Trauma-informed groups rev up to address race, inclusion
Eighteen-year-old Kia Hanson has always enjoyed her time as a youth leader at the East Oakland Youth Development Center (EOYDC). She’s worked mostly with five- and six-year-olds since she began in 2016. Recently, she tapped into new skills, especially if the kids were having a meltdown. Kia Hanson “If they’re off, we ask them, ‘What’s wrong?’ ‘Do you want to talk about anything?’,” she explains. “Basically asking before assuming they’re mad at the world for no reason.” What made the...
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Want to see the play about treating youth trauma, TRIGGER, in your area?
A groundbreaking new play about trauma, TRIGGER, was most recently featured at part of the training and inspiration provided to community members participating in the 4CA Policymaker Education Day on July 11, 2017 in Sacramento at the state Capitol.
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ACEs Science Champions Series: Why this financial coach integrates ACEs-based training
In foreground, Dr. Donielle Prince (l) and Saundra Davis (r) ____________________________ Saundra Davis, a financial coach and consultant who trains other coaches on building resilience among the working poor, knew she had met her partner in helping people deal with their “money disorders” when she first met Dr. Donielle Prince in Sacramento at a black women’s gathering in 2015. Dr. Prince works with ACEs Connection as its San Francisco Bay Area regional community facilitator. She also...
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4 years after integrating ACEs science, Pueblo, CO clinic improves services for families; cuts ER costs, doctor stress
Four years ago, Dr. Leslie Dempsey would never have talked about ACEs — adverse childhood experiences — with her patients. Now ACEs is a common topic. “Just as I don’t feel awkward asking someone if they smoke or do intravenous drugs, I don’t really feel awkward talking about their childhood traumas in a way that it relates to their health. It’s just integrated into obtaining background and social history,” she says. Dr. Leslie Dempsey Dempsey is a physician in obstetrics who oversees a team...
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A middle school tackles trauma, finds more calm and less suspensions
6 th grader Cayla White (right) helps lead class meditation with Niroga Institute’s Lauren Banister/ photos by Laurie Udesky During the 2014/2015 school year, things were looking grim at Park Middle School in Antioch, CA. At the time, staff couldn’t corral student disruptions. Teacher morale was plummeting. By the end of February 2015, 192 kids of the 997 students had been suspended -- 19.2 percent of the student population. “I was watching really good people burning out from the [teaching]...
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Berkeley City College group screens Resilience, looks at ACEs through a social justice lens
As far back as she can remember, Berkeley City College Mental Health Specialist Janine Greer understood that there was a connection between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and health. She had a sense early on that racism figures large in that equation. “Looking around in my community – I’m African American, I noticed that even people who had healthy habits got funky diseases,” she said. “And I’m thinking there must be some sort of health trouble that happens if you’re always stressed.”...
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California issues update on state residents' ACE scores from 2011 & 2013 surveys
The latest adverse childhood experiences survey from the California Department of Public Health shows that 42% of the population has an ACE score of 3 or higher; 16% have an ACE score of 4 or higher. Those with an ACE score of 4 or higher are: 3x more likely to be current smokers 4x more likely to have a depressive disorder 2x more likely to have asthma 2x more likely to be obese 4x more likely to have COPD 3x more likely to have a stroke Here are a few other highlights from the six-page...
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Contra Costa to study racial disparities in criminal justice system [contracostatimes.org]
MARTINEZ -- One year after Contra Costa County's two highest-ranking lawyers sparred over alleged racism in the criminal justice system, the county is beginning to look into why some minority groups are overrepresented in jails and underrepresented on juries. The proposed 15-member Racial Justice Task Force is slated to convene next year with membership coming from law enforcement, the courts, school districts and community groups. If funding is approved by county supervisors or secured...
