Mental Health and Community Well-Being Is Focus of Initiative Honoring Memory of Ana Grace Márquez-Greene

The  parents of Ana Marquez-Greene, one of the students whose life was tragically ended at Sandy Hook Elementary School nearly a year ago, have announced plans to convene "Love Wins,"  a day-long conference for those concerned with mental health and community well-being to help build connections that prevent and cope with trauma.

 To be held on December 2 at the University of Hartford, the conference is the inaugural initiative of The Ana Grace Project, and is designed to “promote love, community and connection for every child and family,” and a day dedicated to honoring Ana Grace.

Nelba Márquez-Greene and Jimmy Greene have dedicated themselves to creating real solutions to the kind of violence that took their daughter’s life.  They have developed The Center for Community and Connection in partnership with the Klingberg Family Centers as a transformational initiative of The Ana Grace Project to identify the most effective ways to build community and interpersonal connection to prevent violence and promote recovery. The Center aims to accomplish this objective through research, practical tools, professional development and public policy.

The Center was inspired by the heart and soul of Ana Grace’s mother, Nelba Márquez-Greene, LMFT, a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist employed by Klingberg Family Centers. Nelba Márquez-Greene and Jimmy Greene “believe that love and community are the antidotes for violence and are spurred on not only by their loss but by their faith and the belief that it is always best to “Overcome Evil with Good,” according to the organization’s website.

Nelba Márquez-Greene and Jimmy Greene are both alumni of the University of Hartford.

The program on Dec. 2 will feature Bruce Perry, MD, Ph.D., as its keynote speaker and is a collaboration of the resources of Western Connecticut State University, Central Connecticut State University, the University of Hartford, Klingberg Family Centers and Stanley Black and Decker.  Perry is the Senior Fellow of The Child Trauma Academy, a not-for-profit organization based in Houston, TX, and adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern University in Chicago.

A workshop on Creating Compassionate Communities by Christopher Kukk will address weaving compassion into the fabric of learning (schools) and living (cities and towns) communities, drawing upon ideas from neuroscience, psychology, evolutionary biology, economics and other social sciences. Dr. Kukk is Professor of Political Science at Western Connecticut State University and founding Director of the Center for Compassion, Creativity and Innovation.

A session to be led by Alice Forrester will describe New Haven's efforts to reduce the impact of adverse childhood experiences using a two-generational approach.  Participants will discuss how collaboration and grass roots activism can impact children and families facing mental health challenges.  Dr. Forrester is the Executive Director of the Clifford Beers Child Guidance Clinic in New Haven, a community-based, mental health center for excellence for the treatment of children and families.  She was appointed by Governor Malloy to sit on the Sandy Hook Commission and has served as the Project Director of two National Child Traumatic Stress Network grants.

“For anyone whose child has been the victim of senseless violence it can seem almost impossible to go on. Grappling with anger and despair, you search for a way to redeem what has been lost, said Nelba Márquez-Greene on the organization’s website.  “And here we stand, knowing we must do something, something meaningful, to help all of us turn the page and begin the next chapter. Our hope as a family is to invest in creating solutions that will draw these individuals away from violence and replace it with the powerful love and connection that can only be found in a healthy community of caring.”

Additional session topics include the human cost of unmet mental needs in our cities, Mental Health First Aid, Circle of Security Parenting and Teaching and Learning with Compassion.

Conference participants will learn about and contribute to best practices in building community and interpersonal connections to prevent violence and promote recovery. Organizers anticipate that conference outcomes will contribute to a shared body of knowledge for community members, parents, and professionals to create their own roles in building connections that “will enable love to win.”

The program will also include presentations by Steven Girelli, Ph.D., President & CEO, Klingberg Family Centers; Bryan Gibb, M.B.A., National Council of Behavioral Health; Deborah McCarthy, O.T., Mindfullness Collaborative for Youth and Schools; Adi Flesher, M.Ed., Garrison Institute; Isabel Pacheco Logan, L.C.S.W., Office of the Public Defender;  Keith Gaston, M.S.W.,  Village for  Families and Children;  Charlie Slaughter, M.P.H., R.D., Department of Children and Families; Geoffry Scales, Hartford Juvenile Probation;  Karl Koistein, L.C.S.W., DCF;  and Iran Nazarrio, COMPASS Youth Collaborative.

