Please join us for the annual Fall meeting of the New York State Parenting Education Partnership on Monday, October 4, 2010!

REGISTER NOW:
https://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/6013/event/2010NYSPEPFallMtg

Date: Monday, October 4, 2010
Time: 8:30am-4:00pm

Location: Carondelet Hospitality Center
385 Watervliet-Shaker Road
Latham, NY 12110-4799

Working with Community Collaborations to Strengthen Families: Likely and Unlikely Partners


“New strategies are needed to move beyond circumscribed service programs toward community-level engagement in nurturing children and families.” Kathryn Harding, 2008.

“Can collaboration and partnerships become the hall mark . . . allowing communities to take advantage of the expertise and wisdom of all disciplines and all participating organizations, thereby maximizing the use of all available fiscal and human resources?” Deborah Daro & Anne Cohn Donnelly, 2009.

Keynote Panel Presentation:
Partners in community child/family support coalitions in New York State discuss why and how their coalition developed, challenges they faced, new opportunities they’ve found, and how they are building their communities’ resources and support of children and families. Participants will learn about potential partners - likely and unlikely - that they might work with to further their program mission.


Followed by questions for the panelists and break-out discussion groups.

NYSPEP Workgroups will meet following lunch and news-and-announcements from participants and the NYSPEP Steering Committee.

Registration Fee: $ 20.00

Recession rips at US marriages, expands income gap

WASHINGTON – The recession seems to be socking Americans in the heart as well as the wallet: Marriages have hit an all-time low while pleas for food stamps have reached a record high and the gap between rich and poor has grown to its widest ever.

The long recession technically ended in mid-2009, economists say, but U.S. Census data released Tuesday show the painful, lingering effects. The annual survey covers all of last year, when unemployment skyrocketed to 10 percent, and the jobless rate is still a stubbornly high 9.6 percent.

READ MORE:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100929/ap_on_bi_ge/us_census_recession_s_impact

Census Finds Record Gap Between Rich and Poor

AP
WASHINGTON (Sept. 28) -- The income gap between the richest and poorest Americans grew last year to its widest amount on record as young adults and children in particular struggled to stay afloat in the recession.

The top-earning 20 percent of Americans - those making more than $100,000 each year - received 49.4 percent of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3.4 percent earned by those below the poverty line, according to newly released census figures. That ratio of 14.5-to-1 was an increase from 13.6 in 2008 and nearly double a low of 7.69 in 1968.

A different measure, the international Gini index, found U.S. income inequality at its highest level since the Census Bureau began tracking household income in 1967. The U.S. also has the greatest disparity among Western industrialized nations.

At the top, the wealthiest 5 percent of Americans, who earn more than $180,000, added slightly to their annual incomes last year, census data show. Families at the $50,000 median level slipped lower.

READ MORE:
http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/census-finds-record-gap-between-rich-and-poor/19651337?icid=main%7Chtmlws-main-n%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk1%7C173763&a_dgi=aolshare_digg

Shortage of foster parents seen as U.S. trend

States are facing shortages of foster parents, despite a nationwide decline in the number of children in need of foster care.

Officials in states including California, Texas, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Florida report having fewer foster homes available than needed. But a study released this month by the Department of Health and Human Services shows that the number of children in foster care has dropped from 460,416 in September of 2008 to 423,773 in 2009 — and is down from about 523,000 in 2002.

READ MORE:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2010-09-23-fostercare23_ST_N.htm

Annual Fall Workshop of the New York State Infant Mental Health Association

Tuesday, October 5, 2010
5:30-8:30 pm

Topic:
The Collaborative Process for Caring for
Very Young Children with Mental Health Issues
Panel Presenters:
Dr. Anthony Malone, Developmental Pediatrician
Dr. Julie Simon, Psychologist
Dr. Dawn Abbuhl, Psychologist

Here is a link to Directions: http://www.ellishospital.org/ellishealthcenter/directions.aspx

More Teens Get Unapproved Weight-Loss Surgery

A type of weight-loss surgery not approved for adolescents is becoming more and more common among teens in California, according to a report published today.

