Young Professionals in PACEs

Summer is a time our members are inspired to continue making changes in their communities by learning more about the root cause of issues to ensure success of their movement.

PACEs Connection is excited to roll out our summer 2023 *CRC* curriculum dates. Members who complete the CRC will qualify for a fall 2023 fellowship program.

Program Summary

The PACEs 16-hour Creating Resilient Communities (CRC) accelerator certification program is focused on supporting and developing individual advocates and organizational agents of change in transforming their communities and organizations using PACEs science, trauma-informed awareness and resilience frameworks.

The CRC accelerator will cover fundamental topics such as understanding PACEs science, community organizing, multi-sector collaboration, and strategic planning; as well as several timely topics. Participants who complete all events in the series will receive a Certificate of Completion and will qualify for PACEs Connection fall 2023 fellowship program.

What's new this summer?

We’re thrilled that guest consultants will share their unique wealth of knowledge.

With shootings and violence at an all time high in schools, Introduction to PACEs in Education will support educators and advocates in having a better understanding of the impact of trauma in students and throughout the education system. (This module is a helpful way to understand basics in advance of PACEs Connection’s Trauma-informed Leadership Institute.)

Lara Kain, founder of Lara Kain Consulting, Coordinator, Education consultant, facilitator, and national speaker on implementing school system transformation and trauma-informed practices into schools, will facilitate Introduction to PACEs in Education.

Schools are an integral part of creating a thriving and resilient community. This session will serve as an introduction for both educators and non-educators interested in the effects of Positive and Adverse Childhood Experiences in school settings and the practices of trauma-informed schools. We will take a brief dive into how trauma and adversity affect learning and behavior, why this shift in school culture is so important, and how communities can support the efforts of their local schools. Learn more about Lara here.

Introduction to Arts as Healing a Community will offer creative ways to promote healing.

Mitzi Sinnott, founder of All Here Together Productions, will draw inspiration for this session from hands-on experience with engaging local communities through community murals, multidisciplinary spoken-word performance events, and bridge-building intimate circles. This session will establish an interactive conversational space in which participants can gain insights on designing and organizing community art experiences that invoke a tangible feeling of warmth, engagement, and trust. We’ll honor our unique intuitive voices and together develop artistic ideas that foster personal growth, even when our prior circumstances may have felt beset with disappointment. Participants will complete the workshop better prepared to imagine and hold themselves accountable for leading a successful community-led arts project that fosters healing and catalyzes collective transformation. Learn more about Mitzi here.

Erika Sage Kelley, CEO and principal consultant at Sage Horizons, advances organizational trauma-responsive and diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) best practices using an arts-based approach and healing-centered poetry framework. Ekphrastic poetry is poetry that comments on a work of art. During this workshop, participants will learn how poetry promotes healing from racial trauma by discovering the connections between poetry and the brain and the links between writing and emotional processing. Learn more about Erika Sage Kelley here.

Register for Introduction to PACEs Connection This Summer

As a friendly reminder, attending Introduction to PACEs Connection is a required prerequisite of the CRC. There are several event dates available and you only need to attend ONE time. If you already attended, you will receive links for the remaining events via email. Registration links to the remaining introductory events are listed below. Click the registration link to choose from multiple options:

➤ Introduction to PACEs Connection

Pick Up the CRC Accelerator Certification Program Where You Left Off, This Summer

➤ Review a brief description of each event and this certification overview.

➤ Look out for the dedicated CRC newsletter with a list of event registration links.

➤ If you haven’t seen the list of events, you may want to update your PACEs Connection newsletter settings. Email communitymanager@acesconnection.com if you haven’t received the list of events.

What 2023 CRC Participants Have to Say About the Accelerator

“This is the way forward!” –Laurie Johnson-Wade @ Lost Dreams Awaken Center, Co-Founder

“This training is fantastic for connecting dots and getting the wheels turning about how to effectively implement a PACES lens into the work your non-profit might already be doing. This training has left me with myriad ideas about the intersections at which I can plan to implement opportunities for youth resilience. Both the curriculum and pedagogy were top-notch.” –Kate Brennan, Director of Strategic Growth, Philadelphia City Rowing

“What an incredible learning opportunity this is! Free resources and training and excellent discussion and collaboration with others who are passionate about trauma-informed practice!” –Jonathan Enix, Putnam County Schools

As a Part of the PACEs Movement, It’s Raining Gratitude!

