Tagged With "U.S"
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Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Questioning, and/or Gender Nonconforming and Transgender Girls and Boys in the California Juvenile Justice System: A Practice Guide [nclrights.org]
If you are a child welfare professional working with youth in California, chances are this practice guide may be a useful resource! Developed by Impact Justice and the National Center for Lesbian Rights, and published in January 2017, this practice guide is designed to provide probation department practice guidelines, and policy recommendations for working with lesbian, gay, bisexual, questioning, and/or gender nonconforming and transgender girls and boys who interface with the California...
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Live in a Poor Neighborhood? Better Be a Perfect Parent. [NYTimes.com]
Eline’s children feared going to sleep in the closet of their studio apartment, but it was the only place they would be safe from the rats. Covered in blankets from neck to toe, Eline would keep an eye on the kitchen entrance and followed the sounds of the rodents rummaging in the cupboards. I represented Eline (I can’t disclose her real name), a mother of two, in Bronx Family Court when she was charged with neglect. Her younger son had been deemed undernourished because of faltering weight.
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Live in a Poor Neighborhood? Better Be a Perfect Parent (www.nytimes.com)
Note: An article by Emma S. Ketteringham that shows how the system traumatizes and re-traumatizes many children and their parents. My hope is that as we talk about trauma-informed, trauma-aware, self-healing and resilient communities we talk less about how people can do better, try harder and more about we can all be a safer, kinder and treat symptoms of adverse childhood experiences and adverse community experiences and focus on treating the causes of both instead. When I met Eline, she...
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Making the Good Stuff Louder: Trauma Dad, Bryon Hamel
Byron Hamel, (AKA Trauma Dad ), is a filmmaker , children's rights and men's wellness advocate. He's also a father with "ACEs through the roof," who survived child torture at the hands of a man now on death row for infanticide. Before the Father & ACEs chat started last week (see full chat transcript ), we discussed if and how to give a trigger warning. Hamel's experienced horrific trauma during childhood. He didn't want to traumatize those on the chat but wanted to be honest.
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Millions sought to stem arrests at California foster care shelters (sfchronicle.com)
A California lawmaker is calling for $22.7 million in state funding to help prevent unwarranted arrests of abused and neglected children in the state’s residential foster-care facilities — a disturbing practice exposed in a Chronicle investigation last year. The three-year budget proposal, to be introduced next week by Assemblyman Mike Gipson, D-Carson (Los Angeles County), comes as arrests continue across the state at county children’s shelters, despite pledges of reform. While the total...
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New Mexico Agrees to Revamp Its 'Broken' Foster Care System [nytimes.com]
By Dan Levin, The New York Times, March 26, 2020 Kevin S., a teenage victim of sexual abuse, has spent most of his life cycling in and out of nearly a dozen foster homes in New Mexico and treatment centers across the West, including one where he claimed he was restrained and “repeatedly harmed” by staff members and other residents. Diana D., a teenager with severe mental health disorders, entered the New Mexico foster care system when she was 14, and over the next 12 months was prescribed...
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Palatine organization The Bridge helps teen cope with stressors [chicagotribune.com]
The Bridge Youth and Family Services has served children and families in the village of Palatine Illinois since the 1960’s. This private agency provides a wide array of services to youth and families to address childhood trauma and change the trajectories of the families they serve. Services include mental health, crisis intervention, mentoring, and social & emotional groups for families throughout this Chicago suburb. Managing stress takes practice, something The Bridge Youth &...
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Parenting Matters: Supporting Parents of Children Ages 0-8 (The National Academies Press 2016)
A study published by The National Academies of Sciences in 2016 resulting in 10 Recommendations to build support for parents... "Over the past several decades, researchers have identified parenting- related knowledge, attitudes, and practices that are associated with improved developmental outcomes for children and around which parenting- related programs, policies, and messaging initiatives can be designed. However, consensus is lacking on the elements of parenting that are most important...
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Building Resilience in Foster Children: The Role of the Child's Advocate [repository.law.umich.edu]
Children who enter the foster care system often suffer from the effects of traumatic stress. The sources of their trauma may vary: they may be the victims of physical abuse, sexual abuse, or neglect-or they may be exposed to violence in their homes or communities. Similarly, many children who enter the child welfare system have experienced the loss of one or more significant adults in their lives, often through death or abandonment. Although the removal of a child from an abusive or...