There will also be a performance piece about gun violence by Janis Astor del Valle and Lara Herscovitch, and a performance by the Connecticut Children’s Chorus.  CEUs will be available for teachers.  Registration and additional information is available at

http://events.constantcontact.com/register/event?llr=kdmy5ioab&oeidk=a07e8bf8e4yaa208d5f

Founded in 1903, Klingberg Family Centers is a private nonprofit charitable organization offering an array of treatment programs. The organization’s programs are designed to serve children and families whose lives have been affected by trauma in its various forms, family difficulties, and mental health issues.

Connecticut “Ideas Worth Spreading” Resonate in Massachusetts in TED Talks

TED came to Springfield, Massachusetts this month with a decidedly Connecticut flavor, as a quarter of the featured speakers offering “ideas worth spreading,” hailed from the “still revolutionary” state.

Of the 16 “TED talks” on the agenda during a day-long program sponsored by and held at the headquarters of Mass Mutual, four of the speakers were from Connecticut, and left the specially selected audience intrigued, impressed and inspired.

Well known worldwide, TED is a nonprofit which began decades ago with a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become considerably broader, and “TED Talks” – widely available on the web – have become a global phenomenon, watched by tens of millions.

TED conferences “bring together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives.”  That’s precisely what occurred at TEDx in Springfield, where in addition to speakers touting the possibilities for that post-industrial urban center, a wide array of innovative subjects were featured under the theme “Driving innovation through diversity and inclusion.”

The Connecticut quartet at TEDx Springfield:

• Keisha Ashe is co-founder and CEO of ManyMentors, a nonprofit science, technology, engineering and math STEM) mentoring organization that connects minority and female middle and high school students with encouraging and supporting near-age mentors in the STEM fields.  “If they never know, they’ll never go,” is the guiding phrase of the initiative, reflecting the fact that many women and minority students are not encouraged to pursue the STEM fields, and are often unaware of the career potential or their own aptitude for the STEM careers.  Ashe is a Ph.D. candidate in Chemical Engineering at UConn.
• Maureen Connolly is an event planning professional with extensive national and international experience across diverse markets, and a visionary and passionate leader skilled at creating high impact programs with measurable results.  She is the foremost advocate for utilizing public celebrations as a means of extending social capital by having the community, rather than the event, at the core of planning.  She has written on the enduring transformational potential of public celebrations, and offers that “now is the time to harness that collective energy and accumulated social capital as a catalyst for social change” that will develop collaborations with the potential to breathe new life into hard-pressed cities.
• David Ryan Polgar is a Connecticut-based writer/attorney/educator and highly regarded tech ethicist who speaks on the topics of information overload, digital diets, and creativity.  He is an award-winning columnist for Seasons magazine, and has been featured in national media. Polgar speaks and writes about the ethical, legal, sociological, and emotional issues surrounding our relationship to technology.  He has created a “Mental Food Plate” as an approach to achieving deeper levels of thinking, and explores the imperative for an industry to develop that will serve as a counterbalance to the burgeoning technologies that “we can’t stop consuming.”
• Jon Thomas is the founder of Tap Cancer Out, a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu nonprofit and host of the most philanthropic martial arts events in the world.  Jon Thomas and his wife Becky run the Stratford-based nonprofit “in the slivers of spare time between their jobs in advertising.”  The nonprofit was founded out of a desire to respond to the devastation of cancer through a sport that Thomas was deeply involved with.  The organization raises funds – all donated to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society - through hosting fundraising tournaments, direct donations, merchandise sales and sponsorships.

The TED website points out that “TED is best thought of as a global community, welcoming people from every discipline and culture who seek a deeper understanding of the world.”  TEDx Springfield was organized by Jae Junkunc of Hartford, from Mass Mutual's Enterprise Risk Management Group, with support of a 15-member team that developed the program over six months.

