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For lifelong heart health, start exercising early in life and keep exercising often — ideally, at least four times a week, according to a remarkable series of recent studies involving hundreds of people and their hearts. But even if you have neglected to exercise in recent years and are now middle-aged, it is not too late. The same research shows that you still can substantially remodel your heart and make it more youthful by starting to work out in midlife, provided you exercise often...

The Chronicle of Social Change is highlighting each of the policy recommendations made this summer by the participants of the Foster Youth Internship Program (FYI), a group of 10 former foster youths who have completed congressional internships. The program is overseen each summer by the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute. Each of the FYI participants crafted a policy recommendation during their time in Washington, D.C. Today we highlight the recommendation of Terrence Scraggins,...

As her doctor stated on Monday, “The damage is done.” This is no longer about her making a conscious choice to poison herself with booze. Her liver is screaming, NOPE. Her brain is shriveling up. And her coo-coo for cocoa puffs is showing. I mean, Dad, my sister and I used to see that side of her, but now it’s a little more evident to the rest of the world.

When I was six years old, some moms took a bunch of us kids to the Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk, which was (in my pre-Disneyland years) my actual, best place in the whole world. Somewhere in the half-mile of noisy carnival rides and smells there was, in those days, a Fun House that had a tall, indoor "wavy" slide with an undulating surface. You'd buy a ticket and the man would give you a burlap sack to take with you to the top of the slide. It made you go down so fast you'd fly a little...

The images were tragic. The audio was heart-rending. The practice of separating parents from children at the border not only looked and sounded horrific, it was horrific. My encounters with the children at an Office of Refugee Resettlement “tender age” shelter stay with me. The fear and sadness of being separated from their parents combined with the trauma from their journeys put them at great risk of toxic stress. I have always been proud to be an AAP Fellow, but I have never been prouder...

Exclusionary zoning, a term referring to local regulations that discourage housing production, has long been associated with heightened racial segregation by several scholars . In many localities, industry is also disproportionately located in communities of color. How much does racial bias influence these outcomes? This is something that has been difficult to measure, as most local officials would likely try to hide prejudicial motivations (if they exist) for their zoning decisions.

Big businesses want lower taxes. Cities—and many of the people who live in them—want lower rates of homelessness. Lately, the compatibility of these two desires is being tested, as local governments across the U.S. float a new strategy to help the growing number of unsheltered people on their streets: Asking businesses to pay a greater share in funding aid. Last week, a coalition of homelessness advocates, non-profits, and tenant groups in San Francisco secured an initiative for November’s...

Homelessness, neglect, malnutrition, or forced parent-child separation have long been known to cause toxic stress levels in childhood that harm developing brains and bodies. Two decades ago, the link between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and long-lasting health effects surfaced in a pivotal study. Now, clinicians and researchers are taking a deep dive into how the stress produced by these experiences influences lifelong changes in children's genetics and health, while developing tools...

White House officials, Republican politicians, and right-wing activists have been complaining recently about getting heckled and kicked out of restaurants and Ubers. Earlier this month, the Raleigh News & Observer reported that a local Uber driver had expelled six Republican volunteers from a ride, allegedly telling them as he pulled away, "Welcome to the resistance." The response from mainstream pundits has largely been to call for civility , but there are strong historical reasons why...

This Thursday the Trump administration faces a deadline handed down earlier this summer by a United States District Court judge: reunite the children separated from their parents at the border by federal law enforcement. There’s no way the White House will pull it off. Reports indicate that hundreds of parents will not be seeing their children because the government can’t locate the parents or has already deported them. This entire catastrophe isn’t just the result of a deliberately cruel...

It has been said that inspiration comes when you least expect it. My visit to Melbourne, Australia, inspired me to take an international look at place-making . I was standing in Federation Square, restlessly waiting for my daughter to finish her shift. I hadn’t seen her in nearly a year. I was wearing my mom hat, not my urban planner’s hat. Nevertheless, as my eyes swept the Square, I had the sense of being in a very special place. And while I didn’t know it at the time, I was not surprised...

Mary Blackborow refers to herself as a worker bee, I call her a school health thought leader. Mary is a pragmatic problem solver with a brilliant mind for simplifying the most complex issues. She has the mind of an engineer with the heart of a nurse. Mary's logical thinking and compassionate care served her NJ high school students well for 18 years. She is a student advocate and champion for social justice. Advocacy is listed as the first characteristic under the Leadership principal of...