A movement to motivate the incoming administration to proclaim the next 10 years as the DECADE OF THE CHILD is being led and launched by the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives, (NPSC) with support from PACEs Connection and a growing list of research, public, behavioral, and mental health-oriented organizations, as well as nonprofits supporting child advocacy, policy, and social justice.
“Our nation is failing its children. Despite our economic power, millions of children in the United States face grim realities. We need an unprecedented mobilization—a comprehensive, coordinated strategy to prioritize the health and well-being of every child in America, said Diana Fishbein, PhD, founder, president, and co-director of NPSC, in announcing news of the movement.
“We will seek congressional support for both policy change and dollars to be allocated to the National Institute for Health (NIH) for whole child health and wellbeing research, and are launching the movement to unite people, organizations, and agencies to mobilize an unprecedented national movement. We are working to end the deficiencies and disparities in child health and wellbeing, and envision future generations of happy, healthy, and productive children and adults” said Fishbein.
A general description of the initiative can be found on the NPSC website. NPSC intends to invoke the same process used to proclaim the Decade of the Brain in the 1990s.
“We would like to be able to document widespread support for creating this movement. Your organizational and individual endorsement could make a critical difference. Our list of supportive organizations, foundations, societies, and individuals is rapidly growing, which is a heartening sign. We would love to see as many of the almost 61,000 individual members of PACEs Connection sign on as possible,” said Fishbein.
“Our hope is that you will indicate your individual support and possibly also that of your organization for the Decade of the Child on our website. We are not asking for money; we just want to marshal the power of organizations, institutions, foundations, communities, and individuals to spread the word about the value of this initiative, so please repost this PACEs Connection story using the social media icons below the post” Fishbein said.
Organizations may also customize a request for individual members to endorse the movement by using materials on the NPSC site. They may also send out a more generic request if desired.
“It is past time for the ‘Decade of the Child’ as too many of our children are suffering. We need all people concerned about the health and wellbeing of our nation’s children to be involved in bringing others on board to help,” said Fishbein.
Organizational endorsements will be updated frequently on the NPSC website. They are, as of October 23, 2024
Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation (PIRE)
Applied Prevention Science International
Integrated Care for Kids/InCK Marks Network
HEDCO Institute for Evidence-Based Educational Practice
Association for Positive Behavior Support (APBS)
itotheN | Intergenerational Impact
Positive Childhood Alliance North Carolina
Institute for Research and Development “Utrip”
Partnership to End Addiction
Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development
Campaign for Trauma-Informed Policy & Practice
Center for Whole Health Learning in K-12
Association For Behavior Analysis International
Nova Institute for Health
Global Alliance for Behavioral Health & Social Justice
We’re still here, and grateful to generous members that the PACEs Connection social networking site is still up!
Generous donations by 22 PACES Connection members — including one large gift from the Jacob and Valeria Langeloth Foundation as directed by long-time supporter Lori Dorfman, DrPH — means PACEs Connection met the deadline to stay afloat for another couple of months before one of its important assets, the Resource Center, and its carefully curated database of journal articles, personal and community supports, videos, free handouts, and more, could be lost due to nonpayment.
This news comes amidst the addition of member number 61,000 to the PACEs Connection family.
“We’re grateful to be up and running and heading toward ways to become more self-sustaining,” said Dana Brown, one of the two former staffers who, as volunteers, are working to revitalize the site.
“It’s great news, too, that we are now at 61,000 members, which is impressive, and will be more so as we revitalize the site and hopefully help members get back in the rhythm of sharing their successes,” said Carey Sipp, the second former staffer working as a volunteer to keep the site going and to find and create secure funding for PACEs Connection’s sustainability.
“We’re far from safe as we have a $3500 payment due to the platform for the Resource Center in about 45 days,” adds Brown.
“We hope that before the big bill of about $40,000 for the learning management system — Crowdstack — comes due in March, 2025, our work to secure funding and monetize the site will not only keep it afloat, but be the step toward revitalizing it to become the vibrant center of updates on preventing and healing trauma, and reporting on outstanding community efforts worldwide to create the positive childhood and community experiences that science shows to be so effective in preventing adult mental illness,” said Sipp.
Sipp and Brown rehomed PACEs Connection to the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives (NPSC) in August.