TED includes the award-winning TED Talks video site, the Open Translation Project and TED Conversations, the inspiring TED Fellows and TEDx programs, and the annual TED Prize. The TEDx program gives communities, organizations and individuals the opportunity to stimulate dialogue through TED-like experiences at the local level. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are planned and coordinated independently.

A TEDx session in Hartford in June included talks by David Fink of Partnership for Strong Communities, Steven Mitchell of East Coast Greenway, Donna Berman of Charter Oak Cultural Center, and Rich Hollant of CO:LAB, among sixteen local speakers.

New Haven Foundation Issues 36-hour local 'giving challenge,' Waterbury Up Next

To celebrate its 90th anniversary, the Connecticut Community Foundation is coordinating Give Local Greater Waterbury & Litchfield Hills, a "challenge" to area residents to give generously online to the region's nonprofits over a 36-hour period from 7 AM on November 12 to 7 PM on November 13.

"Give Local" is based on the successful three-year effort by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven, which now underway with its annual 36-hour effort, running on October 2nd and 3rd - under the name "The Great Give 2013."  The effort concludes at 8 PM on October 3. [As of midnight on Oct. 2, 4,000 individual gifts had been received totaling nearly $400,000 for local nonprofits.]

CFGNH reports more than $1.3 million has been distributed in new and matching funds through its three previous giveGreater.org giving campaigns.  All donations made during the 36-hour period of The Great Give® 2013 to qualified nonprofits on giveGreater.org® will receive a pro- rated portion of the match pool.

In addition, there will be competitive grant prizes, including $1,000 to the first three charities to accumulate 100 individual donors and grand prizes of $15,000, $10,000 and $5,000 for charities with the greatest number of new donors. A series of “Golden Ticket” awards wil also provide funds, recognizing gifts such as those given between 2 and 4 a.m. or those given closest to midnight. In the current campaign, a total of $70,000 will be awarded in match incentive grants.

The Valley Community Foundation has set aside a matching pool of $20,000 for the Great Give. All donations made between $25 – $125 by Valley donors (residing or working in Ansonia, Derby, Oxford, Seymour or Shelton) or Valley Community Foundation fund holders during the 36-hour period of The Great Give® 2013 will be matched until the pool is exhausted.

In Waterbury, the effort is underwritten by Naugatuck Savings Bank Foundation and Crystal Rock. The Connecticut Community Foundation hosted five workshops between September 10-16 for nonprofits in its 21 towns to explain the initiative.

For more information: contact (Waterbury)Edwin Rodriguez, (203) 753-1315 x102, erodriguez@conncf.org; and (New Haven) Tricia Caldwell, (203) 777-7090, tcaldwell@cfgnh.org.

Big Trash Pick-Up: Volunteers to Clean Connecticut's Shoreline

A year ago, 2,450 volunteers in Connecticut removed 16,310 pounds of trash from Long Island Sound’s shoreline and Connecticut waterways. This weekend, the effort continues, as bird watchers, fishermen, sailors, scuba divers, students, citizen groups and businesses will be cleaning up trash from Connecticut’s beaches, islands, and rivers as part of the International Coastal Cleanup (ICC).

Save the Sound, the Connecticut coordinator for the ICC for the past 11 years, has worked with cleanup captains to organize public clean-ups at 25 locations across the state this weekend. (See partial list below.)  The cleanups will continue throughout September and October.  Interested volunteers should check the calendar for listings of clean-ups and to register.

ICC, created by the Ocean Conservancy, is now in its 28th year and has participation in all 55 U.S. states and territories and 100 countries around the world. It is a unique event in that volunteers tally up all garbage they pick up on data cards, which are sent to Ocean Conservancy for analysis. They use the information to track trends in marine debris and help stop it at its source. Last year, more than 550,000 people picked up more than 10 million pounds of trash along nearly 20,000 miles of coastline worldwide.