PACEs Connection is grateful that you’re as passionate about trauma-informed awareness and heart-centered resilience building through a PACEs lens as we are. Our science is for everyone who wants to create, grow, and sustain resilient communities. We also know access matters. Thanks to the generosity of grants, Genentech sponsorship, and partners, the *CRC* Accelerator certification program is FREE. Pay it forward through this Click-to-Tweet link we created to make it easier to promote the CRC or share the CRC with your communities and workplaces.

Email Kahshanna Evans, Director of the CRC kevans@pacesconnection.com with any questions, at any time. The consultant staff at PACEs Connection look forward to seeing you soon!

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About the author: Kahshanna Evans brings her passion for uniting people through stories and trauma-informed awareness to her role as the Director of Creating Resilient Communities at PACEs Connection. Kahshanna has been a leading strategic thinker in various industries, including communications, tech, professional services, and wellness.

PACEs Connection is excited to kick off our 2023 Creating Resilient Communities (CRC) Annual Accelerator Program. (Click here to review a brief description of each event. See below for event times).

The 16 hour CRC accelerator is focused on supporting and developing individual advocates and organizational agents of change in transforming their communities and organizations using PACEs trauma-informed awareness and resilience-building frameworks.

The CRC accelerator will cover fundamental topics such as understanding of PACEs science, community organizing, multi-sector collaboration, and strategic planning; as well as several special topics. See below for quick highlights.

Accelerator Program Highlights:

• The accelerator program consists of 16 hours of a mixture of both relevant interactive learning sessions and informative video modules.
• These events are FREE and OPEN to the public!
• Most events repeat on a monthly basis in case you are unable to attend one month.
• IMPORTANT PREREQUISITE!!! Every participant must FIRST attend the Introduction to PACEs Connection event, and then you may attend the remaining events at your own pace.

Getting Started

Once you have attended Introduction to PACEs Connection, confirmed participants will be sent an email containing the registration links for the following events. Register for any, or all, of the events that interest you.

Introduction to PACEs Connection, offered:

Apr 19, 2023 10:00 AM (PST) / 1:00 PM (EST)

Apr 27, 2023 10:00 AM (PST) / 1:00 PM (EST)

May 1, 2023 1:00 PM (PST) / 4:00 PM (EST)

May 11, 2023 9:00 AM (PST) / 12:00 PM (EST)

May 23, 2023 6:00 AM (PST) / 9:00 AM (EST)

Creating Resilient Communities Topics

Introduction to PACEs Science

PACEs Science and Social Justice

Is PACEs a Movement?

A PACEs Science Lens on Organizing for Social Justice

Organizing For Resilient Communities

Restorative Justice: What's Next?

Introduction to PACEs in Education

Environmental Justice 101

Creating Partnerships on the Path to a Just Society

Click here to review a brief description of each event.

REMINDER: Register here for the REQUIRED first event in this series: Introduction to PACEs Connection. There are several options available; you only need to attend this initial event one time.

➤ Stay tuned for a post with additional dates for this series!

➤ Questions about this series? Email Kahshanna Evans, Director of Resilient Communities: kevans@pacesconnection.com

At noon on  Tuesday, October 27, ACEs Connection staff invite you all to join us as we share about our race and equity journey.

Click here to register.

We are hardly experts in race and equity- in fact, we are really just beginning. But by putting in consistent effort over the past several months, we have already made important shifts both internally as an organization, as well as through the content we reflect on the network. We have a long way yet to go.

Our journey started with not reckoning. Then, we took that first step; stumbling; then ultimately recommitting. We’d like to share with the ACEs Connection community about our process of incorporating equitable practices in our organization, and in becoming more purposeful in addressing racial  and historical trauma as an organization. We hope that you will dialogue and share with us as well. We know we have much to learn from you all.

A Brief Background on our Journey

In July 2019, ACEs Connection staff held our first race and equity workgroup meeting. We met to brainstorm an approach, and our colleague Ingrid Cockhren advised us to take a step back and to do some staff-wide fundamental education about race and equity. Ingrid has a background in diversity, equity and inclusion training, and offered to lead this work for our team.

Post training, there was a gap in our race and equity work, a gap that was highlighted when George Floyd was murdered by police officer Derek Chauvin in Minneapolis, MN on May 25, 2020, after being held down with Chauvin’s knee on his neck for eight minutes, while handcuffed. The murder was caught on video, and sparked nationwide social and political protest against racially motivated, and systemically unaccountable, police brutality.

