Reframing Childhood Adversity: Promoting Upstream Approaches
While Americans agree that child abuse and neglect is unacceptable and are more likely than ever to consider child development an important policy issue, it can be difficult to build the public understanding and political will we need to effectively prevent, identify, and address childhood adversity. As communicators, we still encounter persistent dilemmas in deciding what to say, how to say it, and what to leave unsaid.
Understanding the need for fresh, powerful framing strategies, Prevent Child Abuse America (PCA America) and the newly merged Alliance for Strong Families and Communities and Council on Accreditation asked the FrameWorks Institute to update framing recommendations that have served our field well since 2004. The result is a new strategic brief, Reframing Childhood Adversity: Promoting Upstream Approaches. This highly accessible, actionable guide takes recent science and current communications contexts into account, speaks more directly to racial and social justice, and aligns with efforts to reimagine child welfare systems into child well-being systems. The brief also offers guidance for communicating about adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and strategies for helping the public to see how prevention works.
Join Dr. Julie Sweetland, senior advisor at the FrameWorks Institute, for a guided tour of this timely, powerful new guidance. Since joining FrameWorks in 2012, Dr. Sweetland has led reframing initiatives on issues like human services, health equity, and two-generation approaches to family well-being. Her strategic insight has helped leading advocates, policymakers, and scientists frame their issues in ways that drive change. Dr. Sweetland began her career as a classroom teacher and is deeply committed to building a world that brings out the full potential of children.