Blog

Former PACEs Connection employees Dana Brown (L) with Vincent Felitti, MD, co-author of the 1998 Adverse Childhood Experiences study, and Carey Sipp (R) in San Diego in January, 2024. The last few months have been quite challenging, but we pushed, persevered, and didn’t give up hope. The “we” is Carey Sipp and Dana Brown. We were long-time staff members of PACEs Connection determined to reinstate the website and the resources and information we provide to communities after the platform went...

Test post

To all of you, who, like me, love this website and want to see it and its communities flourish as we work to prevent and heal trauma; build resiliency: please know there is a move afoot by a small group of strategic partners to find a suitable host for PACEs Connection. More will be announced in the coming days. In the meantime, friends, we are figuring out email addresses and other communications logistics and opportunities. PEACE! Carey Sipp, former director of strategic partnerships ...

Hello partners, members, and friends, It is with mixed emotions that I am sharing that PACEs Connection will be sunsetting all operations effective Friday, April 26. While it saddens me to see this chapter of PACEs work come to a close, this work is too important to end, and efforts are underway to identify a new home for PACEs to continue its work. At the same time, this presents an exciting opportunity for PACEs to reemerge stronger than ever. Although we intended a seamless transition,...

Statement of Need Florida has a high obesity rate at 31.6% of adults according to CDC data from 2022, however Charlotte County falls in the fourth quartile in Florida, with an obesity rate of 39.5% ( Adult Obesity Prevalence Maps | Overweight & Obesity | CDC , 2023) ( County Health Status Summary Profile - 2021 , 2022). Adverse Childhood Experiences can severely impact one’s relationship with nutrition, as experiencing instability, violence, or other traumatic experiences can change the...

There is due diligence for increased awareness and intervention upon the mental and emotional needs of children and adolescents in the foster care system, particularly so in Florida. Alachua County specifically has anywhere between 300 and 600 children and adolescents in the system on any given year, with more than half being removed from their unit on the basis of maltreatment (FL Child Welfare Measures, 2022); thus the overall trends for an increased overall need of mental and emotional...

This was a virtual program that included high school students from the Miami-Dade County public school district who had suffered the loss of at least one parent or primary caregiver. The intervention is made up of a team of child psychologists, licensed professional counselors, and licensed social workers that have undergone trauma-informed training before the program launch. The intervention is composed of virtual individual counseling sessions, virtual group therapy sessions, and social...

Project Overview Adolescents who have experienced multiple ACEs are more prone to reporting a range of mental health symptoms, suicidal tendencies, engagement in violent behavior, and substance use (Meeker et al., 2021). This is of particular importance for Alachua County since the rate of hospitalizations from non-fatal self-harm injuries in adolescents aged 12-18 years in 2022 was 140.8 compared to the state rate of Florida at 71 (Florida Health Charts, 2022). The project proposal aims to...

Adolescent pregnancy is associated with a variety of health, social, economic, and educational consequences including an increased risk of pregnancy and birth complications, higher risk of premature birth, high rates of financial insecurity, and less educational attainment (Eliner et al., 2022; Hillis et al., 2004; Cone et al., 2021). Due to these concerns, the reduction of adolescent pregnancy is an important public health goal defined by the Office of Disease Prevention and Health...

This was a virtual program that included high school students from the Miami-Dade County public school district who had suffered the loss of at least one parent or primary caregiver. The intervention is made up of a team of child psychologists, licensed professional counselors, and licensed social workers that have undergone trauma-informed training before the program launch. The intervention is composed of virtual individual counseling sessions, virtual group therapy sessions, and social...

Our grant proposal outlines an innovative, trauma-informed program aimed at eradicating bullying among adolescents in Springfield's middle and high schools. The Springfield Alliance for Youth Resilience (SAYR) will deploy a suite of strategies informed by trauma-aware practices—ensuring safety, fostering trust, enabling peer support, promoting collaboration, and ensuring cultural sensitivity. Addressing the interpersonal and community levels of the Social Ecological Model, SAYR will...

Project Overview Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the leading cause of death among adults in the United States, taking nearly 700,000 lives in 2021 alone (CDC, 2023). Black Americans are at particular risk for dying of heart disease, with CVD accounting for 22.6% of their deaths compared to only 18% of deaths among white Americans (CDC, 2023). To combat this issue, I have created an intervention that focuses on addressing CVD in Black adults aged 20-49 in Alachua County, To narrow the focus...