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Child Welfare and Human Trafficking - Connections Rooted in Trauma
Recently in Washington State, there has been a massive, multi-pronged coordinated effort to address Commercially Sexually Exploited Children (CSEC) across systems. As this effort made its reach to child welfare, I was reminded of a documentary I watched years ago about two girls who were swept into a life of sexual exploitation, kept from their families and everything familiar. One of the girls was in and out of foster care and group homes, the other had run away from her family home, both...
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Donna Jackson Nakazawa Chats Live with Jane Stevens & You: Nov. 14th
Featured Guest: @Donna Jackson Nakazawa Topic: Well-Being, Self-Care & ACEs Date: November 14th, 2017 Time: 10 AM PST / 1 PM EST Where: Here / Chats Donna Jackson Nakazawa is an winning researcher, writer and public speaker on health and family issues. She explores the intersection between neuroscience, immunology, and the deepest inner workings of the human heart. Her most recent book, Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology, and How You Can Heal , examines...
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Dr. Gabor Maté & Full-Potential Parenting, Even When It Is Hard
Note: Allison Morris had dozens of experts in her summit series through Full-Potential Parenting. I took notes only on those by Donna Jackson Nakazawa , Gabe Maté and Sebern Fisher (coming later this month). Though the audios are no longer available, for free, they can be purchased for $100. or less (depending on the year), here. Forgive me for sounding like an advertisement, I don't know Allison personally. I am a huge fan of all parent-led resources and wish I discovered this series...
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Eunju Lee's Research on Kinship Care: Informing a Community-based ACE Response
Eunju Lee, assistant professor at the University at Albany, is a leading contributor to a body of research focusing on kinship care. Kinship care occurs when children cannot safely stay in the care of their parents due to child maltreatment, parental substance abuse, parental mental health issues or other reasons. In these cases, relatives, or family friends in some jurisdictions, take over the care of the children. Kinship care is often utilized by child welfare services as a diversion from...
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Fewer US Children in Foster Care; First Drop Since 2012 [nytimes.com]
By The Associated Press, The New York Times, October 24, 2019 The number of children in the U.S. foster care system has dropped for the first time since 2012, stemming a surge that was linked to substance abuse by parents, according to new federal data released on Thursday. The annual report from the Department of Health and Human Services counted 437,283 children in foster care as of Sept. 30, 2018, down from about 441,000 a year earlier. The peak was 524,000 children in foster care in...
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Flourishing From The Start: What Is It, And How Can It Be Measured? [childtrends.org]
This comprehensive research brief discusses the important factors needed to promote child well-being across childhood. Of course, recommendations are grounded in maternal-infant health and relationships, but the recommendations also discuss how to build protective factors across developmental domains and the development of the child. The researchers make many actionable recommendations for both practice and policy, as well as how to obtain ongoing data, and make data collection and...
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Foster Youth meets Psychiatry: First Do No pHarm
When a foster youth encounters a psychiatrist, chances are high that s/he will get medicated. Traumatized foster youth are often prescribed powerful psychotropics due to exhibiting a wide variety of “normal reactions to abnormal events”, such as despair, agitation, anxiety and self-harm. The practice has been well documented; foster children are prescribed psychotropics at a 2.7 to 4.5 times higher rate than non-foster youth [1] . The National Center for Youth Law aptly summarizes the...
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Health Status of Young Adult Mothers with a History of Child Welfare Involvement [policylabchop.edu]
How many of you are aware of the disproportionate relationship between adolescent mothers and the child welfare system? As this research points out, although teen pregnancy is on the decline nation-wide, half of female youth who have current or previous involvement with child welfare also experience pregnancy by age 19 – and half of that number have experienced multiple pregnancies by this age. Researchers at Children’s Hospital Philadelphia research institute looked at one Mid-Atlantic city...
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Helping Youth Transition to Adulthood: Guidance for Foster Parents
Please see the attached document to learn more about: The transition to adulthood and self-sufficiency can be challenging for any young person. For teenagers who have been living in foster care, the transition to life outside of care can be daunting. Generally, youth who have experienced foster care do not have the same safety nets and support networks as others their age, and the transition challenges can be even greater.
