Tagged With "foster care"
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Graduations, non-linear paths, & the importance of getting started
With graduation season upon us, I have been thinking a lot about one of my favorite graduation speeches. It’s the speech that Shonda Rhimes, creator of Grey’s Anatomy, gave in 2014 at Dartmouth College. She references the typical expected advice from a graduation speech: “Follow your dreams. Listen to your spirit. Change the world. Make your mark. Find your inner voice and make it sing. Embrace failure. Dream. Dream and dream big...." And then she says, “I think that’s crap.”
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Health Issues for Judges to Consider in Foster Care
This resource from the AAP provides an overview of important health issues for children and youth in foster care. It includes downloadable, age-appropriate forms that can be shared with case workers and/or caregivers to obtain, record,...
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How One Connection at CYW’s ACEs Conference Sparked Awareness into Action
Origins offers a number of training and consulting services. We developed The Basics as a half-day session to provide the foundation to support trauma-informed and resilience practices across sectors and industries. The session includes an overview of the Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) Study, the neurobiology of toxic stress, the impact of social and historical trauma, and the science of resilience. We have tested The Basics with two cross-sector audiences, in Los Angeles and Phoenix.
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How The Juvenile Justice System is Failing Girls [yr.media]
By Susie Armitage, YR Media, October 16, 2019 When Bree was booked into a juvenile detention center as a teen, they were subject to a strip search. “The staff had to take off my clothes and started patting me down, touching me, and making me feel uncomfortable,” said Bree, who asked that their last name not be used for privacy reasons. As a youth advocate with the Philadelphia-based Juvenile Law Center, Bree recounted their experience of incarceration in a report. “I felt violated, like I...
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'I Can Be Free Again': How Music Brings Healing at Sing Sing [psmag.com]
"Never ran, never will!" is the gangster-bravado motto that people use to explain Brownsville, Brooklyn, with its blocks and blocks of low-income housing projects. Even the grungiest hipster artisans, who've pretty much invaded Brooklyn in recent years, still stay away from Brownsville. Growing up there in the crack era of the 1980s, Joseph Wilson was surrounded by crack dealers and addicts. His mother was an addict, so his grandmother wound up raising him—and teaching him to love music. She...
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'I Can Be Free Again': How Music Brings Healing at Sing Sing [psmag.com]
"Never ran, never will!" is the gangster-bravado motto that people use to explain Brownsville, Brooklyn, with its blocks and blocks of low-income housing projects. Even the grungiest hipster artisans, who've pretty much invaded Brooklyn in recent years, still stay away from Brownsville. Growing up there in the crack era of the 1980s, Joseph Wilson was surrounded by crack dealers and addicts. His mother was an addict, so his grandmother wound up raising him—and teaching him to love music. She...
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In Photos: A Mother Adjusts to Parenting After Prison [YesMagazine.org]
When Kendra Wright was incarcerated for drug-related offenses at Oregon’s only women’s prison, her then-6-year-old daughter, Selene, was placed in the care of Wright’s grandparents. Prohibited from speaking to Selene, Wright cherished what little contact she had: Wright’s grandmother would call her while Selene was in the same room. “It was the only way I could hear her little voice,” Wright said. But in 2013, Wright was accepted to the Family Preservation Project, an initiative then run by...
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Incarceration, Addiction & Homelessness: The Problem with the U.S. Foster Care System
I was recently asked to be on the Incarcerate US podcast that is hosted by Dante Nottingham, an inmate who has been locked up since the age of 17. As you may know, incarceration in the US is at extreme levels and touches a wide variety of social issues, topics and dilemmas. At Incarcerate US, they believe that the solutions to our incarceration problems reside within the minds and hearts of the people. So the aim of our Incarcerate U.S. podcast is to interview a wide array of people across...
