Trish Alley, President and Founder of Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom and Tara Reynolds, Administrator, recently visited with a number of people and organizations in the Philadelphia area who are working towards resolving some of the challenges that we face (albeit in a rural setting) here in the Northeast Kingdom. Included here is the report from their informative trip:
Trish & Tara’s Trip Report—Philadelphia, PA
(November 2nd—November 5th, 2008)
Monday, November 3, 2008
11:00 A.M—We met with Andrew Newberg, MD, who is an Associate Professor in the Departments of Radiology and Psychiatry and Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He is Board-certified in Internal Medicine, Nuclear Medicine, and Nuclear Cardiology. Andy is also the Director and co-founder of the Center for Spirituality and the Mind (http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/radiology/csm/index.html), also at the University of Pennsylvania.
Andy met with us for about an hour to discuss his recent research on Kundalini Yoga and Kirtan Kriya and their effects on early cognitive impairment. There is growing interest in the medical community in Kundalini Yoga, a physical and meditative discipline designed to create communication between mind and body and ultimately to allow the merger of the individual and universal Self. Kirtan Kriya is a meditation practice that involves repeated chanting of sounds and finger movements designed to help the mind focus and become sharper. Andy uses SPECT (Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography) imaging to capture baseline and meditative state images of the brain. We were particularly interested in this topic because of the Senior Trotters’ work with the New Bridges to Mind, Body, and Spirit project. Our conversation also included sharing what we do at Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom and how our work with the children and seniors is based on a number of different resources which we were happy to introduce him to (some of which he was already familiar with). Some such sources included: Joseph Chilton Pierce, The HeartMath Institute, The ChildSpirit Institute, Rosemary Todd Clough’s Creative Yoga and Movement for Children, and the Institute of Extraordinary Living (at Kripalu).
In April of 2009 Andy will be presenting at the Kripalu Institute with his wife Stephanie, who is a therapist and works with the Council for Relationships. They intend to provide a lecture as well as practical practices for couples to improve dialogue skills as well as ways to reduce stress. Andy is best known in lay circles for his book, Why God Won’t Go Away: Brain Science and the Biology of Belief. He has a new book coming out next spring entitled, How God Changes Your Brain. He has also done brain research on the ‘Oneness Blessing’ and speaking in tongues. As a side note, we found out that Andy and Tara both graduated from Haverford College (Andy in 1988 and Tara in 2000).
12:30—Kevin Carraccio picked us up at UPenn and walked us over to CHOP (Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia) by way of lunch. He was kind enough to arrange for us to meet with Robert Shultz, Ph.D., who is the Director for the Center for Autism Research at CHOP. Bob recently came to CHOP from Yale and was given $25 million to create the new Center for Autism Research (CAR) under his leadership (http://stokes.chop.edu/programs/car/dnl/index.php). Robert hand-picked his staff of about 40 people, and they are focusing their work on researching the causes of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). They are specifically looking at three age groups: children under the age of 2 who are at risk for developing an ASD; children who are newly diagnosed, between the ages of 2 and 4 years of age; and school-aged children. In the next year they hope to study over 1,000 children to get as large a sampling as possible. They are also looking for children (newborn to 12 months old) who have at least one sibling who has been diagnosed with autism. The genetics of ASDs involve combinations of genes that are more likely to express when drawn from the same pool (parents). Participants in this study will receive developmental and behavioral assessment, an MRI scan of the brain, and assistance with referrals for local services. Assessments and scans are provided at no cost to the families.
We asked Bob his opinion on why we are seeing such an increase in the number of children we serve who have ASDs. His response was that in 1994, epidemiologists changed the criteria for diagnosis and the standard definitions of the disorder. This reclassification, combined with the increased awareness of autism in general, has led to the rise in the number of cases we are seeing. His work focuses on genetic and environmental causes of ASDs. He does not consider vaccinations to be suspect. We described our experience at GW&W anecdotally. He was genuinely interested. Our experience seems to correspond to Stanley Greenspan’s relational approach to the treatment of ASDs, different from the more traditional model of repetition of behaviors, which may not be generalized when situational cues change. Bob strongly encouraged us to document our program in a scientific manner and offered to provide us with “local” contacts with his associates at Dartmouth and UVM. “I want to help you. How can I do that?” he said.
4:00—We walked a few blocks down the street to meet Susan Teegan-Case, who is a UCC Minister and Founder and Director of The Arts and Spirituality Center in Philadelphia (www.artsandspirituality.org). Susan received her Masters in Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary. The Arts & Spirituality Center empowers and transforms communities through spiritual and creative expression, in partnership with a broad range of multicultural groups. Last year they served over 3,000 children in the Philadelphia area. She explained that Philadelphia suffers from notoriously violent behavior, with the city averaging one gun death per day. Her work has focused on developing violence prevention curricula through the arts by helping their participants connect with their own hearts. The Arts and Spirituality Center helps children articulate their visions of peace primarily through music and poetry.