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Documentary Wrestling Ghosts tracks a journey from trauma to resilience
When prompted by a life coach to comfort the child inside of her, Kim Montleon, a young mother at the center of the documentary film, Wrestling Ghosts , says emphatically: “I can’t do that; I’m afraid I won’t come back!” That’s the beginning of Montleon’s two-year struggle to dig deep into her own harrowing childhood trauma to find a way to heal so that she can nurture her young children. The documentary by filmmaker Ana Sofia Joanes was screened to more than 140 people on Saturday,...
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Dozens of stakeholders representing thousands of practitioners send public comments on Calif. ACEs-screening plan
Update: We posted this story on Tuesday evening and received a response from the Department of Health Care Services Wednesday that clarifies additional information. DHCS information Officer Katharine Weir said that subject to budget approval by the legislature and the governor: The reimbursement rate will be $29. Federally Qualified Health Centers will also be reimbursed for screening pediatric patients for trauma through Prop 56 funds and federal matching funds. In response to a question...
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During COVID-19, how does a trauma-informed school pivot to distance learning?
All photos courtesy of Antioch Middle School staff Antioch Middle School seventh-grader Alyssia Garcia was accustomed to scanning the cafeteria during lunch for kids who might need her assistance. “I’d look for kids who looked sad, kids who were sitting alone, kids who looked angry,” says Garcia, a peer advocate at her school. Alyssia Garcia When she’d spot students sitting alone or looking sad, she’d approach them and ease into conversation. “If it’s a sad person, I’ll try to cheer them up...
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How collaboration helps clinic in San Mateo County, CA, tackle ACEs in children
Dr. Elizabeth Grady is a pediatrician at the South San Francisco Clinic, a community clinic of San Mateo Medical Center. She and Susana Flores , a senior public health nurse with San Mateo County Health, spoke with me about how the clinic and other health agencies in San Mateo have been able to craft ways to work together to prevent and heal toxic stress in children. Grady also talked about how she and Flores have been working with the Resilient Beginnings Collaborative (RBC), a group of...
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Hundreds to thousands to tens of thousands: The ACEs/trauma-informed/resilience-building movement accelerates in the San Francisco Bay Area
Last Friday, on a sunny Spring day in Santa Clara, CA, about 100 people gathered to celebrate a milestone: Over the last 10 months, 65 trainers from Trauma Transformed, a regional trauma-informed center and clearinghouse in the San Francisco Bay Area, have educated 4,048 people in six counties about trauma-informed principles and practices.
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In ACEs Connection webinar, physicians talk trauma, offer tips for helping pediatric immigrant patients
Dr. Raul Gutierrez, a pediatrician in the San Francisco Bay Area, said he and his fellow clinicians see constant fear and its health consequences every single day among the largely immigrant and Latino population they serve. It’s all the result of anti-immigrant policies and the news cycle that feeds the fear. Dr. Raul Gutierrez “It is almost inescapable with the repercussions of immigration policy on the radio, television, social media and from friends and family,” Gutierrez told the 69...
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Middle school tackles everybody's trauma; result is calmer, happier kids, teachers and big drop in suspensions
Sixth grader Cayla White (right) helps lead class meditation with Niroga Institute’s Lauren Banister (photo: Laurie Udesky) ________________________________ During the 2014/2015 school year, things were looking grim at Park Middle School in Antioch, CA. At the time, staff couldn’t corral student disruptions. Teacher morale was plummeting. By the end of February 2015, 192 kids of the 997 students had been suspended -- 19.2 percent of the student population. “I was watching really good people...
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NEW! Closing the Opportunity Gap Infographic in Contra Costa County
While many kids in Contra Costa County are thriving, others lack basic health, education, and financial supports they need for well-being and long-term success. Since countywide statistics can mask such issues, regional data is useful for highlighting disparities and targeting resources. That’s why Children Now collaborated with the Contra Costa Economic Partnership , The Lesher Foundation , and First 5 Contra Costa to develop an infographic to help illustrate the need to close the...
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A Better Normal Friday, June 19th at Noon PDT: LGBTQ+ Identity and Race in the US: An Intersectional Discussion On Historical and Generational Trauma
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...