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Introducing myself, Morgan Vien & NEW Practicing Resilience Community
Hello! I’m a Community Manager for the Practicing Resilience for Self-Care & Healing community. This is an introduction to me and this new community. I graduated with a B.S. in Public Health from Santa Clara University June 2017. And I’m interested in preventing chronic diseases, such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol, at the community and population level by addressing biological, psychological, and social factors that affect chronic disease outcomes. As the...
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Introducing NEW Becoming Trauma-Informed & Beyond Community
Earlier this year @Dawn Daum wrote to us when she was ready to share ACEs science with people in the organization she works in to make a case for moving towards more trauma-informed care for the benefit of the staff and those they serve. She was frustrated because almost all the training and resources she found were geared towards schools, clinical staff or to organizations working with children and families rather than ACE-impacted adults in the workplace and who are...
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Jail & Prison Resources
Addressing Correctional Officer Stress: Programs and Strategies Source: NCJRS Description: A guide to assist corrections administrators is addressing employee stress. Link: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/183474.pdf Art Behind Bars...
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Job center at women’s reentry facility opens (workforce.org)
Opened in October, the center, managed by grant sub-recipient Second Chance, started enrolling participants, with the goal of offering trauma-informed reentry services to 400 women pre-release and to 100 of those 400 post-release. Enrollment of voluntary participants is based on three criteria. The individual must: be a resident of the facility be within 180 days of release have not been convicted of a sexual offense other than prostitution Though the goals are similar for both men and women...
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LA County Supes Seek Better Care And Outcomes For Pregnant And Post-Partum Incarcerated Women And Girls And Their Babies (witnessla.com)
On Tuesday, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted to identify ways to better support pregnant women and girls in the county’s jails and juvenile lockups. The motion, authored by Supervisors Hilda Solis and Janice Hahn, directs the Department of Health Services and the sheriff’s department, in coordination with other relevant county departments to report back to the board in 90 days with data on the number of pregnant women and girls in sheriff’s department or probation custody,...
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Law Enforcement & Corrections Resources
Cops, Kids, and Domestic Violence Source: National Child Traumatic Stress Network Description: Law enforcement training DVD and support documents (which can be used independently). Link: Video – ...
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May Newsletter from Trauma Informed Oregon: Integration of Trauma Informed Care in the Justice System
Mandy Davis, Director of Trauma Informed Oregon, reminds us how important trauma informed care is in all facets of the judicial system. Read the full newsletter here: https://traumainformedoregon.org/integration-of-tic-in-the-justice-system-tio-happenings-may-june-2019/
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Mental Health in Criminal Justice Resources
7 Common Characteristics of Juvenile Mental Health Courts Source: Gains Center, SAMHSA Description: Identifies seven common characteristics of Juvenile Mental Health Courts (JMHCs) as part of a National Institute of Justice – funded study,...
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Study: About 4 Percent of Women Are Pregnant When Jailed (nytimes.com)
About 4 percent of women incarcerated in state prisons across the U.S. were pregnant when they were jailed, according to a new study released Thursday that researchers hope will help lawmakers and prisons better consider the health of women behind bars. The number of imprisoned women has risen dramatically over the past decades, growing even as the overall prison rates decline. But there had been a lack of data on women's health and no system for tracking how frequently incarcerated women...
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The Importance of Connection | Alissa R. Ackerman | TEDxCSULB (www.YouTube.com) & Commentary
Cissy's note: The TedTalk below is given by one of my good friends, Alissa. When she first told me about the restorative justice work she was doing with Dr. Jill Levenson, speaking with convicted of sexual offending, where she shared about her experiences as a survivor of sexual assault, (aka, without her "professional shield," as she says), I was concerned. Was it safe, wise, and helpful? What would the impact be on her? Part of me felt that it's not the place of survivors to help...