Staff at ACEs Connection wanted to make a statement denouncing this brutal display of systemic racial injustice, and we realized that the race and equity workgroup would have been the best space to draft this statement. We were regretful that we had not prioritized the workgroup since the first phase of our training concluded, and so we resolved to meet weekly, which we have done since June 18, 2020. Setting, and keeping, this meeting time has been a key component in our race and equity commitment at ACEs Connection. Please see this post to read the reflections from our race and equity workgroup members about our equity process thus far.

Below are a few of the ways race and equity is reflected in our content on ACEs Connection as a result of our internal training, and workgroup process, with more to come:

Anti-Racism Resources List

Ep.7 - Racial Health Inequities of COVID-19 [A Better Normal Series]

Ep.17 - Systems Transformation [A Better Normal]

Ep.25 - Racial Trauma & How to be Anti-Racist [A Better Normal Series]

Ep.28 - LGBTQ+ Identity and Race in the US: An Intersectional Discussion [A Better Normal Series]

Ep. 32 - Reinterpreting American Identity [A Better Normal Series]

Ep.52 - Can universal ACEs screening be equitable? Concerns and solutions. [A Better Normal]

Ep.54 Real Talk with Rafael [A Better Normal Series]

Nonprofit charity Jennifer Ann's Group has announced the latest video games from their annual game design challenge. The annual competition challenges game developers to create prosocial video games about issues impacting adolescents; past themes include consent, healthy relationships, bystander awareness, and gaslighting.

As part of the award-winning Gaming Against Violence program, for this 13th Annual Life.Love. Game Design Challenge video game designers were asked to create games about culture and the impact it has on young people's attitudes and beliefs about dating and healthy relationships. As with their previous game design challenges, the video games cannot contain any onscreen depictions of violence.

First place is Culture Overlord, from Lucas Vially in France, which allows the player to determine the mass media items used by the game's protagonist, Dan. The player decides what books Dan will read, the TV shows Dan watches, even the websites that Dan visits. These choices then determine Dan's decisions as he pursues "the new girl" at his school.

→ Watch the Video: Game trailer for Culture Overlord (YouTube)

Second place is Sea of Roses, from Midnight Moon of Tea, in Portugal, which shares the story of Marion. Marion is a budding potion maker from the past who has suddenly found herself in the present. Players will help Marion explore a new world while also helping her to reconsider the past.

→ Watch the Video: Game trailer for Sea of Roses (YouTube)

Third place is A Thousand Cuts, from Elizabeth Ballou, in the U.S., which explores campus culture and its impact on a student who is considering if they should go through the Title IX process. As the game's developer, Elizabeth Ballou, states,

"campus sexual assault is far more complex than it's often made out to be in headlines. The intersection of Title IX stipulations, the legal system, and a school's interest in protecting itself all make for a justice process that's shrouded in secrecy and hesitation. My hope is that my game might place players within this process, so that players understand the individuals caught in the center of it."

'A Thousand Cuts' and the other winning games will be available soon. Since 2008 Jennifer Ann's Group has published dozens of free video games for use by parents and in classrooms.

According to Drew Crecente of Jennifer Ann's Group, “these video games encourage players to explore, examine, and evaluate the role one’s culture can play in forming their attitudes regarding dating and healthy relationships.”

Several of the previously published games have been honored recently. In early 2020 the gaslighting game ‘Lamplight Hollow’ was a winner of JungleJam and featured at DreamHack Anaheim. In 2019 the consent game ‘Rispek Danis’ was recognized at the 2019 Games for Change Awards as a nominee for ‘Most Significant Impact.’ Also in 2019, the healthy relationship game HONEYMOON was included in the excellent reference guide for Educators: 100 Games to Use in the Classroom & Beyond.

Six of the video games published through the Gaming Against Violence program are featured in peer-reviewed published studies showing their effectiveness at changing unhealthy beliefs and attitudes regarding relationship and gender norms.

The intention of the Life.Love. Game Design Challenge is to develop and research prosocial video games about sensitive issues impacting adolescents in an effort to educate and empower young people around the world. The contest is the longest-running of its kind and has been recognized as a Top 10 Trailblazer by the National Youth Advisory Board for its unique approach to teen dating violence prevention through prosocial video games.