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Trauma to Trust uses ACEs science to heal wounds between community members, police
photo courtesy of EJUSA/Ron Holtz Studio Forty-seven-year-old Al-Tariq Best, founder and executive director of the HUBB , an arts and healing organization for youth, recalls the rage, humiliation and fear he felt as a 17-year-old when he and three other Black friends were pulled over by police in Newark, N.J. Al-Tariq Best “[There were] all these people around us. They search the car. They strip the car down. They make us pull our pants down in broad daylight. And I'm, I'm upset. And I'm...
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Greater Richmond Trauma Informed Community Network, first to join ACEs Cooperative of Communities, shows what it means to ROCK!
In 2012, Greater Richmond SCAN and five other community partners hatched a one-year plan to educate the Richmond, Virginia, community about ACEs science and to embed trauma-informed practices. Eight years later, the original group has evolved into the Greater Richmond Trauma-Informed Community Network (GRTICN) with 495 people and 170 organizations. And they're just scratching the surface.
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COVID-19 Black initiative delivers call to action in San Francisco Bay Area
As the COVID-19 pandemic began its devastating sweep through African American communities in April, Andre Chapman, CEO of the San Jose, California-based Unity Care , saw a glaring need for developing a COVID-19 prevention campaign that spoke directly to African Americans. “Many of our young folks and families really didn't understand the impact of this virus, nor did they believe much of the information that was coming through the media,” says Chapman. His organization provides housing and...
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The 'war on drugs' was a war on people of color
In the spring of 1982, Susan Burton turned to alcohol and drugs to cope with the death of her 5-year-old son, who had run into the street and was hit by a vehicle driven by an off-duty police officer . Over the course of the next 17 years, Burton was in and out of prison. “Each time I left, I felt a little more broken,” she told me recently. What would have made a difference, she said, was “if there could have been a way to have therapy from traumatic childhood events, disappointments and...
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Funding Opportunity: California Preterm Birth Initiative
The California Preterm Birth Initiative is pleased to share our spring 2021 request for applications for innovative research proposals on preterm birth! About the Opportunity Twice a year, in the spring and fall, we request research proposals via the UCSF Resource Allocation Program (RAP). The spring RAP applications are due by March 1st. What We're Looking For We are looking for proposals focused on: Reducing preterm birth rates Addressing racial disparities in preterm birth and/or...
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Want to empower youth in communities of color during COVID? Let them lead.
Widespread reporting has revealed that the COVID-19 pandemic has devastated many poor communities of color. Less widely known is how the pandemic has affected young people in those communities. “COVID-19 has had a particularly harsh impact on youth of color,” further traumatizing [juvenile-justice] system-impacted youth and their families already struggling with disproportionately high rates of disease, death, job loss and housing insecurity,” said Jim Keddy of Youth Forward . Keddy was...
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Speakers at children & youth conference call for systems change based in love, liberation
California can support children and youth by tackling the state’s — and the country’s — legacy of White supremacy and replacing it with a trauma-informed approach of love, empathy, and support.
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Supporting Children to Thrive: A 4CA Webinar focused on the 2021 CA Legislative & Budget Landscape on Child Well-Being
On Tuesday March 30 at 1:00 pm (PST) join 4CA as we look at policy opportunities and challenges in the area of childhood adversity in the context of 2021 and beyond.
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Youth Detention Facility finds culture of kindness more effective than punishment
A corner of the Multi-Sensory De-escalation Room, All MSDR photos courtesy of Valerie Clark When a young person enters the de-escalation room in the Sacramento County Youth Detention Facility , they’ll find dimmed lights, bottles of lavender, orange and other essential oils, an audio menu featuring the rush of ocean waves and other calming sounds, along with squeeze balls, TheraPutty, jigsaw puzzles, and an exercise ball to bounce on. TheraPutty, squeeze balls and more Sometimes, with a...
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To solve the Black maternal mortality crisis, start with upending racist practices
It’s been all over the news for months: Black women in the United States are dying from complications during their pregnancies or in childbirth at alarming rates, and those deaths are preventable. Less well explored is how systemic racism and historical trauma have been at the core of what’s driven up these rates over several decades. A March 20 conference entitled The Impact of ACEs on Black Maternal Health took an in-depth look into why Black maternal mortality and complications during...
