CHDI NEWSLETTER


  
Happy Holidays  
from the CHDI Staff!  
  
Recent Publications
IMPACT
CHDI recently released "Developmental Surveillance and Screening in Early Care and Education: Family and Provider Perspectives."
This IMPACT focuses on screening and surveillance in early childhood settings and provides a comprehensive review of the perspectives and experiences of child care providers in Connecticut and the families they serve. Contact Cindy Langer if you would like a printed copy of the report or you can download it.

Issue Briefs
Be sure to read our latest Issue Briefs:
EMPS Annual Report
CHDI ensures that Connecticut's Emergency Mobile Psychiatric Services (EMPS) works for families. Through the EMPS Performance Improvement Center, CHDI uses data to ensure access, service quality, and outcomes among all EMPS providers. Results in 2015 indicate a slight increase in children and families served by EMPS since last year, sustained high performance on metrics that reflect a highly mobile and responsive service for families, and significant improvements in child behavior and functioning. Download the EMPS Fiscal Year 2015 report.
Starting Early/Starting Now Summit
The Starting Early / Starting Now: Designing Policy for the Best Start in Life for Connecticut's Children summit in November sparked ideas and strategies for translating research on early childhood experiences and infant attachment into effective policy solutions that will be summarized in a Policy Brief to be released in January.

The Connecticut Early Childhood Funders Collaborative (a project of the Connecticut Council for Philanthropy) sponsored the summit, in partnership with CHDI and The Connecticut Mirror.

Learn more about the summit and our work to promote social and emotional development in young children.
CHDI Presents to Juvenile Justice Policy and Oversight Committee
CHDI's Jeff Vanderploeg and Jeana Bracey presented to the Juvenile Justice Policy and Oversight Committee (JJPOC) at the State Capitol on December 17. The presentation described findings and recommendations from a recent report titled, "Improving Coordination Between the Juvenile Justice and Behavioral Health Systems in Connecticut." The report will be finalized in the coming weeks and the JJPOC will use the report to improve system coordination and service delivery for youth with behavioral health and juvenile justice needs. Click here to watch the CT-N broadcast of the presentation.
CHDI in the News
Check out CHDI's latest news on our website. Coverage includes:
  • CT Mirror article "Post-Newtown program helps children get mental health care" quoting Lisa Honigfeld
  • WICC radio interview with Jason Lang on child trauma
  • WNPR interview with Lisa Honigfeld on the link between health and early childhood education
Results of Early Childhood Health Data Initiative Presented at AAP National Meeting
Susan Macary presented the results of CHDI's Early Childhood Health Data Initiative in October at the annual American Academy of Pediatrics National Conference & Exhibition in Washington, DC. Eight Connecticut community collaboratives worked with CHDI to evaluate the utility of data from Connecticut's Early Childhood Health Assessment Record to help child care providers improve the health of the children in their care; medical homes maintain the health of their patients in child care programs; communities target health issues and inform the State's early childhood efforts, and share information with State policymakers to plan for further development and better utilization of early childhood and school health information.
CHDI Lends Expertise on School-Based Diversion Initiative to Other States
CHDI is lending our resources and expertise to national centers and other states interested in Connecticut's School-Based Diversion Initiative (SBDI), a model CHDI's Jeff Vanderploeg helped create.
  • The School Justice Partnership National Resource Center now features several CHDI publications in their online library such as the SBDI Toolkit and CHDI IMPACT reports on Trauma and School Mental Health.
  • The National Center on Mental Health and Juvenile Justice (NCMHJJ) is spreading the CT SBDI model to other states. They highlighted the SBDI model in an article for the National Juvenile Justice Exchange and contracted with CHDI to provide consultation to West Virginia, Wisconsin, Nevada and other states as they develop school arrest diversion models. 
  • CHDI's Jeana Bracey, Yecenia Casiano, and Tianna Hill presented at the World Conference of theInternational Institute for Restorative Practices in Bethlehem, PA in October on "Enhancing Supports to Reduce School-Based Arrests".
  • Jeana Bracey discussed school-based juvenile justice diversion models for youth with behavioral health needs in a webinar sponsored by the National Center for Mental Health and Juvenile Justice and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges on December 9. Click here to watch a recording of the webinar and get information about future webinars in this series.
Staff News
CHDI welcomes Adora Harizaj as a Data Analyst working on the Performance Improvement Center (PIC) and School-Based Diversion Initiative (SBDI) projects. Harizaj is completing a Master's in Public Health from UConn. She was most recently employed by the CT Department of Public Health where she worked on a project to create an epidemiological profile of Hepatitis C in Connecticut. She also participated in research to examine the risk factor associated with contracting Hepatitis C, using data from the Youth Risk Behavioral Surveillance Survey.

Congratulations to Michelle Delaney who earned her Masters in Health Psychology from Central Connecticut State University in December. She
defended her Masters thesis entitled "Effect of Perceived Responsibility of Injury Causing Facial Disfigurement and Participant Alcohol Use on Willingness to Help a Facially Disfigured Individual."
Child Health and Development Institute
860.679.1519 | [email protected]
www.chdi.org

Copyright ©2015. All Rights Reserved.