Bank of America is Lead Sponsor of Save the Sound’s ICC Cleanups in Connecticut, and employees from the company are leading and participating in a cleanup at Jennings Beach in Fairfield on Saturday, as well as co-leading a cleanup with the New Haven Rotary club at Lighthouse Point Park.

Working in both New York and Connecticut, Save the Sound has established a 40-year track record of restoring and protecting the waters and shorelines of the Sound.  A program of Connecticut Fund for the Environment, Save the Sound recently received a $50,000 grant from the Fairfield County Community Foundation to support its green infrastructure work in partnership with the City of Bridgeport and the Bridgeport Water Pollution Control Authority. The grant will further Save the Sound's efforts to work with towns to implement innovative installations that act like sponges to absorb and filter stormwater runoff, thereby reducing flooding and improving the water quality of Long Island Sound.

For a complete list of the over 43 ICC cleanups happening in Connecticut throughout September and October, please visit http://www.ctenvironment.org/get-involved/calendar.cfm. A Facebook page has additional information.

Saturday, September 21

NEW HAVEN, 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Bank of America, New Haven Rotary Club, and Save the Sound executive director Curt Johnson at Lighthouse Point Park.

FAIRFIELD,  9:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Bank of America cleanup at Jennings Beach.

NEW LONDON,10:00 AM – 11:30 AM

Local citizen cleanups at Ocean Beach and Alewife Cove Tidal Creek.

 Sunday, September 22

WESTPORT, 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM, 11:00 AM – 2:00 PM

 Friends of Sherwood Island State Park and National Charity League of Ridgefield will hold cleanups at Sherwood Island.

MILFORD, 4:00 PM – 5:30 PM

The Boy Scouts will hold two cleanups at Audubon Coastal Center and Gulf Beach.

New Audio Service To Help Students Challenged by Reading; Innovative Pilot is First in Nation

As students across the state return to begin a new academic year, the Connecticut Radio Information System (CRIS) is launching a first-of-its-kind service for schools, providing instant access to audio versions of educational materials, the Common Core State Standard text exemplars, and children’s magazines on any mobile device, including tablets, smartphones, and MP3 players, or computers with Internet access.

CRISKids™ For Schools is geared for students who are visually impaired or are print-challenged for any reason including a learning, physical, intellectual or emotional disability. The new service also provides custom recordings to fit the needs of the students.

Nearly a dozen schools have signed up to participate in the pilot of CRISKids For Schools.  Student outcomes will be submitted for evaluation by the U.S. Department of Education.  CRISKids For Schools is the only extensive line-up of audio versions of children’s magazines, educational materials and the Common Core State Standards featuring human narration in the nation.

Early results of the new initiative have been impressive, officials say, noting that teachers report that students participating in the CRISKids pilot are reading and enjoying it more. Megan O’Brien, a Grade 5 teacher at Clover Street School in Windsor, has noticed a transformation with her reluctant Grade 5 readers since using MP3 players downloaded with CRISKids.

“They think it’s awesome,” she said, noting that the students are far more motivated to read now with the help of CRISKids.

Support for CRISKids for Schools comes from the generous funding of several foundations, including Help for the Blind of Eastern Connecticut, Fund for Greater Hartford, The Gibney Family Foundation, and the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving.

The Connecticut Radio Information System is Connecticut's only radio reading service, and is registered with the state of Connecticut as a private, nonprofit 501(c)(3) charitable organization. CRIS broadcasts 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, from a broadcast center in Windsor, and regional satellite studios in Danbury, Norwich, Trumbull, and West Haven.

The programs broadcast on CRIS Radio are available to individuals who, because of vision loss, learning disability or physical handicap, are unable to read printed material.   CRIS Radio's live programming is provided free of charge and is available on specially tuned radios (provided free), cable providers, your telephone and online.  In addition, in recent years CRIS has become available on an iPhone, iPad/tablet, Internet radio or downloaded onto an iPod/MP3 player.

Earlier this year, the organization launched CRISKids™ Magazines, which provides audio versions of more than a dozen children’s magazines, and brought the initiative directly to children’s hospital beds.  In another first-in-the-nation initiative, Connecticut Children’s Medical Center teamed with CRIS Radio to offer the audio service to their patients  unable to turn the pages of magazines due to their medical condition or while receiving treatment.