“We need member support to sustain this social networking site and help energize members — longtime and brand new — to share the work being done and to report the stories and successes of the PACEs movement,” said Brown.
“If every member of PACEs Connection just donated $5 a month, the social network could be back in full swing again soon, offering learning opportunities, and new ways to support and connect members and communities,” Brown added.
Tax-deductible donations to support PACEs Connection can be made to its fiscal sponsor, NPSC, here, You may also mail a check, made out to the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives – with “PACEs Connection” on the memo line – in care of Dana Brown, 4364 Bonita Road, PMB322, Bonita, CA 91902. To make a wire transfer or other type of gift, please email Carey Sipp at carey.pacescommunities@gmail.com to receive NPSC’s wire transfer or other electronic funds transfer information. No amount is too small!
Dorfman, who helped make possible the sizable gift toward meeting the Crowdstack payment, is director of the Berkeley Media Studies Group, (BMSG) a project of the Public Health Institute.
Saying she is delighted to hear news of PACEs Connection meeting the funding deadline to maintain the site, Dorfman encourages other members to join her in donating personally, as well as, if they are in a position to do so, to direct foundation or corporate gifts.
“BMSG has conducted research on media portrayals of ACEs science for many years. BMSG found that the number of (ACEs) stories increased dramatically after 2012 – the year science journalist Jane Stevens founded the social network comprising ACEs Too High and ACEs Connection – especially in local and regional news outlets, even though the number of stories was low compared to other topics. We need to see more stories about ACEs, and how communities are addressing them,” Dorfman said.
“It is so important that policymakers, community leaders, medical schools, parents, communities of faith — all sectors — understand the consequences of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), and that we can buffer ACEs with positive childhood experiences (PCEs), which enable children to feel and express empathy,” said Dorfman. “We need widespread community attention, and the 61,000 members of this network can make it happen,” she said.
Please help us save the Resource Center with your tax-deductible gift today, here.
With the December 31, 2024, deadline looming for payment to maintain the PACEs Connection Resource Center, we hope you’ll help protect this invaluable benefit of your free membership and put supporting PACEs Connection at the top of your list.
“There’s not another resource like this,” said Dana Brown, one of two former PACEs Connection employees working as volunteers to keep the site going since it was revitalized in October, after it had been shut down in April 2024, for lack of funding. Please make your tax-deductible gift today, here.
“The Resource Center represents 13 years of collecting and curating peer-reviewed scientific journal articles and reports, videos, presentations, and more,” said Carey Sipp, the second former PACEs Connection staffer working to secure funding necessary to keep PACEs Connection up and running.
“Several years ago we started including ‘Research Corner’ reports edited by our dear friend and supporter Harise Stein, MD, of Stanford University, who sends a monthly report of the most recent articles on the effects of abuse, as well as summaries of the abstracts and links to research articles that address only adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), positive childhood experiences (PCEs) and the science of positive and adverse childhood experiences (PACEs),” said Sipp.
“Saving, in one place, this information about the lifelong effects of positive and adverse childhood experiences—and ways to promote nurturing conditions for children, families, and communities—is too important to leave to chance,” Sipp added.
With encouragement and support from the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives (NPSC) and PACEs Connection’s former fiscal sponsor, Third Sector New England (TSNE)—as well as from many individual supporters—Brown and Sipp helped re-home PACEs Connection to NPSC in September 2024. NPSC now serves as the fiscal sponsor and governing body for PACEs Connection.
Thank you to each of you who donated to PACEs Connection and supported the successful payment to our learning management system, Crowdstack, by November 11th! Your financial support was appreciated tremendously as we collectively raised the $ 14,778.81 needed to maintain our social networking site.
We need your help to continue raising awareness.
The Resource Center is built on a separate technology platform from PACEs Connection, but is linked to it. The platform, “LibGuides” touts itself as being “librarian-first platform for a digital-first world” and is used by libraries and learning institutions worldwide. The annual fee for maintaining the PACEs Connection Resource Center is $3500, due December 31, 2024, or the Resource Center goes down.
“Thanks to the brilliance of PACEs Connection founder Jane Stevens, we’ve offered all the resources here at PACEs Connection at no charge for the last 13 years, and have made posting blogs about conferences, workshops, and consulting services free on the site since its inception,” said Brown.