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Policing in schools: Redefining public safety to be supportive & healing, instead of punitive & criminalizing
A recent video , shared on the national news, shows a 16-year-old Florida student being slammed to the ground by a police officer working at her school. It’s one of many such incidents of school-based police violence against students captured in videos around the country. Some of the victims are as young as five years old. About 47% of U.S. schools employ armed police officers , known as school resource officers, who are there to keep students safe. But students who attend these schools...
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Webinar explores Oregon bill declaring racism a public health crisis
For anyone who thinks Oregon — long regarded as a liberal, progressive state — was a welcoming place for Blacks and other minorities in the past, a recent webinar sponsored by Oregon health care organizations was a chilling wake-up call. In June 1844, Oregon’s provisional government passed its first Black Exclusionary Act , with language stating that any Black person who set foot in Oregon “would be publicly whipped 39 lashes.” From that time forward, Oregon, like most states, amassed its...
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California PACEs Connection initiatives spark new connections in regional meeting
Among PACEs Connection initiatives around the country, it’s well known that our social network is something like a bustling, giant town square where people share ideas, resources and any number of conversations about how to prevent childhood adversity and promote positive childhood experiences. On May 14, PACEs Connection assembled a virtual town square gathering of PACEs initiatives in California, where we have 58 initiatives sparking action all across the state. Speakers at the gathering,...
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California advocates press for expansion of visiting rights to incarcerated loved ones
In a recent nightmare, 8-year-old Jovina dreamt that her father got COVID-19. He was getting sicker, but she and her mother weren’t able to get there in time. “There,” in her father’s case, is a cell at the California Correctional Center (CCC) in Susanville, California, nearly 300 miles from where she lives in San Jose. In Jovina’s mind are a swarm of worries about her father’s welfare, her mother Benee Vejar reports. If an earthquake shakes the Bay Area, Jovina says, “What if the building...
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Peer-led organization offers San Francisco's unhoused food, work, dignity and more
He is sprawled out on the sidewalk, motionless, flushed cheeks framed by high cheekbones. He’s slender, probably in his mid-20s, his straight, coal black hair pulled back, and his orange t-shirt twisted up over his stomach. “He’s OD’ing on fentanyl!” shouts a guy holding a skateboard.
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Check Out New July Dates Added to the 2023 CRC Summer Curriculum and the Official Launch of the Dedicated CRC Community Page
July is a time to celebrate all summer has to offer by building bridges and innovating with community to get to the heart of trauma-informed awareness and resilience building. This month, we’ve added new July dates to the summer 2023 *CRC* curriculum—but that’s only half of the good news. Last year, the CRC began as a pilot program. Now that it's evolved, what better time to bring accelerator participants together in a PACEs Connection CRC community than the summer? We are proud to announce...
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World Mental Health Day: Mobilizing the Human Family Through the CRC & the PACEs Movement
Awareness about health outcomes are as much about the long-term impact caused by adverse childhood experiences as they are by positive childhood experiences. By providing education on trauma-informed awareness and resilience building frameworks, the CRC Accelerator certification is a tool for both.
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Strength Through Unity: Nurturing Trauma-informed Resilience in Families Displaced by Violence Through the CRC & the PACEs Movement
Beyond Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), our members seek to deeply understand strengths-based insights embedded in the remaining ACEs quadrant: Adverse Community Environments, Adverse Climate Experiences, and Atrocious Cultural Experiences.
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February Collective Care Through the CRC & PACEs Movement: The Way Forward for Civil & Human Rights is Trauma-Informed
Nationally recognized days of awareness remind us of important civil and human rights movements led by Black and African-American communities and social justice advocates. February puts leadership, education, access, justice, policy, and governance under the spotlight. Through a PACEs science lens, this month is an opportunity to consider trauma-informed transformation through a PACEs science lens as the way forward.