Connecticut's Green Report Card: Needs Improvement

Connecticut’s state government received mixed grades in the new edition of the Connecticut Green Guide, published by Hartford Business Journal.  The publication reviewed state policy in our areas – microgrids, gasoline taxes, wind turbines and greenhouse gas reduction efforts – and graded the state’s efforts.

Connecticut received an “A” for recently announcing an $18 million grant program with nine microgrid projects in eight Connecticut communities, “adding protection from power outages and moving away from a centralized electricity system.”  Just a week ago, Gov. Malloy was joined by the White House Chair of the Council on Environmental Quality to highlight one of the state’s microgrid sites, in the Parkville neighborhood of Hartford.

The state received an “F” because of a moratorium on wind turbines, which has been in place since 2001, according to the Green Guide.  “Because of poorly written legislation and prolonged bureaucracy,” the publication explained, several projects have been delayed.  Another poor grade, a D+, was assigned because state taxes on gasoline rose 4 cents on July 1, “giving Connecticut the third highest taxes on motor vehicle fuel in the country.”  The publication noted that while “higher prices might encourage conservation, very little of the tax revenue goes toward fixing the aging transportation system, leading to vehicle inefficiencies and congestion.”

Connecticut fared better. earning a B+, in the analysis of the state’s participation in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, along with the other eight states in the region, which will “further lower the cap on power plant pollution,” which should, according to the publication’s review, “make the air cleaner, and the proceeds will aid the clean energy industry.”

The publication also noted that Connecticut became the first state in the country to mandate mattress recycling, with a new law approved by the legislature this year, also adding a new paint recycling requirement to existing laws that call for recycling of electronic waste and mercury thermostats.  The state’s move toward a greater emphasis on “product stewardship,” is characterized by an increasing obligation imposed on consumers to recycle designated products, which helps the environment and provides business opportunities in the recycling of those products.

In a report on the green initiatives across all 50 states, published by Forbes magazine in July, Connecticut excelled in the areas of mass transit, ranking 5th among the states, in CO2 controls, ranking 11th, and recycling, ranking 18th.  The state was 44th in use of renewables and 47th in water quality.  That's according to this recent green ranking of states from MPHOline.org, a website that provides information on a variety of public health topics.

Data from the green product rating site GoodGuide was used to assess air and water quality, information from Wikipedia was the basis of the comparison on the number of mass transit systems in each state, and state agencies were used to provide information on the other categories.

Need a Job? Study Says Volunteering First Can Help

If you are unemployed, it pays to volunteer.  That is the finding of a new analysis by the Center for Economic and Policy Research, tracking individuals out of work who chose to volunteer, and the impact it had on their search for employment.

The report, “Does It Pay to Volunteer: The Relationship Between Volunteer Work and Paid Work,”  estimates non-working individuals’ probability of being employed a year later if they volunteered during the 12-month period. Pooling three years of data from the Current Population Survey (CPS) Volunteer Supplement covering the period ending in September of 2011, the analysis found a positive volunteer effect on the probability of employment for persons who were not employed and volunteered for more than 20 hours per year.

For example, the employment rate for non-working persons who volunteered between 20 and 49 hours per year was 57 percent higher than the rate of non-volunteers. And controlling for personal characteristics such as age, gender and ethnicity, there was a substantial increase (6.8 percentage points) in the probability of employment for persons who volunteered between 20 and 99 hours per year.

In Connecticut, among the many ways to volunteer - most with local community-based organizations - the United Way has developed a web site, www.volunteerConnecticut.org , to match interested individuals with volunteer opportunities.  The Connecticut Association of Nonprofits, at www.ctnonprofits.org, also has a website devoted to volunteering.

The latest statewide data for Connecticut, complied by the Corporation for National & Community Service using 2011 data, indicates that volunteerism is considerable across the state:

• 28.5% of residents volunteer, ranking them 22nd among the 50 states & Washington, DC.
• 29.3 volunteer hours per resident.
• 72.8% do favors for their neighbors.
• 793,710 volunteers.
• 81.7 million hours of service.
• $1.8 billion of service contributed.