“There are now more than 61,000 members of this social networking site. We hope our members – especially business owner members who’ve benefited from the years of free publicity PACEs Connection has provided—will support us during this season of year-end giving,” she added.
You can support PACEs Connection today by making an online donationhere, or mailing a check made out to the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives – with “PACEs Connection” on the memo line – in care of Dana Brown, 4364 Bonita Road, PMB322, Bonita, CA 91902. To make a wire transfer or other type of gift, please email Carey Sipp at carey.pacescommunities@gmail.com to receive NPSC’s wire transfer or other electronic funds transfer information. No amount is too small!
Your three PACEs Connection volunteers, Dana Brown, Carey Sipp, and Rafael Maravilla, meeting December 23, 2024, about our business plan to revitalize the social networking site.
Thank you for your invaluable engagement with PACEs Connection; we invite you to partner with us in preserving more than decade of ACEs science research, videos, tools – with your tax-deductible year-end gift here today!
Dear Friend of PACEs Connection,
We wish you a safe, healthy, and prosperous New Year.
As a member of PACEs Connection, you likely value learning the latest research and information about the impact of positive and adverse childhood experiences (PACEs), and share our belief that learning about and sharing this information is vitally important for our well-being individually, organizationally, and collectively.
Having this knowledge available helps in communities as educators work with stressed children, family support providers deliver trauma-informed care, and health and human services professionals seek to “first do no harm”.
Since 2011, PACEs Connection has been a key global social networking site for sharing this information, raising public awareness of the impact of childhood trauma, and helping everyone from educators to policymakers understand the connection between ACEs and illness; the connection between safe, nurturing positive childhood experiences and better outcomes.
Today, PACEs Connection is at crossroads in keeping this invaluable, transformational resource here for you and the world.
We hope you’ll consider making a tax-deductible year-end gift to PACEs Connection to help us keep both PACEs Connection and our Resource Center here for the millions who visit annually, and for you, when you’re looking for the latest information as is found in the Research Center Corner section of the Resource Center each month.
This invaluable resource helps millions of students, teachers, parents, physicians, community workers, volunteers, business owners, and others find information they need. The Resource Center delivers the vetted, trustworthy information on ACEs and PCEs to create workplace policy, curricula for classes, and understand why and how childhood trauma affects themselves and others.
We hope you and your loved ones have a deep sense of love and connection as you start the New Year, and that you’ll log into PACEs Connection and share what’s working well in your community or workplace.
We are here to highlight and amplify your heart-centered leadership in our common work to prevent and heal childhood trauma; create protective positive childhood and community experiences.
P.S. We’re revitalizing PACEsConnection.com to help prevent and heal trauma; create the positive childhood and community experiences that help break cycles of trauma, addiction, and abuse. Here is the linkto make a tax-deductible, year-end gift. If you need information about mailing a check or making a gift via electronic funds transfer, please emailcarey.pacescommunities@gmail.comTHANK YOU!
Panelists present for the inaugural symposium included R.J. Gillespie, MD; Christina Bethell, PhD, MPH, MBA; Lisa Powell, PhD, and Anna Maria Wilms Floet, MD.
“This is just the beginning” according to event leadership following their one-day event on “Translating the Science of Positive Childhood Experiences into Practice and Connecting with Community Organizations”.
Event chair Jill Obremskey, MD, a Nashville pediatrician, longtime child advocate, and leader in the All Children Excel PACEs Connection community, welcomed nationally-recognized leaders in the PACEs science movement to prevent and heal trauma RJ Gillespie, MD, and Christina Bethell, MBA, PhD, as keynote speakers.
“This event focused on promoting and optimizing the social and emotional health of young children, which is critical to reversing the growing trend of mental health concerns in adolescents,” said Obremskey.
Keynote speaker RJ Gillespie, a pediatrician, spoke on the benefits of incorporating the adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) positive childhood experiences (PCEs) questionnaires in building relationships with the parents of his patients.
“This symposium empowered pediatricians to adopt early relational health (EHR) in their respective practices as a primary prevention measure. We helped physicians and community members bridge the gap between the pediatric healthcare community and community-based family and behavioral health services,” said Obremskey.