Additional winning games and screenshots as well as further details about these culture video games are in the official press release, Winners Announced: Video Games Exploring Culture's Influence on Dating

In a conversational style, join physician Drew Factor who will speak with Dr. Tracy Gaudet, Liza Guroff and Ané Watts in a discussion entitled "Reimagining Health Care". Dr. Gaudet will speak about her experience engaging in transformational change at the Veterans Administration and how this has shaped the development of her own Functional Medicine Institute, while Ms. Guroff and Ms. Watts will speak about their knowledge of a Trauma-Informed Approach both at a systems (National Council for Behavioral Health) and individual (personal coach) level.

WHEN:  Friday, October 23, 2020, 12pm - 1pm PT

REGISTER AT THIS LINK

The downstream effect of childhood trauma has been well documented regarding the biological and psychosocial impacts. This presentation will highlight the neurobiological changes associated with ACEs that function as a "primer" for the onset of addiction and related behaviors. It will conclude with principles for influencing these same pathways that assist with restoration of the mind and health downstream effect of childhood trauma  has been well documented regarding the biological and psychosocial impacts.

Susie Wiet, MD is an integrative developmental psychiatrist with expertise in holistic
treatment of trauma-addiction, dual diagnosis, and complex psychiatric disorders. She is
the founder and owner of Sovegna (a multi-disciplinary treatment center for recovery) and
the Trauma-Resiliency Collaborative (multi-disciplinary volunteer organization). During her
personal time, she enjoys learning from her children, celebrating time with family and
friends, expanding her creativity, practicing yoga, and deepening her faith.

She graduated from Northwestern University Medical School (Chicago, IL) and trained at the University of Utah in General Psychiatry and Child/Adolescent Psychiatry (fellowship). She holds three American Medical Board certifications: General Psychiatry, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and Addiction Medicine. She is a member of several professional organizations, most recently Institute of Functional Medicine.

For questions about registration, please email Kelly Flugum at kelly.flugum@cirinc.org

For questions about CALIFORNIA ACES ACADEMY, please email Nicole Taylor at nicole@avahealth.org

[Please click here to learn more about the CALIFORNIA ACES ACADEMY from Academy of Violence and Abuse.]

Original Flyer attached below.

Please join us for the ongoing community discussion of A Better Normal, our series in which we envision the future as trauma-informed. 

Friday, August 14th, 2020 
12pm PT // 1pm MT // 2pm CT // 3pm ET
Hosted by Alison Cebulla and facilitated by Cissy White of ACEs Connection with Guest Nick Larson, lead singer of band Próxima Parada.

>>Click here to register<<

"Before any of us had the vocabulary to define ACEs [ACEs = adverse childhood experiences], we were using music as the language of healing." - Cissy White, ACEs Connection, Community Manager

I am excited to bring Próxima Parada lead singer and long-time friend Nick Larson to A Better Normal for a conversation on Healing Trauma Through Music. Their latest album includes a song about growing up with alcoholism in the family in a transformative and healing way that only music can do. There is an awareness throughout the album that pain can be transformed into beauty, the importance of connection, and the pain beneath habits and negative coping strategies. 

The discussion will focus on some of the following themes:

• Music that heals--specific songs, bands, and albums that helped us cope in childhood and adulthood and why
• The calling to be an artist and how that calling intertwined with the calling to be a healer: helping people feel and experience a whole range of human emotions from pain to joy
• The personal stories of trauma transformation behind some of Nick's songs

Próxima Parada’s latest release, Kind Reminder, is 10 songs that help us overcome personal struggles, affirm life, access joy in the present moment, and find peace. Their songs are about acceptance and vulnerability in one form or another, and in every song, the music says just as much as the lyrics. Próxima Parada specializes in music that is both meaningful and a hell of a lot of fun. Starting in 2012 as a group of college friends wanting to extend their dynamic to their community in San Luis Obispo, CA, they never dreamed that they would tour nationally, perform at festivals, and that their music would soothe and uplift people around the world, with 150,000 monthly listens on Spotify, and many songs with 1-2 million+ listens.

>>Click here to register<<

Listen to Próxima Parada'a soulful and uplifting music in advance of this A Better Normal Episode:

• Spotify
• Apple Music
• YouTube

Connect with Próxima Parada on Social Media:

• Instagram
• Facebook
• Website

Please join us for the ongoing community discussion of A Better Normal, our ongoing series in which we envision the future as trauma-informed. 