In the survey, many volunteers did not volunteer in the professional field in which they were seeking employment. This suggests that even without accumulating the relevant human capital for the fields in which they were seeking employment, volunteering may have signaled to prospective employers that the applicant possessed desirable qualities such as motivation, creativity and reliability.

Thus, volunteering could be particularly useful for job applicants with little prior experience such as recent college graduates or persons attempting to re-enter the labor market after a period of joblessness. The data did not indicate that volunteering has a significant impact on wage growth of the typical person.

For purposes of the survey, a volunteer was defined as person who performed unpaid volunteer activities over the previous 12 months through or for an association, society or group of people who share a common interest.  Volunteering in an informal manner, such as helping an elderly neighbor is not included in the survey. Unpaid work, including internships for for-profit employers, is also not considered volunteer work, while some other types of unpaid internships may be included, if the person considered it volunteering rather than work.

Nonprofits Boost Voter Turnout When They Reach Out to Clients, Study Finds

Voter turnout increases when nonprofit organizations are doing the asking.  That is the finding of a new study by Nonprofit Vote, which tracked the impact of nonprofit voter engagement efforts in seven states.  In addition, the demographic characteristics of the new voters is differs from the general voting population in ways that respond in traditional voting disparities.

“The clients and constituents engaged by nonprofits were markedly more diverse, lower income and younger than all registered voters in the seven states, made up of populations with a history of lower voter turnout in past elections,” the study indicated in its analysis of 2012 voting.  Among the key findings:

Voter turnout among those contacted by nonprofits was 74%, six points above the 68% turnout rate for all registered voters. In fact, nonprofit voters outperformed their counterparts across all demographics.

Voter turnout among voters contacted by nonprofits compared to all registered voters was 18 points higher for Latino voters, 15 points higher for voters under the age of 30, and 15 points higher for voters with household incomes under $25,000.

“The action by nonprofits had its biggest impact on turnout among least-likely voters – those that campaigns typically disregard based on low ‘voter propensity scores’ assigned before the election to predict their likelihood to vote,” the analysis indicated.  Young voters, ages 18-29, topped the list.

The report--Can Nonprofits Increase Voting Among Their Clients, Constituents, and Staff? An Evaluation of the Track the Vote Program—reflects data compiled from 94 nonprofits in seven states that registered or collected voter pledges from 33,741 clients and constituents during services.

In Connecticut, the Connecticut Association of Nonprofits participated in Nonprofit Vote, a nationwide initiative to involve nonprofits in efforts to urge people to register and vote.  The organization’s September 2012 newsletter, in an article by Nonprofit Vote, pointed out that “Many organizations now recognize the value of voter engagement as a key component in their advocacy toolkit and are no longer watching passively from the sidelines on Election Day.”

 “What stood out the most in the data,” the report found, “was the effect the personal outreach efforts of the nonprofits had in shrinking voter turnout disparities evident among all registered voters and in Census surveys generally.”

The top reasons that nonprofit organizations cited for conducting voter engagement were to advance their organization’s mission and empower their clients.  Nonprofits used a range of agency-based strategies to engage voters, and the most identifiable success factors were motivated staff and volunteers and strong support from a state or national partner in the form of training, check-ins and materials, the report said.

"Nonprofit service providers are well positioned to integrate new Americans into civic life and engage others who need encouragement to exercise their right to vote. This report provides useful evidence on how service providers can help to increase voter participation of populations new to the political process," said Elizabeth T. Boris, Director of the Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy at the Urban Institute.

The states participating in the study were Arizona, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, and Ohio.  The Center for Information & Research on Civic Learning & Engagement (CIRCLE) at tufts University assisted in the analysis.

Noting that past research has found that personal contact with potential voters strongly encourages voting, the report indicated that the data “speaks broadly to the power of personal contact in mobilizing people to vote.  More specifically it affirms the impact of the personal contact coming from someone or an organization known to and trusted by the voter.”