“Our speakers and panelists help people see the benefit of a cross-sector continuum of care that supports families and fosters early relational health, especially in children aged zero to three,” Obremskey added, with regard to the event held in Nashville in November
Christina Bethell, PhD, spoke on the importance of creating a culture of flourishing in communities. Bethell is a co-author of the positive childhood experiences and adult mental health research published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, Pediatrics, in 2019.
For more information on the event, please contact Alexis Hill at the Metro Nashville Health Department at alexis.hill@nashville.gov
REGISTER now and plan to join us Friday, January 10, 2025 from 2:00-3:00pm CTResearch on investing in early childhood development shows it to be the most influential, productive, and cost-effective strategy for establishing children on a path to strong self-regulation, well-developed executive function, and lasting resilience that will improve, in countless ways, their lives across the lifespan.”The first three years of development, and especially the first two or three months, are incredibly important for secure attachment and neurodevelopment,” said Bill Barberg, co-creator and lead organizer of a series of webinars on creating a Neuro-Nurturing® Ecosystem in your community.Barberg’s Population Health Learning Collaborative, with initial partners Deborah McNelis of Brain Insights and Carey Sipp of PACEs Connection, is teaming up with a growing coalition to simplify, accelerate, and support the journey of creatingNeuro-Nurturing® Ecosystems to help communities establish lasting connection and ongoing supports for pregnant women and new mothers, caregivers, and families with newborns.The growing number of organizations supporting the webinar series currently includes:NPSC – The National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve LivesPACEs ConnectionCTIPP – The Campaign on Trauma-Informed Policy and PracticeCAHMI – The Child and Adolescent Health Measurement InitiativeDecade of the Child – a national research and policy agenda focused on whole child health and wellbeing.REGISTER now and plan to join us Friday, January 10, 2025 from 2:00-3:00pm CT*This briefing will be recorded and sent to all registrants.Register now to learn ways to co-create and implement powerful upstream strategies to improve the education, health, wealth, and health equity of your community. “We’re presenting a long-term strategy that can be done with many small steps by different organizations, with many of wins along the way,” said Barberg.”Our goal in this series of webinars is to share plans and resources so communities can build on the work of neurodevelopment experts, advocates, and leaders in practices and policies with regard to infants, child welfare, and families. We will help community leaders to take advantage of resources that you can add to this this high-impact approach to improve equity and positive early development outcomes,” Barberg explained.To support this effort to raise awareness of the importance of early relational health, and to learn ways to support early relational and optimal neurodevelopment in your community, please register now, and then please share information about the webinar with your colleagues.Plan to spend an hour on January 10th (or whenever you have time to watch the recording) to learn more about creating a Neuro-Nurturing® Ecosystem in your community.Building community and corporate support can improve the lives of new parents and caregivers, help their infants — your newest citizens — benefit from optimal early brain development, which pays health, mental and emotional health, and other dividends across the lifespan.Barberg says he expects most communities learning about the ecosystem will focus on building awareness and buy-in for the strategy during 2025 so they can be positioned for accelerating and expanding their positive impact with actual programs and events in 2026 and beyond.”The most critically important action we can take for pregnant and new parents and their precious newborns is to learn and share this information in hopes of reducing stress in the lives of new parents, increasing their ability to nurture and create the most brain-healthy start possible for their new baby. Starting this program, creating ways to track impact and scale it, will have terrific lasting impact for infants, parents, educators, and all who’re dedicated to supporting the best outcomes possible,” said Barberg.Here are three social media posts to help you spread the word:LinkedIn PostFacebook PostInstagram Post
This webinar is the first in a series of several webinars that will feature respected experts in early childhood development. Presenters (and collaborators) for the series will include:Christina Bethell, Ph.D., Professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Founding Director of the Child and Adolescent Health Measurement Initiative.Diana (“Denni”) Fishbein, Ph.D., Senior Scientist, Franklin Porter Graham Child Development Institute at UNC-Chapel Hill, President & Co-Director of the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives.George Halvorson, Chair and CEO of the Institute for InterGroup Understanding; former CEO of six different health care delivery and financing organizations in the U.S. including Kaiser Permenente, where he served as chairman and CEO for more than 10 years. Author and child advocate.Deborah McNelis, M.Ed, early brain development expert, creator of the Neuro-Nurturing® model, author of “The First 60 Days” and the Neuro-Nurturing® series of developmentally appropriate ringed activity books loved and in use worldwide.And many more.Register for this first webinar and you’ll be invited to the subsequent ones in the series.