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The law said an ex-felon couldn’t be a nurse. So this single mom got the law changed. (washingtonpost.com)
When Lisa Creason was a 19-year-old single mom, she robbed a Subway shop. Or, at least, she tried to. One evening in 1993, she walked in without a plan, without an ultimatum, and demanded money from the cash register. When she was denied, she took off. That spontaneous decision, which she said she made out of desperation to provide for her baby girl, would cost her for the next two decades. But it never defined her. On Thursday, Creason, now a 43-year-old mother of three and a nursing school...
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The unsung heroes of Oakland's drastic decline in gun homicides (theguardian.com)
There is a saying, made famous by the criminal justice reformers Glenn Martin and Piper Kerman, that those closest to the problem are closest to the solution, but are also furthest from the resources and power to address it. For Sherman Spears, his own experience of being shot and treated at a local Oakland hospital was a turning point in his life. He founded Youth Alive!’s Caught in the Crossfire , the first hospital-based violence intervention program . It has become a national model to...
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Throwaway Kids: 'We are sending more foster kids to prison than college’ (kansascity.com)
For the past year, The Kansas City Star has examined what happens to kids who age out of foster care and found that, by nearly every measure, states are failing in their role as parents to America’s most vulnerable children. https://www.kansascity.com/news/special-reports/article238206754.html Read more here: https://www.kansascity.com/news/special-reports/article238206754.html#storylink=cpy
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TIC: News and Notes for the Week of October 21, 2019 [dhs.wisconsin.gov]
ACEs, Adversity's Impact There is only one boat: The myth of normalcy by Dr. Gabor Mate Understanding historical trauma to strengthen community Childhood trauma linked to early, premarital childbirth and poor health for women Early life racial discrimination linked to depression, accelerated aging When mothers are killed by their partners, children often become 'forgotten' victims. It's time they were given a voice Children's language skills may be harmed by social hardship Does racism...
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We Need to Understand How to Provide Trauma-Informed Care [JJIE.org]
The philosophy of trauma-informed care is becoming more and more embedded in the philosophies and practices of child-serving agencies. When a child experiences a single traumatic event and is fortunate enough to be surrounded by supportive and nurturing adults, that trauma can generally be assessed and usually treated effectively with the help of parental support. When a traumatized child responds with internalized distress such as sadness, depression or anxiety, our systems appear to...
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Why Focus on Resilience? 2019 BPT Conference Big Idea Session with Teri Barila
“There comes a point where we need to stop just pulling people out of the river. We need to go upstream and find out why they’re falling in” -Desmond Tutu. This quote captures the essence of why resilience matters. To Community Resilience Initiative, Resilience is not about “lifting yourself up by your bootstraps” or “bouncing back” from serious harm or injury. To us, Resilience is about self-discovery and self-awareness based on what the ACE Study, neurobiology, and epigenetics tell us...
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Why Jails Are Booming (citylab.com)
A new report from the Prison Policy Initiative shows that the populations of local jails are swelling for reasons that have little to do with crime. State prison rates have come down modestly overall, reports the Sentencing Project , and some states can boast double-digit decreases since the turn of the century. City and county jails, meanwhile, have been bloating. Roughly two-thirds of states have seen jail populations at least double since 1983 a dozen have seen jail populations triple.
Ask the Community
Help our public radio station with a story: How did separation from your parents as a child impact you?
KQED is the National Public Radio affiliate in San Francisco, CA. We’d like to hear from adults (18+) who were separated from their parents when they were children. Perhaps the separation was due to economic reasons, war and conflict, incarceration, foster care, or something else. How did that period of separation impact you in the long-run? How has it impacted your connection to others and how you build relationships? If you're a parent, how does it influence how you parent? We’re...
Ask the Community
Trauma-informed organizational assessment for criminal justice?
Hi all - are any of you aware of any "trauma-informed organizational assessment" tools specifically designed for criminal justice organizations such as prisons / jails, probation/parole departments, courts, etc to look at their internal policies, procedures, physical environment, etc (SAMHSA's 10 domains for trauma-informed care) and determine where they're at at the moment and where they may need to make changes to become more trauma-informed? Would appreciate links/examples of any...
