Tagged With "the South"
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How Atlanta Is Turning Ex-Cons Into Urban Farmers [politico.com]
TLANTA—On a 4-acre farm a few miles south of the Fulton County Jail, Abiodun Henderson swung a pickax into the soil at her feet. She kept at it until she was winded and sweating on this brisk October morning. Around her, 10 young men and women tentatively swung their own tools at the ground, loosening the soil for a set of raised beds where turmeric and ginger plants would grow inside a hoop house through the mild Georgia winter. “This is how deep we’re going!” Henderson shouted over to...
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Hurricane Florence first responders receive free trauma/resilience training
In a webinar offered this morning by Elaine Miller Karas , executive director of the Trauma Resource Institute in Claremont, CA, leaders from several North Carolina ACEs Connection communities affected by flooding and other damage by Hurricane Florence learned more about trauma response and how to better help their communities find resilience. Karas, who was delivering her Community Resiliency Model (CRM) training at Duke University in Durham, NC, offered the free training and provided...
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IN ATLANTA, AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOOSTS SCHOOL PERFORMANCE, TENANT HEALTH (From Nationswell 2.15.18) by Josh Green
REAL ESTATE ENTREPRENEUR MARJY STAGMEIER IS THE ANTI-SLUMLORD, A CONSCIENTIOUS CAPITALIST, AN INVESTOR WHO GENUINELY CARES. Among the rolling hills and dense pine canopies east of Atlanta’s I-285 bypass, down the street from a halal meat market, two Buddhist temples and Good Times Country Cookin’, sits the Willow Branch Apartment Homes. The complex is tucked behind a flapping “Welcome” flag, which is emblematic of Clarkston, a small but famously global suburb that has been coined “Ellis...
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In Rural Tennessee, a Big ICE Raid Makes Some Conservative Voters Rethink Trump’s Immigration Agenda [newyorker.com]
April 5th began in the usual way at the Southeastern Provision meat-processing plant, in Bean Station, Tennessee—some workers were breaking down carcasses on the production line, while others cleaned the floors—until, around 9 a.m., a helicopter began circling above the plant. Moments later, a fleet of cars pulled up outside. Agents from the I.R.S., Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ice), and the Tennessee Highway Patrol emerged, and proceeded to arrest ninety-seven people, most of them...
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Medicaid Expansion Improved Health in Southern States: Study [thehill.com]
By Peter Sullivan, The Hill, January 7, 2020 A new study finds that Medicaid expansion improved people’s health in Southern states, resulting in fewer declines in people’s health. The study published in Health Affairs finds that Medicaid expansion made declines in health status 1.8 percentage points less likely in states that expanded the medical coverage. It examined 12 Southern states, including those that have accepted the expansion of Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, like...
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New Study Examines State Lawmaker Perspectives on Adverse Childhood Experiences
New Study Examines State Lawmaker Perspectives on Addressing Adverse Childhood Experiences Released by Children's Trust of South Carolina
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Personal stories from witnesses, U.S. representatives provided an emotional wallop to House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing on childhood trauma
Room erupts in applause for the grandmother of witness William Kellibrew during July 11 House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing. The power of personal stories from witnesses and committee members fueled the July 11 hearing on childhood trauma in the House Oversight and Reform Committee* throughout the nearly four hours of often emotional and searing testimony and member questions and statements (Click here for 3:47 hour video). The hearing was organized into a two panels—testimony from...
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Personal stories the set tone of hearing in U.S. Senate HELP Committee on Opioid Crisis Response Act
Jennifer Donahue, Delaware Office of the Child Advocate, testifies before the HELP Committee (Jennifer Perry to her right) ____________________________________________________________ Some seasoned advocates say legislators are influenced by stories while their staffs are swayed by data. There was some of both at the April 11 hearing on the draft Opioid Crisis Response Act of 2018 of the U.S. Senate HELP (Health, Education, Labor & Pensions) Committee but it was the personal stories that...
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Some 350 Florida Leaders Expected to Attend Think Tank with Dr. Vincent Felitti, Co-Principal Investigator of the ACE Study; Expert on ACEs Science
Leaders from across the Sunshine State will take part in a “Think Tank” in Naples, FL, on Monday, August 6, to help create a more trauma-informed Florida. The estimated 350 attendees will include policy makers and community teams made up of school superintendents, law enforcement officers, judges, hospital administrators, mayors, PTA presidents, child welfare experts, mental health and substance abuse treatment providers, philanthropists, university researchers, state agency heads, and...