Full disclosure: In case there are questions as to why I’m posting this personal post and then subsequent blog posts from an organization called CHC: Creating Healthier Communities (CHC) and its CEO and president, Jean Accius, PhD., please allow me to explain.
(Fellow volunteers Dana Brown, Rafael Maravilla, and me on a recent Zoom call about revitalizing PACEs Connection.)
In addition to my volunteer role with PACEs Connection alongside fellow volunteers Dana Brown and Rafael Maravilla, I recently accepted a full-time role with Creating Healthier Communities (CHCImpact.org) as the director of nonprofit partnerships.
CHC leadership knows of my volunteer role in revitalizing PACEs Connection. I work Monday – Thursday for CHC; Fridays and some weekends and evenings I’m often in meetings or working with Dana and Rafael on PACEs Connection.
CHC, a nearly 70-year-old organization, helps nonprofits achieve their missions by bringing communities, nonprofits, and businesses together, with the goal of improving the health and wellbeing of every person in every community through collaboration for scalable, sustainable solutions that drive real, lasting change.
(Sound familiar? It reminds me of our hopes for the PACEs Connection cross-sector communities when the organization was founded in 2012, and now, as Dana Brown, Rafael Maravilla, and I work to revitalize it. Just sayin’.)
More about CHC: Creating Healthier Communities
CHC helped found the workplace-giving campaign for federal employees — the Combined Federal Campaign (CFC) — in 1961, and since then has helped raise more than $8.6 billion through the CFC.
We also manage workplace giving campaigns for scores of states across the U.S. and for several hundred corporations.
CHC distributes funds and resources to some 5,000 nonprofits each year, and officially partners with 1,400 state, local, and chapter nonprofit organizations to help them maximize the funds they receive from annual workplace giving campaigns. We leverage seasoned support to help many of the world’s leading nonprofits steward donors (when donors allow contact), maximize positive exposure, and take advantage of volunteering, speaking, and tabling opportunities when possible.
With a focus on health equity, CHC also secures and manages grants for various community-based campaigns such as our Black Birthing Initiative, and another focused on preventing cervical and breast cancer in minorities.
Why does this matter? What’s the connection?
I share this information because it was always a dream at PACEs Connection to help resilient communities secure funds, become sustainable, and grow. We did help some communities achieve those objectives, but we didn’t do it to scale as hoped. The work ground down after layoffs in 2023 and to a halt when PACEs Connection was sunset by its fiscal sponsor in April 2024. Since then, Dana Brown and I have secured a new fiscal sponsor (more on that here, with gratitude to our new fiscal sponsor, National Prevention Science Coalition), and we are committed to moving forward. Supporting PACEs Connection resilient communities is one of our objectives.
Today I am hoping some of you are with resiliency task forces that have grown, have become 501(c)(3) organizations, and would like to know more about how to become a nonprofit partner with CHC, as this could be a way to help some of our communities raise awareness, and raise funds.
If you’re part of a resiliency task force that is a 501(c)(3) organization, I encourage you to explore a partnership with CHC. This could be an easy and low-cost way (there are application fees after the first year; the first year is free) to raise awareness and funds for your community efforts.
Equally as important?
We hope to raise awareness among CHC’s member organizations about the importance of leveraging PACEs science to address overarching challenges, while at the same time creating science-based solutions. PACEs Connection stands ready to continue as a nexus for shared information and opportunities for healthier communities.That has always been a big part of our why.
Opportunities for nonprofit members of PACEs Connection
Here is a link to the CHC website to begin the application process. (Note: final application happens in the third quarter of each year, just prior to the launch of workplace giving campaigns.)
Organizational requirements for partnership include an IRS 990 designation and form; 501(c)(3) status; and a board-approved non-discrimination policy.
Many states and campaigns require an organization to also have a current audit. Please note: this is a “long-game” strategy, as to be included in the 2026 workplace-giving campaigns for funds likely distributed in 2027, organizations must apply in August and September 2025. So again, this is not a quick fix. But one thing is certain: organizations that don’t apply won’t receive funds. So it is worth the time and the free enrollment the first year to see if your organization and its mission resonate with workplace donors.
