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The Center for Child and Family Traumatic Stress at Kennedy Krieger Institute's 6th Biennial Trauma Conference, Addressing Trauma Across the Lifespan: Modern Day Threats and Social Discord on October 5-6, 2017 was a tremendous success.

The Center for Child and Family Traumatic Stress at Kennedy Krieger Institute's 6th Biennial Trauma Conference, Addressing Trauma Across the Lifespan: Modern Day Threats and Social Discord on October 5-6, 2017 was a tremendous success.

Attendees participated in two days of thought provoking, experiential, evidence supported and pertinent information to assist them in service delivery for those impacted by trauma across the lifespan. Day one offered 3-hour and half-day workshops that were extremely popular and featured experts in the field of Race Based Traumatic Stress, Play Therapy, Story Telling and Ethics. In the morning, Kay Connors and Dr. Elizabeth Thompson engaged the audience in a sometimes difficult but much needed discussion exploring the connection between race and trauma. Beth Campbell and Casey Anderson had fun with the audience in their morning workshop with experiential practice and imagination with the use of play therapy in trauma treatment.

The afternoon workshops on day one included Corey Beauford helping professionals stay alert and “in the know” with a workshop on Ethics in the Age of Social Media along with an interactive workshop provided by David Fakunle and Deborah Pierce-Fakunle on DiscoverME/RecoverME an intervention program that uses tenets of storytelling from an African perspective to aid in the process of recovery from trauma. 

Day two of the conference opened with Keynote Speaker, Dwight Watkins, setting the stage for deep and meaningful thinking about the political, social, and cultural contexts for trauma. Sharing his journey to acknowledging his own trauma history, Mr. Watkins “Call to Action” for those working with trauma survivors was poignant and powerful.

An obvious climax of the day was the featured speaker, Stacy Jewell, who performed an excerpt of her “ 7 Layers Captive” production. Jewell's performance was riveting and powerful as she shared fragments of her story as a survivor of sex trafficking. Jewell's featured performance was a resounding success. Participants throughout the remainder of the day were talking about this amazing, captivating, and compelling performance. 

In addition to these two dynamic speakers on day two, there were 15 interactive, creative and informative workshops offered as part of three breakout sessions across the day. Participants were widely impressed with the content and wide array of options.

We wish to thank everyone who attended, including our exhibitors and sponsors, who helped make this conference a huge success. 

2017 Biennial Trauma Conference Workshops

Participant Comments:
 

“As an experienced psychologist, the information was beneficial and offered new perspectives. The two day experience deepened my sensitivity and will have a ripple effect.”

“Each session was engaging, informative and distinct. Rarely has each program created both introspective and advocacy messages.”

“I felt like this was an excellent conference! I left with many concrete ideas and plans to implement in my clinical work and also made connections that could be helpful in future collaborations. I would highly recommend this conference to others, particularly trauma providers looking for concrete ways to make positive changes in their work.”

“Once again, a great conference. I especially appreciated the attention to the current political climate as it pertains to race and trauma.”

“The sessions were impactful and educational. It made me evaluate my practice as a social worker from a clinical and ethical standpoint.”

The best conference I have ever attended! Fantastic information. Opened my eyes and provided insight. I will be able to take the information I learned and use it to make changes in my work and I am looking forward to it!”

“A critical and timely topic ‐ thank you. Excellent work bringing in diverse community perspectives (i.e. barbershops). Excellent choices for keynote and featured speaker ‐ these were meaningful voices from the community, a valuable contribution. Very well organized ‐ before, and after. Thank you for all the thoughtfulness and effort that clearly went into this event.”

“The workshops were extremely relevant and poignant. Discussion exercises were great as they brought up topics that were important to talk through in a multi‐racial setting.”