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The Coronavirus’s Unique Threat to the South [theatlantic.com]
More young people in the South seem to be dying from COVID-19. Why? By Vann R. Newkirk II The Atlantic, April 2, 2020 In a matter of weeks, the coronavirus has gone from a novel, distant threat to an enemy besieging cities and towns across the world. The burden of COVID-19 and the economic upheaval wrought by the measures to contain it feel epochal. Humanity now has a common foe, and we will grow increasingly familiar with its face. Yet plenty of this virus’s aspects remain unknown. The...
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The Sacramento Violence Intervention Program, Trauma & ACEs
On May 22, I had the opportunity to experience a presentation by DeAngelo Mack on the Sacramento Violence Intervention Program, Trauma and ACEs. The presentation was at Kaiser Sacramento and was directed to residents in the organization. I have worked with @DeAngelo Mack, @Chris Cooper and @Esmeralda Huerta through Resilient Sacramento for the past few years and have admired their work in the community, this was the first opportunity I had to attend...
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Tools and how to use them is focus of second webinar on Community Resiliency Model, May 14, 2020
The second of two free Community Resiliency (CRM) webinars with Elaine Miller-Karas , key creator of the CRM, will be held Thursday, May 14, from 11 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. ET, (10 a.m. CT; 9 a.m. MT, and 8 a.m. PT) and will include the practical application of tools of the model. CRM is an ACEs science-based biological model for helping individuals become emotionally regulated during natural disasters and other dysregulating times. Miller-Karas will be joined by CRM trainers from Wilmington, NC:...
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USFSP summer camp teaches kids about trust, communication [Tampa Bay Times]
SMART Leadership Camp Director Harris Ambush talks with campers and counselors about finding a "happy place" in their mind Monday June 18, 2018, at University of South Florida St. Petersburg. City Council members approved a $35,000 grant to a team at USFSP who are piloting a program that will help kids deal with "adverse childhood experiences." JIM DAMASKE | Times ST. PETERSBURG — A dozen kids sit in a circle with their eyes closed and their hands resting gently on their folded legs. Slowly,...
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Webinar: Cultivating Our Best Selves in Response to COVID-19 | Tuesday, March 17 at Noon PDT
How to use the skills of the Community Resiliency Model (CRM) for self and others to be the calm in the storm as we face the unknown. Free Webinar Tuesday, March 17 at Noon PDT Speakers: Elaine Miller-Karas, LCSW Linda Grabbe, PhD, FNP-BC, PMHNP-BC Zoom Webinar Registration Link: https://zoom.us/j/715837300 Additional ways to join are listed at the bottom of this post. About the webinar leaders: Elaine Miller-Karas is the Executive Director and co-founder of the Trauma Resource Institute and...
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71 ACEs Initiatives Join ACEs Connection in 2019
We are proud to celebrate the 71 community initiatives that joined the ACEs Connection network in 2019. They are listed below, and can be found along with all existing ACEs Connection communities via the ACEs Connection map. Communities in the United States: Midwest ACEs Indiana Coalition Ardmore (OK) Behavioral Health Collaborative: Chisago County (MN) ACEs Initiative Franciscan Health ACEs Connection FH–Jasper & Newton Counties (IN ) FH–LaPorte County (IN) FH–Lake County (IN)...
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Re: Hurricane Dorian’s on the way. Florence taught us how to be resilient!
Thank you and an invitation to other communities affected by Dorian. Thank you Mebane, for this inspiring, helpful post and for allowing me to share it with other communities in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, and South Carolina. As the Southeast Region community facilitator for ACEs Connection, I am praying for all in the path of this powerful hurricane, and all those who've already experienced its devastating impact. I have seen communities come together, as New Hanover County has, to...
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ACEs Champion Danette Glass says COVID-19 increases the need for trauma-informed communities
Glass’s mission has always been to protect and foster the practice of nurturing children. That’s because she herself experienced at least five types of adverse childhood experiences, as measured in the original CDC-Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences Study (ACE Study). If the scale could account for childhood adversity such as structural racism and community violence that’s more likely to occur in communities of color, her burden of ACEs is higher.
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Do safe, stable, and nurturing relationships work? New research has important findings for responding to ACEs
While we know that adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can cause risk behaviors, research has told us that the presence of protective factors can help mitigate the effects of ACEs. Common risk behaviors such as smoking tobacco and alcohol misuse can be a result from the trauma of childhood disadvantage. In responding to ACEs, public health research proposes that protective factors such as safe, stable, nurturing relationships (SSNRs) with a caring adult can mitigate the long-term effects of...