If you’re planning ahead for voter registration efforts this fall, the National Association of Secretaries of the State (NASS) approved a resolution last month that establishes September 24, 2013 as National Voter Registration Day.  Within the resolution, the Secretaries, who serve as their states’ top elections officials, called for “new and innovative methods” of voter registration.

Founded in 2005, Nonprofit VOTE partners with America’s nonprofits to help the people they serve participate and vote.  The organization is described as the leading source of nonpartisan resources to help nonprofits integrate voter engagement into their ongoing activities and services.

NASS Resolution Establishing September 24th, 2013 as National Voter Registration Day

Organ Donation Draws Renewed Attention as Data Points to Acute Need

In the United States, 56 percent of the patients waiting for organ transplants are individuals of color, even though they account for 36 percent of the total population.

“While successful matching between donors and recipients does not take race or ethnic background into consideration, since we really all can help each other, more donors from all backgrounds will only result in fewer deaths on the waiting list,” says Caitlyn Bernabucci, Public Education Specialist for LifeChoice Donor Services. “Compatible blood and tissue types, which are a part of the donor and recipient matching process, are commonly found in people with similar backgrounds and ethnicities.”

To bring attention to the issue, August 1-7 is designated National Minority Organ Donor Awareness Week.  This is a nationwide observance to educate people of the need for donation and transplantation within the multicultural community, and how to register their decision to donate.

Today, nearly 199,000 people are on the national organ transplant waiting list. Largely due to the rarity of donation opportunities, only about 28,000 organs are transplanted each year. As a result, 18 people die each day due to the lack of a donor.

Currently, Hispanics/Latinos comprise 16% of the population, 19% of those waiting for a kidney, and 17% of those waiting for a liver, the federal agency reports.  According to the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (HHS), African-Americans, Asians and Pacific Islanders, and Hispanics/Latinos are three times more likely than Caucasians to suffer from end-stage renal (kidney) disease, often as the result of high blood pressure and other conditions that can damage the kidneys. Almost 35 percent of the more than 95,000 people on the national waiting list for a kidney transplant are African-American.

In Connecticut, as of July 19, 2013, the waiting list for all organ transplants for Connecticut residents includes 1,368 individuals.  The ethnicity breakdown, according to official statistics, includes 668 whites, 457 blacks, 198 Hispanics, and 42 Asian.  Overall in Connecticut, individuals on the waiting list include 1,151 seeking kidney transplants, 192 awaiting liver transplants, 17 waiting for a pancreas transplant, and 25 hoping for a heart transplant.

HHS data indicates that in 2012, Hispanic recipients were 14.1 percent of the total organ transplants in the U.S, reflecting 15.8 percent of kidney transplants in the nation.  Among Hispanics, 66 percent of transplant recipients received kidneys and 22 percent received livers.  African-Americans received 19.9 percent of all organ transplants, including 24.8 percent of kidney transplants.  HHS reports that since 1996, the number of non-white donors has doubled.

“A disproportionately high number of minorities are currently in desperate need of an organ transplant. The need is so great in these communities mainly because diseases that cause end stage renal failure and the need for a kidney transplant, such as uncontrolled high blood pressure and diabetes, tend to impact this group more than others,” adds Bernabucci.

Although organs are not matched according to race/ethnicity, and people of different races frequently match one another, all individuals waiting for an organ transplant will have a better chance of receiving one if there are large numbers of donors from their racial/ethnic background. This is because compatible blood types and tissue markers—critical qualities for donor/recipient matching—are more likely to be found among members of the same ethnicity, the federal agency points out, adding that “a greater diversity of donors may potentially increase access to transplantation for everyone.”

Originally launched in 1996 as National Minority Donor Awareness Day on Aug. 1, the one-day observance became a week-long designation at the request of organ procurement organizations (OPOs) and other organ donation partners throughout the country, according to Texas organ transplant officials.