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How Can State Law Promote School Continuity and Success for Children in Foster Care
The federal Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008 (Fostering Connections) promotes education stability for all children in foster care. A May 2014 joint letter from the U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services and...
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How do these pediatricians do ACEs screening? Early adopters tell all.
Last week, three pediatricians — with a combined experience of 15 years integrating ACEs science into their practices — reflected on the urgency they felt several years ago that prompted them to begin screening patients for childhood adversity and resilience when there was practically no guidance at all. Along their journey , they accumulated a list of lessons learned for other pediatricians and family clinics to use. The three pediatricians participated in the ACEs Connection webinar,...
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HOWEVER KINDLY INTENTIONED: STRUCTURAL RACISM AND VOLUNTEER CASA PROGRAMS [cunylawreview.org]
When we talk about child welfare reform, we shouldn’t shy away from issues of disproportionality and institutionalized oppression, as both are prevalent, present, and deserving of dialogue. One area of conversation I’ve noted of late is with CASA programs. CASA’s are Court Appointed Special Advocates who make recommendations to the court on behalf of the child’s best interest. More often than not, CASA volunteers are well-meaning individuals who give their time to help children. But, many...
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InBrief: Relilience Series [developingchild.harvard.edu]
This series of videos from the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University provide a great resoruce on resilience: 1. InBrief: What is Resilience? 2. InBrief: The Science of Resilience 3. InBreif: How Resilience is Built Reducing the effects of significant adversity on young children’s healthy development is critical to the progress and prosperity of any society. Yet not all children experience lasting harm as a result of adverse early experiences. Some may demonstrate “ resilience...
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2017 Kids Count Data Book [aecf.org]
Wednesday June 14th the Annie E. Casey Foundation released the 2017 Kids Count Data Book - State Trends in Child Well-Being. This comprehensive report is " a premier source of data on children and families." You can download the report from this post, as well as on the Kids Count website , where you can also access an interactive data map in their Data Center . This is an invaluable amount of data available to the public, relevant to anyone working with children and families - with the...
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4 years after integrating ACEs science, Pueblo, CO clinic improves services for families; cuts ER costs, doctor stress
Four years ago, Dr. Leslie Dempsey would never have talked about ACEs — adverse childhood experiences — with her patients. Now ACEs is a common topic. “Just as I don’t feel awkward asking someone if they smoke or do intravenous drugs, I don’t really feel awkward talking about their childhood traumas in a way that it relates to their health. It’s just integrated into obtaining background and social history,” she says. Dr. Leslie Dempsey Dempsey is a physician in obstetrics who oversees a team...
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8th Annual Foster Care Youth Conference- 3/21
Registration is now open for the 8th Annual Foster Care Youth Conference! The conference is open to all foster care and transitional aged youth (ages 14-24) in Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano or Yolo counties. The conference will provide approximately 150 foster care/kinship and transitioning youth with an opportunity to participate in workshops covering resumes and interviewing, communication, trade demos, hair and barbering, fashion, art and sports. Eligible youth will receive a stipend for...
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8th Annual Foster Care Youth Conference- 3/21
Registration is now open for the 8th Annual Foster Care Youth Conference! The conference is open to all foster care and transitional aged youth (ages 14-24) in Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano or Yolo counties. The conference will provide approximately 150 foster care/kinship and transitioning youth with an opportunity to participate in workshops covering resumes and interviewing, communication, trade demos, hair and barbering, fashion, art and sports. Eligible youth will receive a stipend for...
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ACEs Research Corner — February 2020
Editor's note: Dr. Harise Stein at Stanford University edits a web site — abuseresearch.info — that focuses on the health effects of abuse, and includes research articles on ACEs. Every month, she's posting the summaries of the abstracts and links to research articles that address only ACEs science. Thank you, Harise!! -- Jane Stevens] Kambeitz C, Klug MG, Greenmyer J, Popova S, Burd L. Association of adverse childhood experiences and neurodevelopmental disorders in people with fetal alcohol...