In a recent project entitled Drums for Peace, the Center nurtured hope, respect, and confidence by focusing on listening and communication skills as well as developing a sense of harmony. We shared with Susan our experience with Don Knaack (The Junkman) and expressed that his work not only helps kids develop language and attention skills, but that he also encourages children to be environmentally conscious. We further discussed the parallels between Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom and The Arts and Spirituality Center in terms of students dealing with relatives who have been incarcerated and the ramifications that this has on families. Finally, the Center has had great success in their work with their ongoing poetry project, We the Poets, and have self-published several compilations of their work over the years. We the Poets helps students discuss social issues, improve their literacy skills and expand their world views. From our conversation with Susan and by receiving a copy of several back issues of We the Poets, we are encouraged to continue to seek funding for our own Community Poetry Project so that we may be able to publish the works of our local citizens ages 6-100!
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
9:00 AM—We found our way to the Settlement Music School in South Philadelphia (on election day!) where we met with Ellie Brown, Ph.D., a Haverford College classmate of Tara’s. She teaches Psychology at West Chester University and is the Founder and Director of ECCEL, the Early Childhood Cognition and Emotions Lab (http://www.wcupa.edu/_ACADEMICS/sch_cas.psy/eccel.html). ECCEL pilots its research, conducted by Ellie and her students, at the Settlement Music School’s Kaleidoscope Preschool Arts Enrichment Program, a Head Start Learning Tree site. The Settlement Music School was founded 100 years ago for the benefit of immigrant children in Philadelphia, and the community still reflects wide diversity and significant, generational poverty.
Ellie’s research focuses on the effects of chaotic living conditions resulting from family poverty, resulting sleep problems, and poor responses to academic challenges. We had the opportunity to visit music and creative movement classes, and we briefly observed a visual arts class. Ellie was unexpectedly called back to her academic campus as a member of the school’s crisis management team, so our visit was cut short. She left us with copies of the Kaleidoscope Parents Handbook as well as printed information about her research. She is in the process of compiling and interpreting data based on work with 100 children from this very diverse and predominantly poor neighborhood. It was obvious from the hour we spent with her that we experience similar challenges in vastly different environments and that our interests are very compatible. She is interested in what we are doing at Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom and is eager to share and possibly to expand her research with us. Her assessment tools measure emotion, behavior, and attention in children as they progress through the Kaleidoscope Program. She is waiting for the results of cortisol (often referred to as our “stress hormone”) tests collected from children’s saliva to see how they enhance other research observations. She also referred us to the Peace Through Play Nursery School, A Preschool with Consciousness, in Chestnut Ridge, New York. Their curriculum focuses on music, movement and art with an emphasis on cooperative learning, socialization, and pre-academic skills based on each child’s abilities and growth. They also include yoga in their daily program.
Ellie’s current work focuses on early childhood education and development. It is helpful to us to understand the foundation that some of our school-age children may lack as well to validate our approach with the older children. We are additionally interested in her work, as we are accepting five year olds for the first time this year. They have very different attention spans and developmental needs than the six year olds!
12:00—Philadelphia Society for Services to Children (PSSC) and The Children’s Aid Society of Pennsylvania have just merged to create Turning Points for Children (www.turningpointsforchildren.org). Trish’s family connection with early incarnations of PSSC goes back to her Great-Grandfather. Her Father chaired the Board at one point and is still remembered by Helen Dennis, PSSC’s retired and longtime Executive Director, for being Santa Claus. We met with Mike Vogel, CEO of Turning Points for Children and Gail Ober, COO. PSSC and Children’s Aid Society of Pennsylvania are two of the oldest child service organizations in the United States.
We had the opportunity to meet with staff responsible for FAST, Families and Schools Together: Protecting Hearts and Minds, a program developed and licensed by the Wisconsin Center for Education Research at the University of Wisconsin. FAST is a nonprofit agency that designs and distributes family strengthening and parent involvement programs to help kids succeed in school and in life. Their award-winning programs help families improve parenting skills and connect families to their schools by bringing together local support resources to build protective factors around kids. (www.familiesandschools.org). Turning Points just received a major award for their expansion of this program into 38 elementary schools in Philadelphia. It is a well researched program that has demonstrated long-term benefits by involving families in the school life of their children. We discovered that the program can now include out-of-school activities (like GW&W), but strong school participation is still required.
