At a March 8 breakfast meeting in Washington, D.C., the featured speakers—U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota (left) and Judith Sandalow, Executive Director of the DC Children’s Law Center (CLC)—used the vivid image of children growing up with “black mold climbing the walls,” referring to unsafe physical and emotional environments at home and in communities, exacerbated by poverty but not limited to poor households. Heitkamp described how the science now explains what we already...

Michael Lamb, Executive Director, Washington D.C., Turnaround for Children sent the following message about a new paper, Building Blocks for Learning, just released by Turnaround and three new positions it is seeking to fill. Take a look: "Hi friends and colleagues, it’s an exciting time for Turnaround in Washington, D.C. as we work towards our vision that one day all children in the US attend schools that prepare them for the lives they choose. In addition to our exciting work in schools,...

PART I: MOTHERS ON THE INSIDE Tonya Kamara, 54, seems to have the weight of the world on her shoulders. She lives in a one-bedroom apartment in Southeast Washington, DC, with her one-year-old grandson, Anthony, and her 26-year-old nephew, who is between jobs. Her two daughters also live with herwhen they are not incarcerated. Anthonys mother, April, age 32, and her 25-year-old sister, Latonya, both struggle with a history of mental health problems and drug addiction, which has led to cycles...

The first year of Trauma-Informed DC (TIDC) has been action filledthere have been several large public events ( screenings of Paper Tigers and Wounded Places, a School to Prison Pipeline forum and more) as well as small gatherings that have helped gauge where community interests lie and that have built a network, now comprising nearly 600 people. The founder of TIDC, Leah Harris, felt the time seemed right to pause and take stock of what had been accomplished and plan for the future. Harris...

The latest report from the Center for the Study of Social Policy (CSSP), the agency monitoring the District of Columbia’s Child and Family Services Agency (CFSA), contained a startling revelation. For the first time in 15 years, children in the District of Columbia have spent the night in agency offices (and even motels) because there were no foster homes available. Foster homes are scarce around the nation, but the crisis in the District was a direct outcome of decisions made by the...

When U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan stepped down last week after seven years on the job, he didn't talk about test scores or teacher quality. Rather, fighting back tears, he used the opportunity to talk about what he called the "greatest frustration" of his tenure — Washington not passing gun control legislation. "If I can leave you one number: 16,000. That in my first six years as Secretary of Education that's the number of young people who are killed across our...

  Washington, D.C., may not be the mostexpensive place to live in the country, but it can certainly feel like it . Nearly half of renters pay 30 percent of their income towards housing, and nearly a quarter shell out 50 percent . After a...

  Opposing views of  Rep. Tim Murphy’s  Helping Families In Mental Health Crisis Act  are expressed on Pete Earley’s (mental health advocate and author of  C razy)  website : Leah Harris presented her...

The Washington Post just published the following opinion piece by prison reform activist, Taylar Neuvelle, who was also interviewed recently by Scott MacFarland of NBC News Washington, DC about the condition of the DC jail . Neuvelle also participated...

Members of the Trauma-Informed DC Initiative met with At-Large City Councilmember David Grosso and Christina Henderson, Education Committee Director, on November 4 to follow up on a number of issues raised at the Initiative’s School-to-Prison...

The video of the [S&R Foundation] Illuminate Series conversation, The Adversity Epidemic: Science, Schools, and Social Equity is available on the Illuminate website, and can be viewed here: http://www.illuminateseries.or...-and-social-equity-0 . Introduction: Human beings are the only mammals on the planet whose thinking, feeling and learning brain develops extensively after birth. Young brains are wired for growth, but their anatomical structure is...

Please join DC CARE and our partners Ribbon Consulting Group, PWN-USA, Us Helping Us, People into Living, Trauma  Informed DC Initiative and The Women's Collective for a special lunch event to discuss and explore ways to end the culture of...