Aligning Resources Across Georgia To Support Resiliency
To Our Resilient Georgia Partners and Stakeholders:
Many of us are reeling from recent news events. Here is a heart-warming video of a brother helping his sibling practice mindful breathing and reminding us all to take deep breaths to help ground ourselves. First we center, and then we do everything else.

That said, we would like to take a moment to share this article about talking to the children in your life about racism. The end of the article provides a brief list of things you can do today as a parent or caregiver. We encourage you to reach out to those around you that experience racism and check in on them. Meaningful relationships grow and flourish when you are willing to have meaningful, sometimes uncomfortable conversations.

Resilient Georgia, in partnership with the Pittulloch Foundation, is proud to announce that our regional work has expanded to include four new grantee coalitions in Clayton County, Cobb County, Gwinnett County, and Valdosta County and surrounding areas. We now have 12 regional coalitions working diligently across the state to provide a regional emphasis on trauma-informed awareness and care, ACEs, and child sexual abuse prevention training as a basis to transform systems and procedures crossing both public and private sectors. Check out a WALB news10 segment on the critical coalition efforts already underway to address the current mental health pandemic in Valdosta and surrounding areas.

We would also like to highlight several resources and news updates:
  • We hope you take a few minutes to watch this video medical students at the Medical College of Georgia produced titled, "Stay Inside - A Toast to the Frontline". It is a fantastic tribute to essential workers and the incredible work they have done this past year. Please share widely!
  • We are proud of the work our regional grantee, United Way of Southwest Georgia, is leading with their efforts on "Reimaging Albany", a campaign that aims to strengthen the education and health systems and build wealth in the community, which was recently highlighted as part of the Georgia Systemic Change Alliance.
  • Child psychiatrist, CEO of eMed & former AMA President, Dr. Patrice Harris, joined NPR's "Morning Edition" and discussed the lasting impact of the pandemic on children's mental health that teachers should look out for as they transition back to in-person learning.
  • Sign up here for a free Mindful Self Compassion: 1-Day Workshop, a 1-day evidence-based skills-building workshop in mindful self-compassion. This training helps participants learn fundamental concepts and skills in mindfulness and self-compassion. The workshop is also available on Monday, June 21st & August 23rd, 9:00 am – 4:00 pm (IN-PERSON) at Frank Murray Community Center, Savannah, GA.
  • We would like to draw your attention to this helpful factsheet from Voices for Georgia's Children that nicely illustrates and explains the impact of positive and negative life experiences on the brain development of children and adolescents.
  • Finally, learn more about Cobb County Police Department's new Community Affairs Unit tasked with responding to mental health crises and meet the unit's first Crisis Response Officer, Jacob King, in this public service announcement. 
Thank you as always for your continued partnership and support, and for continuing to share helpful resources and training with us to disseminate as we all work collectively towards a more resilient and trauma-informed Georgia! 

Sincerely,

Brenda Fitzgerald, MD
Executive Board Chair
&
Emily Anne Vall, PhD
Executive Director
Innovative Community Organizations Spotlight

Can you give us a brief description of STAR-C?

Star-C is a 501(c)(3) non-profit with a mission to reduce transiency in local schools and improve students’ academic success by providing wraparound services to families living in affordable apartments.

Building on a foundation of affordable housing for working families, Star-C offers: free, onsite afterschool program and summer camp; access to affordable healthcare; food security & eviction relief.
What are some of the innovative partnerships that have helped address the behavioral health needs of the region?
In 2018, Star-C partnered with Springview Apartments, a 244-unit severely blighted apartment community in SW Atlanta, near a low-performing school.
Star-C created a broad collaboration of community partners including Morehouse Medical,
Kaboom Playgrounds, Car-Max Foundation, Atlanta Public Schools, numerous churches, Atlanta Housing, Georgia Power, and other organizations to provide convenient on-site resources and services for the residents.
What are some accomplishments you would like to highlight?
  • Star-C started an “Eviction Lab” in 2019 to build a platform of funders and resources to assist tenants with temporary rental setbacks. 
  • Fast forward to 2020 and COVID-19, Star-C launched a $50,000 Go Fund Me to offer rental assistance. As of today, the Star-C Eviction Relief program has 330 participating apartment properties across metro Atlanta, encompassing 65,000 apartment units, and has paid over $5.0 million in rent assistance to 3,200 families. They just raised another $4.0 million to help fund rental assistance for another 2,000 families.