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Answering Children's Questions About Foster Care
Recently, a colleague came to me for advice on addressing a very tough question from a child: Why don’t I live with mommy anymore? With roughly 400,000 children in out-of-home placements in the United States, this is a question that gets asked...
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Balancing Adverse Childhood Experiences with Hope [alliance1.org]
This report presents evidence for HOPE (Health Outcomes of Positive Experiences) based on newly released, compelling data that reinforce the need to promote positive experiences for children and families in order to foster healthy childhood development despite the adversity common in so many families. These data: Establish a spirit of hope and optimism and make the case that positive experiences have lasting impact on human development and functioning, without ignoring well-documented...
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Brief Aims to Better Understand How Positive Factors Change Child Trauma [socialjusticesolutions.org]
According to a leading group of children’s advocates, it’s not enough to just study the impact of childhood trauma and how we can lessen its toll on children and adults later in life. Armed with new data, researchers from Center for the Study of Social Policy, Alliance for Strong Families and Communities, Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative, Prevent Child Abuse America, Casey Family Programs and the Montana Institute say that positive childhood experiences are more important...
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PROTECTIVE FACTORS & RESILIENCY (Futures without Violence)
Exposure to domestic violence can have lasting effects on children and teens. Not all young people are affected in the same way, and in fact many children are resilient, able to heal and go on to thrive. Various risk and protective...
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Reimbursement for Parenting Education and Support Services
Unfortunately, regardless of training received and degrees earned, parenting educators can't serve families and get reimbursed by public and private insurers for their services. In an effort to bring light to this issue, I wrote the attached paper with two colleagues at NC State. Our (unpublished) paper outlines research supporting parenting education services and their efficacy to improve individual and family health and long term wellbeing and community prosperity. We highlight the fact...
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Resource List - Trauma Informed Approaches and Autism Spectrum and Other Developmental Disabilities
Resources for individuals, organizations, and communities moving along trauma and hope-informed pathways in order to: Prevent and mitigate adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). Promote resilience and safe, stable, nurturing relationships and environments. Promote equity and racial justice. Prevent substance abuse and promote mental health. … so that all children, youth, families and communities have equal opportunity for educational success, economic stability, health, and well-being.
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Resource List - Trauma Informed Approaches and Autism Spectrum and Other Developmental Disabilities
Resources for individuals, organizations, and communities moving along trauma and hope-informed pathways in order to: Prevent and mitigate adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). Promote resilience and safe, stable, nurturing relationships and environments. Promote equity and racial justice. Prevent substance abuse and promote mental health. … so that all children, youth, families and communities have equal opportunity for educational success, economic stability, health, and well-being.
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Resources for Professionals
Adoption Information & Resources Resources on all aspects of domestic and intercountry adoption, with a focus onadoption from the U.S. foster care system. Includes information for adoption professionals, adopted adults, expectant parents considering adoption, birth parents and relatives, and prospective and adoptive parents on a broad range ofadoption topics. Child Welfare Information Gateway. (2013). Link: https://www.childwelfare.gov/t...?hasBeenRedirected=1 ...
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Self-Taught Techie Designs App to Get At-Risk Kids into Preschool [chronicleofsocialchange.org]
Steve Sturm believes every child should have the same opportunities that his 3-year-old daughter Reagan enjoys. Things like new boots, trips to the trampoline park — and preschool. But for children known to the foster care system, too many miss out on the earliest years of their education. “There wasn’t any real focus on early ed. It was kind of an afterthought,” said Sturm, who works with the education unit at L.A.’s Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS), the biggest child...
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Sentator Dick Durbin and U.S. Rep. Danny Davis Introduce New Legislation: Illinois Children Traumatized [chicagofender.com]
CHICAGO – U.S. Senator Dick Durbin and U.S. Representative Danny Davis on Monday unveiled the Trauma Informed Care for Children and Families Act, which is designed to address the toxic stress and trauma that impacts many children from Chicago’s most violent neighborhoods. “As we work to address the root causes of violence, we need to focus on the impact that community violence and other traumatic experiences have on Chicago’s children,” said Durbin. “During a visit to the Cook County...
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Social Policy Report The Biological Embedding of Child Abuse and Neglect Implications for Policy and Practice
Each year within the US alone over 770,000 children are victimized by abuse and neglect (US Department of Health and Human Services, 2010), and this figure is likely to underestimate the extent of the problem. Researchers have long recognized that...