Ask the Community
Trauma-Informed Services for Formerly Incarcerated Populations
Hi everyone, I am in the process of synthesizing resources and best practices for trauma-informed services for formerly incarcerated populations. I am specifically interested in community-based mental health and substance abuse treatment services, housing related assistance, job-training assistance, and case management and civil legal services. Do any of you have good examples or models of trauma-informed care for these types of services, specifically for formerly...
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What Is Service Yoga 2.0 Workshop (San Diego, CA)
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Re: Trauma-Informed Services for Formerly Incarcerated Populations
Hi Stephanie - in Lancaster County, PA, we have been working over the past several years to "build the foundation for a trauma-informed criminal justice system". We started by providing the following trainings for criminal justice professionals, using nationally developed curricula: 1) trained entire staff of our county prison and entire staff of our county adult probation & parole department using SAMHSA's "How Being Trauma-Informed Improves Criminal Justice System Responses" (400 CO's...
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Re: Policy
Hi Margaret, I'm assuming you're looking for Trauma-Informed policies as it relates to Criminal Justice. There have been some Crim. Jus. posts in the ACEsConnection.com/Blog, that I've seen,which may have links in the Blog to the story post, such as the Trauma-Informed programming in the Hawaii Women's Prison. The California [Men's] Honor Prison in Los Angeles utilized Trauma-Informed programming, while it was operational. I don't know if it still is. Prisoners there, voluntarily renounce...
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Re: Trauma-informed organizational assessment for criminal justice?
I'm not sure of any that are specific to criminal justice, however Florida came out with an assessment for their juvenile detention facilities. Perhaps you can adapt it to what you need? It's call the Trauma Responsive and Care Environment (TRACE).
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Re: Without access to credit, ex-cons may return to lives of crime [thehill.com]
I too am an ex-offender and when I got out of prison...I cleaned up my credit, bought a home, started a non-profit, finished school, received a Masters and 2 State of WA, Dept of Health licenses to provide Therapist guidance in Mental Health & Addiction. I also started this journey after I swallowed a 1/4 ounce of crack cocaine and called on God to save me, after 9 days out of Prison. Here is a Link to the story they wrote about me: https://www.seattlepi.com/loca...n-s-list-1206233.php I...
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Re: Without access to credit, ex-cons may return to lives of crime [thehill.com]
Alfred, thank you for sharing a glimpse into your life. You have so much to teach all of us! Please consider sharing parts of your story on our home page. Our hope is that members of ACEs Connection feel safe and supported enough to share how the adverse childhood experiences they experienced impacts or impacted their life. Your road to recovery is a riveting story just waiting to be shared! No pressure at all, just a nudge. Karen
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Re: How to Build a Better Jail (nationswell.com)
I had the pleasure some years ago, of working with an architect who had previously been on the staff of the National Clearinghouse on Criminal Justice Planning and Architecture, at the University of Illinois-Champaign/Urbana, which was contracted by the Justice Department to develop National Standards for new prison/jail construction and programming. With the subsequent advent of 'trauma-informed care' and our better understanding of the role of ACEs, I wondered what changes might be...
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Re: Use of ACE test in County Jails
Doug - I like your extension of the inquiry. We have conducted two projects in our county jail to improve health, wellness, and self-care management. Our first project focused on improving health literacy and the second on health insurance literacy. Both have been published in Corrections Today as follows: Young, D. & C. Weinert. 2013. Improving Health Literacy with Inmates . Corrections Today , 75(5):70-74. Alexandria, Virginia: American Correctional Association. Young, D. &...
