2016 ACEs Symposium Presentations

Goals of the symposium:

  • Relay the sense that programmatic innovation is needed to effectively address early adversity and improve children’s outcomes.
  • Introduce participants to the latest science about resilience that is informing best innovative practices for both program design and implementation as well as the science that measures program efficacy.
  • Provide participants with concrete examples of innovative and effective practices in programs that address early adversity.
  •  Give participants tools about how to talk about programmatic innovation and effectiveness to non-experts.

Opening remarks from Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell Jr.


A Time for Optimism:  Keys to Achieving Generative Result


Susan Dreyfus, President and CEO,  Alliance for Strong Families and Communities
This presentation focuses on why innovation in early childhood development policy and programs is needed, what can be learn from research about the policies that hold the most promise for improving outcomes for children, how to think about and define outcomes and what innovation looks like.     


The Science of Resilience: Overcoming Early Adversity


Dr. Jelena Obradović, Project Director, Stanford Project on Adaption and Resilience in Kids
This session introduces the science of resilience or how scientists are working to identify the biological, behavioral, and environmental processes that enable some disadvantaged children to demonstrate remarkable resilience, while placing others at risk for adverse outcomes.


Balancing Innovation, Evidence and Current Best Practice

Mary Coleman, Ph.D., Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer, EMPath
This session focuses on the tensions between doing new things and replicating evidence-based programs and  offers a concrete sense of what this looks like.


FrameWorks Session: Talking About Innovation and Programmatic Efficacy (Productively!)

Moira O’Neil, Director, Research Interpretation and Application, FrameWorks Institute
How to communicate for policy change.


Examples of Innovation and Impact

Jason Gortney, Director, Children’s Home Society of Washington
​and Cerella Craig, Community Mental Health Ambassador MOMS Partnership, New Haven
Innovations in the Washington Home Visitation Program and in the delivery of services for mothers and children through community and neighborhood-based resources in New Haven.


Closing Session

Loraine Swanson Lucinski, Deputy Director, Child Health, Tennessee Department of Health
New Possibilities: The Tennessee Context

Also in this video: Closing remarks by Memphis Mayor, A C Wharton, Consultant, ACEs Awareness Foundation