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Trauma-informed policing: Learn how three highly experienced community leaders strengthen ties between police and community
ACEs initiative participants in communities where there is tension between the community and law enforcement will want to join Becky Haas in a compelling conversation on law enforcement, ACEs science, COVID-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement and protests. Haas is a nationally recognized adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) science initiative builder and trainer. She and colleagues Renee Wilson-Simmons, the head of the ACE Awareness Foundation of Memphis, Tennessee, and Maggi Duncan,...
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‘Death by structural poverty’: US south struggles against Covid-19 [theguardian.com]
Monica McCasklill, left, and her daughter Kena Johnson, at their home in Greenwood, Missisppi. They respectively lost their grandmother and great grandmother, Ethel Huntley, to Covid-19. Huntley lived in a nearby nursing home and the family allege failings in her primary care. Photograph: Rory Doyle/The Guardian. By Oliver Laughland, The Guardian, August 5, 2020 Poor access to healthcare, failed political leadership and the endurance of segregation and racism have contributed to a surge in...
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Reviving a Crop and an African-American Culture, Stalk by Stalk (nytimes.com)
SAPELO ISLAND, Ga. — Fall is cane syrup season in pockets of the Deep South, where people still gather to grind sugar cane and boil its juice into dark, sweet syrup in iron kettles big enough to bathe in. This autumn, no cane syrup has been more significant than the batches Maurice Bailey and his friends made from the first purple ribbon sugar cane grown here on Sapelo Island since the 1800s. The 11-mile-long barrier island is home to the Salt Water Geechees , who can trace an unbroken line...
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ACEs Connection/CTIPP Southeastern Leaders’ call: State updates, funding information, and “mind-blowing” information about helping people out of poverty
Southeastern ACEs Connection and national CTIPP leaders on the quarterly leader call welcomed guest speaker Rebecca Lewis-Pankratz (top left) for their quarterly call. Also among those present were (top row l-r) Carey Sipp, Jesse Kohler, Jesse Hardin, (second row, l-r) Patti Tiberi, Mebane Boyd, Jen Drake-Croft, Dan Press, (third row, l-r) Mimi Graham, Christopher Freeze, Margaret Stagmeier, (fourth row, l-r) Emily Marsh, Liz Peterson, Alyssa Koziarski and Janet Pozmantier. Also present was...
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Lisa Polk
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PACEs Connection presents the "Historical Trauma in America" series
PACEs Connection's Race & Equity Workgroup will be examining historical trauma in the United States of America and its impact on American society in a series of virtual discussions. This series will highlight each unique region within the United States and outline how unresolved historical trauma has impacted every aspect of American life and directly shapes the socio-political landscape of today as well as the overall well-being of Americans. Discussions will make connections between...
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Historical Trauma in the American Midwest Event Recap
On September 16, 2021, PACEs Connection hosted our second event in our Historical Trauma in America series . This event was led by Ingrid Cockhren, the director of the PACEs Connection Cooperative of Communities; and Porter Jennings-McGarity, our community facilitator of the Midwest Region. It featured guest speaker Agnes Woodward who is Plains Cree from Kawacatoose First Nation, Saskatchewan, Canada. To download the slide deck from this presentation, click here. Then click "download file".
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In North Carolina, a new Civil War memorial honors Black Union soldiers (Washingtonpost.com)
By Kevin Maurer November 1, 2021 at 8:00 a.m. EDT In the early 1900s, two Civil War memorials — both honoring the Confederacy — were erected in the busy downtown district of Wilmington, N.C. They were meant largely to send a message of intimidation to African Americans and “carpetbaggers,” Northerners who came to the South during reconstruction — and there they stood for a century. Five miles away, Heather Wilson, the deputy director of the Cameron Art Museum, wanted to tell a different...
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Renée Wilson-Simmons—founder of Healing Trauma, Reclaiming Joy—counts on PACEs Connection to be 'a catalyst for cultivating the PACEs movement.'
Renée Wilson-Simmons discusses the book "The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-term Effects of Childhood Trauma and Adversity" with author Dr. Nadine Burke Harris at the Columbia University, New York City, NY, Mailman School of Public Health in 2018. Note: PACEs Connection is in dire financial straits. We need you, our almost 58,000 members, to help cover the loss of foundation funding that was promised and did not come through . Unfortunately, staff pay and hours have had to be cut; most of us...