Transforming Our Tomorrow: 2021 Virtual Conference

(Image of Nadine Burke Harris: © Christopher Michel)

Dr. Nadine Burke Harris is an award-winning physician, researcher and advocate dedicated to changing the way our society responds to one of the most serious, expensive and widespread public health crises of our time: childhood trauma. She was appointed as California’s first-ever Surgeon General by Governor Gavin Newsom in January 2019.

Dr. Burke Harris’ career has been dedicated to serving vulnerable communities and combating the root causes of health disparities. After completing her residency at Stanford, she founded a clinic in one of San Francisco’s most underserved communities, Bayview Hunters Point. It was there that Burke Harris observed that, despite the implementation of national best-practices for immunizations, asthma, obesity treatment and other preventive health measures, her patients still faced outsized risks for poor health, development and behavioral outcomes.

Drawing in research from the CDC and Kaiser Permanente, Dr. Burke Harris identified Adverse Childhood Experiences as a major risk factor affecting the health of her patients. In 2011, she founded the Center for Youth Wellness and subsequently grew the organization to be a national leader in the effort to advance pediatric medicine, raise public awareness, and transform the way society responds to children exposed to Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and toxic stress. She also founded and led the Bay Area Research Consortium on Toxic Stress and Health, to advance scientific screening and treatment of toxic stress.

She currently serves as a government liaison for the American Academy of Pediatrics’ National Advisory Board for Screening and sat on the board of the Committee on Applying Neurobiological and Socio-behavioral Sciences From Prenatal Through Early Childhood Development: A Health Equity Approach for the National Academy of Medicine.
Her work has been profiled in best-selling books including “How Children Succeed” by Paul Tough and “Hillbilly Elegy” by J.D. Vance as well as in Jamie Redford’s feature film, “Resilience”. It has also been featured on NPR, CNN and Fox News as well as in USA Today and the New York Times. Dr. Burke Harris’ TED Talk, “How Childhood Trauma Affects Health Across the Lifetime” has been viewed more than 6 million times. Her book “The Deepest Well: Healing the Long-Term Effects of Childhood Adversity” was called “indispensable” by The New York Times.
Dr. Burke Harris is the recipient of the Arnold P. Gold Foundation Humanism in Medicine Award presented by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Heinz Award for the Human Condition. She was named one of 2018’s Most Influential Women in Business by the San Francisco Business Times.

About her keynote:

From Hope to Healing: Building Healthier & More Trauma-Informed Communities

As we emerge from the one of the biggest traumas of our century, we have an opportunity to build back healthier at all levels of society. To enhance access to mental behavioral and physical health services for our children. To increase screening and treatment for Adverse Child Experiences (ACEs) and toxic stress. To finally start treating our mental health as our health. Join California Surgeon General, Dr. Burke Harris, as she shares her vision for how collectively, we can transform tomorrow by fostering enriching communities and environments for our children and families.

Lisseth Rojas-Flores is Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology, Department of Doctoral Psychology at Fuller Theological Seminary. Rojas-Flores’ research centers on immigrant children’s well-being focusing on how trauma, community violence, and socio-structural adversity impacts the child and family unit. With funding from the Foundation for Child Development Young Scholars Program, Rojas-Flores examined the impact of immigration enforcement on Latino citizen—children’s psychological and academic well-being in the U.S. In an international context, she conducts collaborative research to examine the impact of community violence and trauma on adolescents, parents, and teachers living in El Salvador. As part of a multidisciplinary research team in Colombia, she examines the challenges caused by forced migration and trauma. She works to mobilize local religious communities to support people in internal displacement situations (IDPs) to recover and flourish. As a bilingual/bicultural licensed clinical psychologist, she strives to address the interrelationships between family, mental health, faith, and social justice.

About her keynote:

Latinx Children’s Well-Being and Flourishing in A Time of Crisis: Moving Forward Amid Complex Challenges

Growing up in mixed-status households, where at least one family member has precarious legal status, compounds chronic risk and jeopardizes the health and wellbeing of over 17 million Latinx US-citizen children. Parents’ unauthorized legal status is a social determinant of health that drives inequities and health disparities for children. Decades of heightened immigration enforcement and a prolonged pandemic will continue to have long-standing economic, physical, psychological, and spiritual effects among immigrant families. As the end of the pandemic looms, we must not forget the impact that COVID-19 has had on children of immigrants–and take heed of calls for justice-oriented and multidisciplinary approaches to drive positive social change. Empowering black and brown Latinx children and their immigrant caregivers requires deep commitments to advocacy, trauma-informed care, structural change, and respect for the dignity and agency of their vibrant and connected communities. This presentation will discuss how to understand and navigate health inequities, needs, and strengths of Latinx immigrant communities to provide comprehensive, equity-driven, whole-child care to children growing up in mixed-status families.

Vu Le (“voo lay”) is a writer, speaker, and the former Executive Director of RVC, a nonprofit in Seattle that promotes social justice by developing leaders of color, strengthening organizations led by communities of color, and fostering collaboration between diverse communities.

Vu’s passion to make the world better, combined with a low score on the Law School Admission Test, drove him into the field of nonprofit work, where he learned that we should take the work seriously, but not ourselves. There’s tons of humor in the nonprofit world, and someone needs to document it. He is going to do that, with the hope that one day, a TV producer will see how cool and interesting our field is and make a show about nonprofit work, featuring attractive actors attending strategic planning meetings and filing 990 tax forms.

Known for his no-BS approach, irreverent sense of humor, and love of unicorns, Vu has been featured in dozens, if not hundreds, of his own blog posts at NonprofitAF.com.