We continued our visit with Turning Points for Children with a discussion of their Kids n’ Kin Program. There are an estimated 64,000 children in Philadelphia who are living with caregivers that are not their biological parents. Kids n’ Kin supports these families by offering services that promote safety and a stable family life for these children. The program includes home visits, family therapy, legal assistance services, and parenting groups and workshops. The Families Dealing with Incarceration part of Kids n’ Kin was of particular interest to us. In the Kids n’ Kin Family Reintegration Project, a social worker and family advocate provide intensive support services for caregivers, mothers in recovery from substance abuse, and their children during the mothers’ transition from correctional facilities home. The Pennsylvania Department of Corrections funds bus trips for children and families in Kids n’ Kin to visit with the children’s incarcerated mothers at the State Correctional Institution in Muncy, PA. A social worker/therapist team facilitates the visits to strengthen family relationships and provide positive redirection for the children. Additionally, children with incarcerated parents meet in a variety of therapeutic group settings about adjusting to life with a relative caregiver, enhancing their relationships with incarcerated parents and personal decision making. Age groups are for children and teens ages 8 and up. We were introduced briefly to Dr. Joseph Crumbley, (http://www.drcrumbley.com) who stepped out of a session to say hello. “Dr. Joe,” who is radiant, works extensively with the families of incarcerated Moms, including with Kids n’ Kin, and specializes in transracial adoption. He said he hopes to get up to this area at some point, so we will keep in touch with him. GW&W has served children of incarcerated parents over the years, and currently serves five children who are being raised by grandparents for various reasons.
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
8:30 AM—The Presbyterian Children's Village (www.pcv.org) provides a comprehensive range of prevention, child welfare, therapeutic, and educational services and programs to help heal the spirits of children, families, and communities in crisis in the greater Philadelphia region. The Presbyterian Children’s Village has two campuses; we visited the residential campus in Rosemont. Here we met with Darlene Hewett, President & CEO, and Reverend David Sanchez, Village Chaplain. The residential campus at Rosemont houses 60 adolescents (right now there are 40 females and 20 males). They have a 6 month program focusing on education, where they first gather information on the children’s needs and then help to set them up for academic success. Most of the children they see are coming to them from foster care or group homes.
PCV helps the children learn independent living skills (how to study, how to hold/maintain employment, how to be a good community member, etc.) They have been using the Sanctuary Model (www.sanctuaryweb.com) created by Sandra Bloom, MD, which is a trauma-informed method for creating or changing an organizational culture in order to more effectively provide a cohesive context within which healing from psychological and social traumatic experience can be addressed. Their mission is: to teach individuals and organizations the necessary skills for creating and sustaining nonviolent lives and nonviolent systems, and to keep believing in the possibilities of peace. Bloom is a board certified psychiatrist and the author of Creating Sanctuary: Toward the Evolution of Sane Societies.
Reverend Sanchez has adopted a holistic approach to his chaplaincy at the Village. He incorporates the spiritual, physical, and mental in his therapeutic care for resident children. David describes his work as a Ministry of Presence and believes that one of the most effective tools is the ability to listen with compassion. His work is aimed at helping young people develop their own values. He said that what he hears a lot is that these individuals are “tired of being tired”. Many of the teenage girls that he has worked with find themselves taking on the responsibilities of their mothers. He encourages them to step back from their situations to evaluate their feelings and their goals. David organizes volunteer efforts where Village children go out into the community to provide services such as Meals on Wheels and Nursing Home visits, etc. He offers Bible studies, grief counseling, chapel services and support group meetings (called Value Groups).
Darlene explained the benefits of their Art Therapy program, which provides group therapy for residents during non-school hours. These programs vary and include art, music, pet, and horticultural therapy. She shared with us some of the artwork that the children had produced from these sessions. She described how art therapy has proven to be an effective and important method of communication, assessment, and treatment. The art therapists work as part of a team which includes physicians, mental health therapists, social workers, and teachers. Both Darlene and David were highly interested in our ‘curriculum toolbox’ and they both took notes as we were describing some of the resources that we have found to be effective at Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom, including Non-violent Communication (www.cnvc.org) and Ruby Payne’s A Framework for Understanding Poverty.
10:00 AM—(Conclusive Remarks): We got back on the road to Vermont with a strong sense that our work at Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom is a piece of a much larger assembly of people and organizations that may be approaching critical mass. This trip enabled us to reconnect with some old friends, to make new ones, and to share our work with an enthusiastic audience outside of our small community. It was encouraging to realize that such highly regarded scientists, spiritual leaders, teachers, and other professionals are inspired by the work being done at Greensboro Wonder & Wisdom. A vision of how our tiny non-profit relates to the ‘bigger picture’ is starting to emerge. While it is not clear at this point how all of these connections will manifest themselves in the future, it is certain that the energy we share and the passion that we all bring into the system is positive reinforcement that we are, indeed, making a difference. Ultimately, this trip was supportive of our mission of changing our culture one heart, one family, one town, one state, one nation at a time.
Our special thanks go to Helen Dennis who ferried us through the streets of Philadelphia virtually and mostly in person, introduced us to Susan Teegan-Case, and enhanced our knowledge between appointments with great wisdom and cheer. She even took us to Kimmel Center, the new home of the Philadelphia Orchestra, where a volunteer gave us a “sneak peak” at Verizon Hall when she heard we were from Vermont. We just happened to catch an orchestra rehearsal in process. What a treat!