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Re: Behind the Scenes With John Legend & Sesame Street (2 minutes - Sesame Street in Communities)
Many thanks, Stacie Schrieffer LeBlanc, J.D., M.Ed. Executive Director, New Orleans Children’s Advocacy Center & Audrey Hepburn CARE Center Programs of Children's Hospital | Founding Member of LCMC Health 1101 Calhoun I St. New Orleans, LA 7011.8 Office (504)896-9237 | Fax (504)896-9733 Stacie.LeBlanc@lcmchealth.org | www.CHNOLA.org | www.NOCAC.net Help guide our community to protect children from abuse by following and sharing: www.Faceboook.com/NOCAC |...
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Re: From Behind the Wall and Beyond: Working with Men in the Criminal Justice System
I am so so sorry to hear about your husband Angelika. i hope you are able to find peace - it is so important to raise awareness about ACEs and to create trauma-informed systems of care in this world.
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Re: Help our public radio station with a story: How did separation from your parents as a child impact you?
I like this story, but it's just not a Bay Area problem... it's systemic my Dad ran to the Bay Area from Seattle and we still have not healed this relationship. He is still caught up in he's my Dad...which he is not! He never raised me to play with me nor attended me when I am in need. Seattle Alfred
Blog Post
New episode of Transforming Trauma! Compassion Prison Project: Bringing Trauma-informed Care into the Prison System with Fritzi Horstman
Transforming Trauma Episode 017: Compassion Prison Project: Bringing Trauma-informed Care into the Prison System with Fritzi Horstman In this episode of Transforming Trauma, our host Sarah Buino is joined by Fritzi Horstman, Founder and Executive Director of the Compassion Prison Project . Through her work, Fritzi aims to bring trauma-informed care to a population in high need of trauma healing and not likely to receive it: men and women in prison. Sarah and Fritzi discuss Adverse Childhood...
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California reaches milestone with ACEs initiatives pulsing in all 58 counties. Next: All CA cities.
Karen Clemmer, the Northwest community facilitator with ACEs Connection, was already deeply interested in the CDC/Kaiser Permanente Adverse Childhood Experiences Study when she and a colleague from the Child Parent Institute were invited to lunch by ACEs Connection founder and publisher Jane Stevens in 2012. But that lunch meeting changed everything. Karen Clemmer “Jane helped us see a bigger world,” says Clemmer. “She came with a much wider lens. She didn’t look only at Sonoma County, she...
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New Initiative In Trauma-Informed Policing
Cowart Trauma Informed Partnership is thrilled to announce new initiative in trauma-informed policing!
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Police Reform Should Include Implementing ACEs Science
When I first learned about ACEs science, I was working for the local police department as the Director of a crime prevention program. This program was aimed at reducing drug related and violent crime by strengthening community partnerships. Our efforts yielded 19 crime prevention programs implemented by 35 community agencies. Together we reduced crime by 40% in one neighborhood, and pioneered a first probation program of its kind in Tennessee to reduce recidivism. At the end of the grant in...
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New Resource: Coping with Stress During the COVID-19 Pandemic One-Pager (English & Spanish!)
English: The California Department of Public Health, Injury and Prevention Branch (CDPH/IVPB) and the California Department of Social Service, Office of Child Abuse Prevention’s (CDSS/OCAP) , Essentials for Childhood (EfC) Initiative , ACEs Connection , and the Yolo County Children’s Alliance have co-created a newly developed resource, “Coping with Stress During the COVID-19 Pandemic” in both English and Spanish. This material is intended for Californian families experiencing the severe...
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Stories from Incarcerated Women Show the Importance of Furthering Trauma-Informed Care while Prioritizing Decarceration [urban.org]
By Jahnavi Jagannath, Kierra B. Jones, Janeen Buck Willison, Urban Institute, November 5, 2020 Women make up the fastest-growing share of the incarcerated population in the US. Incarceration can be especially traumatic for women, who may experience more harassment and violence while incarcerated and face unique barriers to successful reentry after incarceration. To learn what affects incarcerated women’s feelings of safety and well-being and how prisons can be more responsive to their...