Esther Wattenberg, September 2015 From time to time, a concerned visitor to my office will make a polite inquiry, after glancing at my cluttered desk: Have I heard of something called a “filing cabinet”? My muffled response is usually along these lines: “Yes, and I hope that person received the Nobel Prize for invention.” Occasionally, [...]
The Star Tribune editorial supporting the Governor’s Task Force on the Protection of Children, “A start, but press on to prevent child deaths,” (April 2, 2015), should be met with a note of caution: Essentially, the 93 recommendations have substantially changed the emphasis of Child Protection from “well-being to “safety.” In this directive, we have [...]
With powerful search engines spawning tidal waves of data, we are in a restless search for responses that will create an optimistic future for our children. For those of us who worry about vulnerable children in high-risk families, the search is especially urgent. Since “neglect” is a major entry point into the Child Welfare system, [...]
Glancing at the several piles of clutter on my desk, variously labeled as "Exposing the Achievement Gap and Its Consequences," I am tempted to rename this series, "Notes from a Cluttered Mind." "Putting socks on the octopus" may be the most accurate summary of where we are in our persistent search for closing the achievement [...]
The Child Welfare narrative, for some historians, is linked to this observation of a behavioral economist: "The fate of a child is determined by the accident of birth: to whom that child is born." Thus, the wheel of fate, the luck of the draw, fate without pity and fairness begins the drama of a child's [...]
Here are a few scattered notes from a seminar entitled, “The Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma: Recovering Humanity; Repairing Generations,” held Saturday, October 5th, at the Law School at the University of Minnesota. What drew my attention was not only the subject, “transmission of trauma,” a child welfare issue of central importance, but also the auspices [...]