Too, when donors choose to share their contact information, nonprofits have the opportunity to grow relationships and steward new donors. Fees are based on the number of state campaigns an organization goes into and on the funds raised. My CHC colleague Shelby Speth and I will be happy to talk with you about this. Please email me at csipp@chcimpact.org to set up an appointment.
Introducing Jean Accius, PhD, President and CEO of CHC
It is with these thoughts in mind that I share information about the opportunity for working with CHC, and that I will begin sharing blog posts by CHC CEO and president Jean Accius, PhD.
We are all working toward the same objective: creating healthier communities.
Jean is a thought leader on social determinants of health, public health, health equity, aging, and more. He is a frequent speaker at leading health-related think tanks and on podcasts and webinars. I will post his blogs as well as fact-based information pieces from the CHC website. Among recent posts of interest to nonprofit organizations are:
Coming full circle with CHC — There is a bit of a history!
Again, our hope at PACEs Connection was always to help our cross-sector communities grow — in the number of communities started, the number of members each community engaged, and in the connections that could support the communities in various ways with funding, braided services to prevent and heal trauma, and to promote positive childhood and community experiences, by providing educational opportunities with speakers, webinars, and more.
Our hope endured even as PACEs Connection faced funding challenges and was sunset in 2024. We are here to keep the PACEs science movement alive, and to encourage the growth of our existing interest- and geographic-based communities (more than 450 and counting).
If you have any questions about this, please know my motives are purely to lift up the nonprofit organizations whose members belong to PACEs Connection, and to introduce them to an organization that could help them raise funds through workplace giving, as is the case with many of the nation’s leading nonprofits that work with CHC already, including St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, The March of Dimes, The Children’s National Hospital Foundation, Doctors Without Borders, and the Alzheimer’s Association.
One quick historical aside: Ironically, several years ago PACEs leadership approached CHC about working together. Apparently, the timing wasn’t right then. My hope is that the stars are aligned now for a terrific partnership with CHC, and with other organizations that can become strategic allies with PACEs Connection. We believe CHC can be a terrific partner as we help PACEs Connection nonprofit members grow and thrive in our work to prevent and heal trauma, and to build healthier communities by emphasizing the preventive and protective value of positive childhood, community, and workplace experiences.
Again, to learn more about partnering with CHC to raise funds via workplace giving campaigns, please email me at csipp@chcimpact.org.
For PACEs Connection-related matters, Dana Brown and I are available at
Please join top researchers and leaders in the movement to create Neuro Nurturing Ecosystems in support of maternal, infant, family and community health TODAY, March 14th, for an information-packed webinar co-sponsored, in part, by PACEs Connection and its fiscal sponsor, the National Prevention Science Coalition.REGISTER now to attend this free webinar, the second in a series that has received scores of five-star reviews.National leaders in early relational health, health equity, and more will share on the importance of Neuro-Nurturing infants to support positive pathways to health and wellbeing and preventing and healing trauma. We will also hear the latest on the Black Birthing Initiative led by Creating Healthier Communities (CHCImpact.org)This webinar shares valuable information on practical strategies for community coalitions to be part of a national (and international) movement that can influence the health and wellbeing of a population of healthier babies across the lifespan.Click to below to learn more about the expert presenters and webinar details.
Compelling research indicates that improvements in infant neurodevelopment and Early Relational Health (ERH) could reduce the need for massive amounts of future spending on healthcare, mental health services, and programs related to poverty or crime.
“Everyone wins when infants are nurtured in the environments and with connections that help them develop self-regulation, executive function, and the precursors to literacy and more advanced learning,”said Bill Barberg, longtime international public health consultant and lead coordinator of the series.“This webinar will share insights from top researchers and strategists about practical actions we can take to help individuals, neighborhoods, and communities adopt a wide range of Neuro-Nurturing practices and supports. “Now is the time to put the science we’ve learned into practice at the scale we need to improve the wellbeing of today’s infants and the future’s adults,” said Barberg.”Communities supporting pregnant women and new parents and caregivers in these natural, loving practices can help create entire populations of babies whose brains are nurtured for optimal health and development across the lifespan,” Barberg added.