About his Keynote:

A Bolder, Brighter Tomorrow: Unlocking Nonprofits and Philanthropy’s Full Potential to Create an Equitable World

The pandemic and society’s reckoning with systemic racism reveal just how critical nonprofit and philanthropy are to a thriving community. At the same time, we have many archaic and destructive philosophies and practices that get in our way. How do we move forward? How do we not perpetuate the very injustice we’re trying to fight? What does fundraising look like when it’s not centered on the comfort of donors? How do organizations relate to one another if we’re not mired in the Nonprofit Hunger Games? How do we put out the fires of inequity instead of just helping people burned by it? And how do we do all this while creating space for leadership by the communities most affected by injustice? Vu, author of NonprofitAF.com, will inspire, entertain, and probably enrage in this thought-provoking presentation.

• Economic and Concrete Supports as Core Child Welfare Strategy to Strengthen Families
• Race Equity: From Theory to Practice Deconstructing Structural Racism and Building Well-Being
• Framing Messages to Strengthen Families
• Race Equity: From Theory to Practice What Happens Before the Knock
• Race Equity: From Theory to Practice Operationalizing Anti-Racist Practice in Child Welfare

• All in For Kansas Kids: Using 1-800-Children and Aunt Bertha
• Collaborative Leadership: Effecting Community Change
• Family Resource Centers – Unity in Diversity
• Nurturing Fathers
• Building Power Through Caretaker and Family Voice Spaces
• The 90by30 Initiative Story: Mobilizing Community for Transformational Change
• The stories we tell ourselves: How social and behavior change communications can change norms around child abuse and neglect prevention

• Exploration and Cultivation of Partnering with Parents
• Foundational Authentic Youth Engagement Skills
• Prevention through Partnerships: It takes EVERYONE!
• Youth Engagement as an Equity Strategy
• See My Color, Acknowledge My Trauma, Change the Outcome

Day 1

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Youth Engagement in Prevention Work
• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Moving Families from Surviving to Thriving
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Bridging the Gap between Families and Services
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Be Strong Families—A More Perfect Union Parent Café

Day 2

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Building Birth and Foster Parent Relationships
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Nurturing Fathers
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Building Power through Caretaker and Family Voice Spaces

Day 3

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Creating a Culture of Parent Support
• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Exploration and Cultivation of Partnering with Parents

Day 1

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Child Sexual Abuse Prevention: Getting the Message to Everyone through the “Are They Good for Your Kids” Campaign
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Preventing Child Sexual Abuse in Organizations through Policy Change and Partnerships

Day 2

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Children with Problematic Sexual Behavior: Who Are They and How Can We Help?
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Legislation in the States: A Call to Action for Policymakers and Advocates
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Child Sexual Abuse Prevention for the LGBTQIA+ Community
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Child Sexual Abuse Prevention—Connecting Families and Communities

Day 3

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: The Power Dynamic of Child Sexual Abuse in Youth Sports
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Child Sexual Abuse: A Preventable Public Health Problem
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Preventing Child Sexual Abuse in Youth Serving Organizations: An Update on the CDC Foundation Project Progress and Next Steps

Day 1

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Economic and Concrete Supports as Core Child Welfare Strategy to Strengthen Families
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Creating an Effective and Equitable Prenatal-to-3 System of Care
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Increasing Access to Earned Income Tax Credit

Day 2

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Paid Family Leave, Childcare Subsidies, and Tax Credit Policies as Child Maltreatment Prevention

Day 1

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Getting Comfortable Being Uncomfortable: Using a Community of Practice to Explore the Application of the Diversity Informed Tenets with Home Visiting Professionals
• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Race Equity: From Theory to Practice Deconstructing Structural Racism and Building Well-being
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Race Equity: From Theory to Practice—What Happens before the Knock
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: Race Equity: From Theory to Practice Operationalizing Anti-Racist Practice in Child Welfare

Day 2

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Will There Be Anyone Who Looks Like Me: Starting Conversations about Race and Privilege

Day 3

• 1:00-2:00pm CDT: Racism as a Toxic Stressor for Families: What Can Home Visitors Do About it?
• 2:30-3:30pm CDT: Let’s Talk About Race and Corporal Punishment
• 4:00-5:00pm CDT: See My Color, Acknowledge My Trauma, Change the Outcome

Day 1

• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Playing for Keeps Preview and the PCAA Back to School Campaign
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Trauma-Informed Yoga
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Coffee with Kelly Crane: A Conversation about Child Abuse and Neglect Policy
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Coffee with Darrell Armstrong: A Conversation about Race, Religion, and Child Abuse
• 5:15-6:00pm CDT: Tiny Tails for You: Zoo Zoom
• 5:15-5:45pm CDT: Family Workout by Coach Slater, Esdot Fitness

Day 2

• 10:00-10:45am CDT: How to Transform Anxiety Through Life Giving Self-Care Strategies
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Coffee with Bart Klika: A Conversation about Child Abuse and Neglect Research
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Drawing and Doodling
• 5:15-5:45pm CDT: Children’s Concert by Mr. Ray
• 5:15-5:45pm CDT: Family Zumba
• 5:15-5:45pm CDT: Family Mindfulness Story Time

Day 3

• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Coffee with Dr. Melissa Merrick: Prevent Child Abuse America
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Trauma-Informed Yoga
• 10:00-10:45am CDT: Family Workout by Coach Slater, Esdot Fitness
• 5:15-6:00pm CDT: Spiderfit Kids
• 5:15-5:45pm CDT: Origami for the Family