LGBTQ+ Identity and Race in the US: An Intersectional Discussion On Historical and Generational Trauma

With Panelists Rev. Dr. D. Mark Wilson and Alexander Cho, Ph.D., Moderated by ACEs Connection staff members Jenna Quinn and Alison Cebulla

Friday, June 19th, 2020
Noon to 1pm, PT (3pm to 4pm ET)

>>Click here to register<<

Please join us in honoring both Pride Month and Juneteenth in this intersectional discussion with two experts on LGBTQ+ Identity and Race in the US. We will be launching our new LGBTQ+ ACEs Connection Community this week.

"The month of June was chosen for LGBT Pride Month to commemorate the Stonewall riots, which occurred at the end of June 1969. As a result, many pride events are held during this month to recognize the impact LGBT people have had in the world." ("Gay Pride", wikipedia.org)

"Juneteenth is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States. Dating back to 1865, it was on June 19th that the Union soldiers, led by Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas with news that the war had ended and that the enslaved were now free. Note that this was two and a half years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation - which had become official January 1, 1863." ("History of Juneteenth", Juneteenth.com)

Please join our ACEs & African Americans community here.

Discussion will strive to include the following topics (time permitting):

• What do people need to know about the historical and generational trauma at the intersection of being a person of color and LGBTQ+ in the United States?
• What is the path forward to healing?
• What changes have you seen already in your lifetimes? What needs to change?
• Digital/social media use (positives and negatives) for queer people of color
• Interdependence vs individualism
• Black lives were never meant to matter: a history
• Historical movements: The Black Power Movement in the 1960s, the Black Consciousness and Arts Movement while at Howard University, a black college, in the 1970s-1980s,  The Black Gay Literary Movement and Afro-Centric Hip Hop Movement of the 1980s-1990s
• White privilege and entitlement; white shame and guilt
• Whiteness, race, and the LGBTQ+ community
• African American and black churches and homophobia
• Recognizing the contributions of LGBTQ+ people to the African American church

>>Click here to register<<

Rev. Dr. D. Mark Wilson is an African American clergyperson ordained in the American Baptist Churches, USA, the former Senior Pastor of McGee Avenue Baptist Church (Berkeley), where he served for twelve years. He earned his undergraduate degree from Howard University, his Masters of Divinity Degree from Harvard Divinity School and Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Michigan.  He is the current Director of Music at Easter Hill United Methodist Church and the former Assistant Professor of Congregational Leadership at the Pacific School of Religion. In additional to his work as a pastor, he is a Lecturer in the Department of Sociology Department at St. Mary’s College of Moraga, California and Continuing Lecturer in the Music Department of University of California at Berkeley, where he conducts the UC Berkeley Gospel Chorus.  In addition to creating courses on race, ethnicity, gender and LGBTQ equality at St. Mary’s College of Moraga, Dr. Wilson has used musical performance to create diversity and global justice throughout the community and world in Cuba, Nicaragua and Sri Lanka.  When he’s not sharing music around the world, he can be heard singing in the bass section and performing solos in the Cantare Con Vivo Chorale, directed by David Morales. Pastor Mark, as he is affectionately known to church members, is the Bay Area’s first African American pastor to come out as a gay man in a Bay Area African American Baptist Church and to be welcomed and embraced by the church’s membership. He has also been an early leader of the Welcoming and Affirming Movement to affirm LGBTIQ people in the Baptist faith community.  He is a member of City of Refuge United Church of Christ and former Outreach Coordinator for the Project Trust Collaboration of San Francisco Theological Seminary and Kaiser Hospital, addressing spirituality and mental health. 

Alexander Cho, Ph.D., is an expert in LGBTQ youth digital media use, race and ethnicity, and digital design. He is the University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellow in Informatics at UC Irvine and incoming Assistant Professor of Asian American Studies at UC Santa Barbara. He is co-author of "The Digital Edge: How Black and Latino Youth Navigate Digital Inequality" (NYU Press) and co-editor of the forthcoming "a tumblr book: Platform and Cultures" (University of Michigan Press). He is active in policy and advocacy settings, most recently working with UNICEF as lead author of the report "Digital Civic Engagement by Young People." Prior to his academic work, Alex was a journalist and editor, including publishing the worldwide exclusive coming-out interview with Star Trek icon George Takei. Website.

>>Click here to register<<

Equity & Inclusion Statement

ACEs Connection is an anti-racist organization committed to the pursuit of social justice.