Friday, March 14th, 2025 | 3:00 PM – 4:00 PM Eastern TimeREGISTER*This briefing will be recorded and sent to all registrants.**While it is not necessary to view the first webinar in the series to get the value from this second webinar, we encourage you toview the recording from January 10th.
Register now for this free event on March 27Noon to 1pm EST!In the early months of the year, the Trump Administration introduced sweeping health policy changes with implications for nonprofits and community organizations. Shifts in federal funding, evolving agency priorities, and potential cuts to key health initiatives are raising big questions.CHC: Creating Healthier Communities invites all nonprofit and for-profit leaders to join a webinar March 27 from noon to 1 p.m. to learn more about
🔹 What these changes mean for funding and compliance 🔹 How nonprofits can adapt their messaging strategies 🔹 What challenges—and opportunities—lie ahead
Luke Hartig, a seasoned expert in policy and governance, will provide key insights. Jean Accius, president and CEO of Creating Healthier Communities (CHCImpact.org) will share updates on how CHC is navigating these shifts to continue improving community health.
This event is for nonprofit professionals at all levels—including those in development, communications, and leadership—who want to stay ahead of federal policy changes in this evolving landscape.
(L-R) Morgan Zehner of Creating Healthier Communities (CHC), Luke Hartig of Gravity Research, and Carey Sipp of CHC discuss funding sources and the importance of language in current government funding applications.
NOTE: During our Creating Healthier Communities (CHC) Board meeting in Alexandria, Virginia two weeks ago, I heard Hartig speak and answer questions about how to frame the work being done in communities and nonprofits during this time of heightened sensitivity to how the work is described. In my work at PACEs Connection and Creating Healthier Communities I see takeaways that may bode well for resilient communities with regard to how we frame our work. Specifically? While we know certain terms such as diversity, equity, and inclusion (for which we will continue to advocate at PACEs Connection) are words that can cause a negative response in this political climate, some words we use often to describe our work are in favor and will be seen as positive descriptors to potential funders and government agencies.
Words that may help communities gain traction include
– prevention
– health access
– holistic care
– rural supports and focus
Hartig will likely offer additional updates on the importance of word use in funding applications and more when we meet on Thursday. I hope you will register and join us!
CHC: Creating Healthier Communities is proud to join The Decade of the Child initiative, a visionary effort to improve the health and wellbeing of our nation’s children. This collaboration aligns with CHC’s longstanding commitment to addressing barriers to good health. For nearly 70 years, CHC has worked alongside nonprofits, businesses, and communities to create resilient environments where everyone can thrive. Our involvement in The Decade of the Child builds on this legacy, with CHC staff recently participating in a webinar where we had the opportunity to highlight our Black Birthing Initiative and engage in meaningful discussions around creating healthier communities.
The good news is that we already know what children need to thrive and solutions are within reach. Decades of scientific research have informed sound recommendations for advancing evidence-based policies and practices that promote health and prevent many of the challenges children and youth currently face. However, real progress requires transformational change in how we think about and invest in strategies that work. CHC envisions a world where every person in every community has an opportunity to live their healthiest life, and by joining The Decade of the Child, we are reinforcing our commitment to making that vision a reality for future generations.
Carey Sipp 10/24/244:02 PM
A movement to motivate the incoming administration to proclaim the next 10 years as the DECADE OF THE CHILD is being led and launched by the National Prevention Science Coalition to Improve Lives, (NPSC) with support from PACEs Connection and a growing list of research, public, behavioral, and mental health-oriented organizations, as well as nonprofits supporting child advocacy, policy, and social justice.
“Our nation is failing its children. Despite our economic power, millions of children in the United States face grim realities. We need an unprecedented mobilization—a comprehensive, coordinated strategy to prioritize the health and well-being of every child in America, said Diana Fishbein, PhD, founder, president, and co-director of NPSC, in announcing news of the movement.
Organizations may also customize a request for individual members to endorse the movement by using materials on the NPSC site. They may also send out a more generic request if desired.
CHC, a nearly 70-year-old organization, helps nonprofits achieve their missions by bringing communities, nonprofits, and businesses together, with the goal of improving the health and wellbeing of every person in every community through collaboration for scalable, sustainable solutions that drive real, lasting change.
Carey Sipp 