Click here to read more about the inspiring work Star-C is doing.
Mental Health is the Next Pandemic
As we mark one year of the Covid-19 pandemic, we continue to learn more about its impact on the mental health of Americans. A press release from the American Psychological Association reports that nearly half of parents of children under 18 (48%) stated that "the level of stress in their life has increased compared with before the pandemic." The press release shares similar statistics that point to the need for more mental health resources and support for parents. They end by sharing a few tips on how parents can stay healthy such as practicing self-care in 15 or 30-minute increments throughout the day.

Looking towards solutions, Strong4life has provided resources for parents/caregivers and educators on how to create calming spaces for children. The resource for educators gives tips on how to set up an effective calming corner in the classroom, make a calmer corner work, and what to include in a calming corner. The resources for creating a calming corner at home features similar tips for the classroom and more, while also emphasizing the importance of these spaces in helping kids learn how to manage their emotions and build resiliency.

Expanding on our conversation from Cobb County's Police department PSA (shared in this newsletter's top section) on new ways of addressing mental health crisis outside of direct law enforcement, Colorado State Representative, Leslie Herod presents a TEDTalk on the research-back approach of having mental health professionals respond to emergency mental health calls in place of police officers.
Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs)
Dr. Christina Bethell, director of the Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, shares a different perspective on ACES; many people who experienced ACEs also had positive experiences as children that made a difference in adulthood. For example, having a caring adult in your life is a positive experience. Her research found that when this need was met in childhood, "the odds were 72% less that people had depression or poor mental health as adults, even after adjusting for ACEs." While interpreting these findings with Rise Magazine, she advocates that schools and community entities promote health and positive relationships to foster PCEs.

This week, we would like to share some resources that can help create and foster these important positive childhood experiences. First up, is the Grow Kinder Podcast from the Committee for Children, a podcast on building social-emotional skills. The hosts have "conversations with thought leaders in education, business, tech, and the arts [dedicated] to growing kinder and helping others do the same." In addition, read about 7 tips to teach kids/students to be resilient by The Imagine Project. Similarly, Hey Sigmund also provides 20 Practical, Powerful Strategies (Backed by Science) to build resiliency in children. Finally, caregivers and educators can guide children through mindfulness practices using Mind Yeti, also available in Spanish.
COVID-19 Resources
  • Results of a national probability survey coauthored by Emory University researchers found that "one in eight residents of the United States had been infected with SARS-CoV-2 by the end of October 2020." Other notable findings include; "people living in metropolitan areas are 2.5 more likely to be infected than those living in non-metropolitan areas, and people who are Black and Hispanic were more likely than whites to have experienced SARS-CoV-2 infection."

  • Parents and caregivers can look to these researchers featured by the American Psychological Association on how to effectively communicate with their teens during quarantine. The researchers offer guidance on how to check-in on teen's mental health and talk about race and racism among others.

  • The Georgia Charitable Care Network (GCCN) has been working closely over the last few months with Sosento, Inc. on a patient education resource "COVID Ender's Toolkit" for clinics serving safety-net patients. The toolkit contains easily-deployable tools and downloadable resources that support these clinics in promoting vaccine education and distribution. 
Racial Equity Resources
  • This short NPR special series story reports on an unexpected positive upside of distance learning for some Black students. For these students, remote learning has offered them an escape from harsher discipline, systemic racism, classroom bias, and a chance to thrive in their academics.

  • Read more about the results of this Princeton study looking into the association between eviction, which disproportionally affects Black and Hispanic women and adverse birth outcomes in Georgia. The results, published in the Journal of American Medical Association, found that "eviction actions during pregnancy, as opposed to eviction actions at any other time, were associated with worse birth outcomes".
Be sure to read additional resources on the topics above, and more, here.
“Hang on to your hat. Hang on to your hope. And wind the clock, for tomorrow is another day.”
- E.B. White