Most of the patients are white girls, although they make up less than half of overweight youth, researchers say.

From 2005 to 2007, they found rates of so-called gastric banding, in which a silicone band is placed around the top portion of the stomach to restrict food intake, rose five-fold. However, use of gastric bypass -- which surgically reduces the size of the stomach -- dropped, leaving the overall rate of weight-loss procedures constant.

READ MORE:
http://www.foxnews.com/health/2010/09/20/teens-unapproved-weight-loss-surgery/

News Around the World: China Could Overthrow One-Child Rule

The Chinese government is beginning to rethink its famed one-child limit as it begins to lift the restriction in five provinces with low birth rates.

The pilot projects, which are set to begin in 2011, allow for a second child per family if at least one spouse is an only child. USA Today reports that Beijing, Shanghai and four other provinces will follow suit in 2012, with nationwide adoption of the new policy expected by 2013 or 2014. In 1979, China's one-child policy was introduced after decades of huge population boom followed by mass death due to resulting food shortages. The policy, which has prevented 400 million births, restricted the country's ethnic Han majority to have only one child per family (exempting most ethnic minorities) and has remained nearly the same since, though a few exceptions have been made. (Some rural farm families have been allowed to have a second child if the first is a girl.)

READ MORE: http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/09/09/china-could-overthrow-one-child-rule/#ixzz0zQFmQhlv

A New Generation of Caregivers Takes Control of Kids

The number of children being raised by their grandparents has risen sharply since the start of the recession in 2007, according to a new Pew Research Center study that found one in 10 children in the U.S. now lives with a grandparent.

The trend was most noticeable among whites, Pew said in its analysis of census data. Those whites who were primary caregivers for their grandchildren rose 9 percent from 2007 to 2008, compared with a 2 percent increase among black grandparents and no change among Hispanics. In all, 2.9 million children are being raised mainly by at least one grandparent, or 4 percent of all children.

READ MORE:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/09/AR2010090906576.html

Teens' 'unhealthy' sex exposure blamed on TV, music, Web

"The media represents arguably the leading sex educator in America today," said Dr. Victor Strasburger, the lead author of the paper. "We do such a poor job of educating kids about sex in sex education classes in school, and parents are notoriously shy about talking to kids about sex. The media picks up the slack."

Seventy percent of teen shows contain sexual content, Strasburger added, "and less than 10% of that content involves what anyone would classify as being responsible content. There's no mention of contracting an STD (sexually transmitted disease) or the need to wait to have sex until later."

The United States leads the western world in teen pregnancy rates and American teens have an alarmingly high rate of STDs — one in four children.

READ MORE:
http://www.usatoday.com/yourlife/parenting-family/teen-ya/2010-09-06-sex-education_N.htm

Addressing Hospital Acquired Infections in NYS: Improving Patient Safety

Free live webcast - September 16, 2010
9:00 am - 10:00 am - Eastern Time

Rachel Stricof, MPH, CIC
Bureau Director
Bureau of Healthcare-Associated Infections
New York State Department of Health

Healthcare-associated infections (HAI) are a major public health problem. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there were an estimated 1.7 million healthcare-associated infections and 99,000 deaths from those infections in 2002. 1 A recent CDC report estimated the annual medical costs of healthcare-associated infections to U.S. hospitals to be between $28 and $45 billion, adjusted to 2007 dollars. 2 The speaker will discuss the development of the New York State HAI reporting system, describe HAI rates in NYS in the three years since mandated reporting began; and describe activities underway in New York to support hospitals to reduce risk and enhance patient safety.

REGISTER HERE:

http://www.informz.net/ualbany-sph/event.asp?eid=3725&uid=237207396&minst=1072948