In our work to promote resilience and prevent and mitigate ACEs, we will intentionally embrace and uplift people who have historically not had a seat at the table. ACEs Connection will celebrate the voices and tell the stories of people who have been barred from decision making and who have shouldered the burden of systemic and economic oppression as the result of genocide, slavery, family separation, forced relocation, mass incarceration, red lining and all other practices, policies and institutions that have traumatized marginalized groups. These groups include people of color, people living with mental health and substance use challenges, people living with disabilities, and members of the LGBTQI community. 

Of interest: 

Spend June 5 with members of the new National Academies report: Realizing Opportunity for All Youth

Announcement in ACES Connection calendar : June 5 Calendar Announcement

https://www.pacesconnection.com...nal-academies-report

or at Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy, University of Virginia  (ILPPP)

https://ilppp.virginia.edu/ORE...ePrograms/Course/144

Working with the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine ILPPP is providing opportunity to learn about the National Academies' new report, Realizing Opportunity for All Youth that finds ample evidence that changes in brain structure and connectivity that happen in adolescence present young people with unique opportunities for positive, life-shaping development, and for recovery from past adversity.

Faculty for the day will be Richard Bonnie, Professor with the UVA School of Law, and ILPPP Director, who was chair of the committee producing the report. Other presenters from the report committee include Joanna Williams PhD, UVA Curry School of Education, and Susan Mangold, Esq. Juvenile Law Center, Philadelphia. Discussants will include Andrew Block JD, Associate Professor of Law and Director of the State and Local Government Clinic with the UVA School of Law, and Julia Taylor MD, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics with the UVA School of Medicine, from leadership of the Virginia Department of Development Health and Behavioral Services and the Virginia Department of Social Services. 

You are extraordinary.

Writing this post feels like I have come full circle. In April of 2019, Alfred White reached out to me on ACEs Connection. Shortly after, we spoke at length about the plans he had to create a place of healing and hope in Federal Way and King County, Washington, specifically for individuals with a history of trauma and who were now impacted with symptoms such as addiction and homelessness. I recall sharing with Alfred that there was such a need for this in that community, but doubt if the community was ready for such an endeavor. It would be another ten months before I spoke with Alfred again, and when I did, I was happy to learn that he had proven me wrong.

When Alfred and I reconnected in early 2020, I was shocked to learn that he had been battling extensive chronic health conditions – health conditions that resulted from a generational and lifelong history of trauma and adversity that had begun before he was even born. Alfred shared with me that he had been diagnosed with liver cancer and was awaiting a liver transplant. He shared that he also had fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and a series of other health conditions. The trauma impacting Alfred’s mind, body, and soul manifested in his life as substance abuse, homelessness, and criminality. This culminated with Alfred swallowing 1/4oz of crack cocaine, ultimately having a near miss with death, and making the decision that it was time to get clean and sober. 

An image of Alfred after his last encounter with substances.

Despite the extensive challenges on top of intergenerational trauma and early adversity, Alfred demonstrates a great deal of hope and resilience. He secured a property and partnered with a general contractor to renovate a space into a resilient residential treatment facility, and he continues to pursue connections to breathe life into his vision for a healing center. Alfred impresses and inspires me on a daily basis, proving that our traumas and our histories do not define us.

It was an honor when Alfred extended an opportunity of partnership to me. My passion for supporting children and families, as well as building community capacities, aligned well with the plans he described. Alfred is the Founder of The League of Extraordinary People. My heart was filled when we finalized our Mission and Vision statements earlier this week. There is no greater feeling for me than the fulfillment I experience when engaging in work to empower others. If this work resonates with you as it did with me, we would love to connect with anyone, particularly those who are peers as Alfred is. No matter your background, skill, or experience, you are extraordinary and have something meaningful to contribute to this work! As we progress through this virtual time, many opportunities for volunteering are available – for example, content development, writing and editing, photography, or even simply sharing your journey with us to inspire others.

Our mission is to launch an educational and spiritual enrichment revolution to build hope, resilience, and healing through community empowerment.

Our vision is to establish a transformational, integrative, and replicable self-healing Center of Extraordinary People. This residential community model will heal transgenerational trauma through a foundation of safety, trustworthiness and transparency, peer support, collaboration and mutuality, empowerment of voice and choice, and purposefully elevating historical ethnic and cultural legacies.

Be part of The League of Extraordinary People!

You can find us at www.tloep.org.