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Some 350 Florida Leaders Expected to Attend Think Tank with Dr. Vincent Felitti, Co-Principal Investigator of the ACE Study; Expert on ACEs Science
Leaders from across the Sunshine State will take part in a “Think Tank” in Naples, FL, on Monday, August 6, to help create a more trauma-informed Florida. The estimated 350 attendees will include policy makers and community teams made up of school superintendents, law enforcement officers, judges, hospital administrators, mayors, PTA presidents, child welfare experts, mental health and substance abuse treatment providers, philanthropists, university researchers, state agency heads, and...
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Supporting Brain Development in Traumatized Children and Youth
This Administration on Children and Families (ACF) bulletin summarizes the effects of early trauma on brain development and looks at steps child welfare professionals can take to screen for developmental delays and identify the trauma-affected children and youth in their care. It also looks at ways to access cross-sector, therapeutic, and evidence-based treatment to encourage healthy recovery for trauma-affected children and youth. HERE TO ACCESS MATERIALS. Document attached.
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Therapy Dogs and Service Dogs: What Are They and Why Are They Important?
Therapy dogs are used in a wide variety of environments and circumstances but, broadly speaking, they are dogs whose presence is designed to help alleviate stress, promote feelings of well-being and sometimes help with a process of rehabilitation or healing in humans other than their owners.
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We Want Kids to Grow Up in Safe Families. So Let’s Measure That. [chronicleofsocialchange.org]
Our cultural norm of relatives and kin stepping in to help struggling families is ingrained in our history and tradition. The U.S. Supreme Court has conferred constitutional protections on the sanctity of the extended family [ See Moore v. City of East Cleveland, 1977 ]. Federal law encourages states to “consider giving preference to an adult relative over a non-related caregiver when determining placement for a child.” Placements with relatives and kin provide children with greater...
Calendar Event
A New Era of Funding Family Justice (webinar)
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Researchers Find Association between Participation in Extended Foster Care and Reduced Risk of Homelessness [chapinhall.org]
By Huiling Feng, Justin S. Harty, Nathanael J. Okpych, and Mark E. Courtney, Chapin Hall at The University of Chicago, June 2020 A fundamental tenet of the federal Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act of 2008 is that allowing foster youth to remain in care past their 18th birthday would improve their outcomes as adults. One of the most significant challenges transition-age foster youth face is homelessness. Foster youth experience disproportionately higher rates of...
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Rebecca Lewis Pankratz: Breaking Generational Poverty, Poverty Circles, & Poverty Programs
"A CEs Connection is the curator of incredible hope, healing and possibility. Parents are not the bad guys. Most of us are just kids with ACEs who grew up..." Rebecca Lewis-Pankratz Last Friday, @Rebecca Lewis-Pankratz joined our A Better Normal series to discuss poverty circles and programs. Rebecca is the Director of Learning Centers as Essdack, as well as a poverty consultant, and we met online, via Twitter (her handle is @pOVERty’s Edge. Rebecca is a brilliant speaker, gifted writer, and...
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Moving Away from Top-Down Leadership in Child Welfare [imprintnews.org]
By PAUL S. DILORENZO , September 24th, 2020, Imprint News.org The trust level between child welfare leaders and local partners will be a key factor in predicting success for any neighborhood-based family support efforts emerging from a Family First Act planning process. One critical move on that path is enmeshing the work of government and community in a way that elevates the latter. At a government-run child welfare agency, personnel have limitations on their authority and responsibility.
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Navigating Conversations with Youth about Race & Equity [prc-austinmn.org]
By Parenting Resource Center, October 2020 A L L I E D F O L K & T H E P A R E N T I N G R E S O U R C E C E N T E R , I N C . W O U L D L I K E T O I N V I T E P A R E N T S A N D C A R E G I V E R S T O T H I S T W O P A R T O P E N D I A L O G U E A B O U T N A V I G A T I N G C O N V E R S A T I O N S W I T H Y O U T H R E G A R D I N G R A C E A N D E Q U I T Y . This is a two-part series that will take place on October 12th and October 19th at 6 PM. The link to the event will be...