LifeChoice Donor Services, Inc. is the federally designated, non-profit organ procurement organization (OPO) for six counties in Connecticut and three counties in Western Massachusetts with a combined population of 2.2 million people.  The OPO serves twenty-three acute care hospitals for organ and tissue donation and two organ transplant hospitals, Hartford Hospital in Hartford, CT and Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, MA. Organ transplants include kidney, liver, pancreas, heart, lung and intestine.

Donate Life New England is a joint project of three federally designated organ procurement organizations that serve New England – New England Organ Bank, LifeChoice Donor Services, The Center for Donation and Transplant, the Connecticut Eye Bank, as well as Donate Life Connecticut. For more information about LifeChoice and to join the Donor Registry, please visit www.lifechoiceopo.org or call 1.800.874.5215.

Teacher Training in STEM Fields to Expand in CT

Connecticut’s drive to improve both teacher training and the caliber of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) education being provided to students across the state received a boost with the announcement that the Connecticut Science Center would be tripling the capacity of its teacher professional development program, the result of a grant from Joyce D. and Andrew J. Mandell.

The number of teachers participating in the program will increase from 500 to 1,500 annually over the next few years, officials said, with the goal of giving educators the tools they need to meet rigorous new state and national standards for STEM education and core curricula.

Governor Dannel Malloy, State Education Commissioner Stephan Pryor, Hartford Mayor Pedro Segarra and Hartford’s 2012 Teacher of the Year Keith Sevigny, a past participant in the professional development program, were among those joining Connecticut Science Center President and CEO Matt Fleury in making the announcement.

In addition to expanding its capacity to serve more teachers, the newly named Joyce D. and Andrew J. Mandell Academy for Teachers at the Connecticut Science Center will also award graduate-level college credit through Charter Oak State College for certain programs.  Academy offerings include Student Engagement Strategies, Inquiry Teaching and Learning, STEM Education Units, Science Content Workshops, Engineering Practices, and Science Coaching. Teachers completing the covered courses can earn a total of nine credits toward their Master’s degrees over a three-year period.

Governor Malloy said the announcement made it a day of “celebration,” emphasizing that the impact “will be played out in the years to come.”  Reiterating his commitment to education and economic development, the Governor said this effort is another example of initiatives designed to “allow our state to compete.”  He  noted the BioScience Connecticut initiative and recently approved growth plans for the University of Connecticut as further indications of the state’s commitment.

Described as a “high-impact professional development program for educators,”  the Academy is “committed to supplying educators with professional development experiences that support rigorous science and curriculum standards.”   Commissioner Pryor, underscoring the challenges in education, pointed out that “15 countries do better than the U.S. in science and 24 do better in math.”  Pryor added that “we can prepare students for jobs of the future, but not if we are slipping in math and science.”

Officials pointed out that new nationally mandated benchmarks such as the Next Generation Science Standards and Common Core Education Standards will require teachers to seek training to improve the way they teach science and integrate it with the rest o f their curriculum.

“We want every child in the state to be able to compete,” said Joyce Mandell. “Teaching teachers how to connect with their students is one of the most important things we’ve ever done.  We’re very proud of our association with the Connecticut Science Center.”

Citing a story published in U.S. News, the website CT Stem Jobs, reported last month that about 20 percent of all American jobs are now in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields, with half of those open to workers who don't have a four-year college degree, according to a new report by the Brookings Institution called "The Hidden STEM Economy."

Those jobs constitute a "hidden STEM economy," the Washington, D.C.-based think tank says, because they are "prevalent in every large metropolitan area," but many people believe at least a bachelor's degree is necessary to work in careers that require STEM skills. Many of these so-called "blue-collar" stem jobs are in construction, installation, manufacturing and health care. They include registered nurses, mechanics, carpenters and electricians.

"Of the $4.3 billion spent annually by the federal government on STEM education and training, only one-fifth goes towards supporting sub-bachelor's level training, while twice as much supports bachelor's or higher level-STEM careers," the report says. "The vast majority of National Science Foundation spending ignores community colleges. In fact, STEM knowledge offers attractive wage and job opportunities to many workers with a post-secondary certificate or associate's degree."