What Shapes Us: Strong Foundations, Thriving Futures

What Shapes Us: Strong Foundations, Thriving Futures

by The Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University

Season 1

Solutions Spotlight: How Communities Are Leading Efforts to Ensure Clean Water Access

Access to clean water is too often determined by where we live and the political and economic influence we have to demand it. Yet water is a critical part of a child’s environment, and disruptions in its availability and quality can impact young children’s development and health, both in the moment and throughout their lives. We explore how communities are mobilizing to address disparities in water access and climate-related threats like flooding. Hear from our panelists, Kealoha Fox, PhD, Climate Change Commissioner for the City and County of Honolulu, and Dana Eness, Executive Director of the Urban Conservancy, as they share practical, community-driven solutions to support children’s development, health, and well-being.

Extreme Heat & Early Childhood Development: A Discussion on Rising Temperatures and Strategies for Supporting Development and Lifelong Health

In April 2024, we hosted a webinar where we explored the science from our latest working paper, Extreme Heat Affects Early Childhood Development and Health. The Center’s Chief Science Officer, Dr. Lindsey Burghardt, joined by Dr. Kari Nadeau, Chair of the Department of Environmental Health at Harvard’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health, brought the latest research and insights from the field to discuss the intersection of heat, early childhood development, and health equity. They also discussed actionable solutions to benefit children, caregivers, and communities now and in the future. The webinar discussion has been adapted for this episode of the Brain Architects podcast.

A Cascade of Impacts: A Discussion on the Ways Water Affects Early Childhood Health & Well-being

In October 2024, we hosted a webinar where we explored the science from our latest working paper, A Cascade of Impacts: The Many Ways Water Affects Child Development. The discussion was led by the Center’s Chief Science Officer, Lindsey Burghardt, MD, MPH, FAAP, and featured Devon Payne-Sturges, DrPH, Associate Professor with the Department of Global, Environmental, and Occupational Health at the University of Maryland, School of Public Health, and Nathaniel Harnett, PhD, Assistant Professor in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. In this podcast, learn about the many ways water affects early childhood health and well-being as well as actionable strategies and policy solutions that can support clean water access for all children and their caregivers. The webinar discussion has been adapted for this episode of the Brain Architects podcast.

A Place to Play: Moving Towards Fairness of Place for All Children

In March 2024, we continued our Place Matters webinar series with our third installment: “A Place to Play: Moving Towards Fairness of Place for All Children.” During the webinar, we explored the power of play in supporting early childhood development, as well as the importance of ensuring that children and caregivers have access to safe green spaces, like parks and playgrounds. Our panel of experts discussed how access to safe, stimulating, and joyful play space is not equally distributed across communities, along with strategies to work toward building a future where all children have a safe place to play. The webinar discussion has been adapted for this episode of the Brain Architects podcast.

Understanding Racism's Impact on Child Development: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States

In December 2023, we continued our Place Matters webinar series with our second installment: “Understanding Racism’s Impact on Child Development: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States.” During the webinar, Stephanie Curenton, PhD, Nathaniel Harnett, PhD, Mavis Sanders, PhD, and Natalie Slopen, ScD, discussed their latest research, exploring how racism gets “under the skin” to impact children’s development and how it contributes to unequal access to opportunity in the places where children live, grow, play, and learn. Together, they explored ways to dismantle systemic barriers and work toward solutions that promote healthy child development. The webinar discussion has been adapted for this episode of the Brain Architects podcast.

A New Lens on Poverty: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States

In the fall of 2023, we kicked off our three-part Place Matters webinar series with our first installment: “A New Lens on Poverty: Working Towards Fairness of Place in the United States.” The webinar discussion featured the work of Mona Hanna-Attisha, MD, MPH, FAAP, whose research uncovered the water crisis in Flint, H. Luke Shaefer, PhD, co-author of the new book The Injustice of Place: Uncovering the Legacy of Poverty in America, and their groundbreaking new program, RxKids, an innovative effort to address child poverty and improve health equity. This conversation, moderated by our Chief Science Officer, Lindsey Burghardt, MD, MPH, FAAP, has been adapted for the Brain Architects podcast.

Place Matters

In June, we hosted a webinar about our latest Working Paper, Place Matters: The Environment We Create Shapes the Foundations of Healthy Development, which examines how a wide range of conditions in the places where children live, grow, play, and learn can shape how children develop. The paper examines the many ways in which the built and natural environment surrounding a child can affect their development, emphasizes how the latest science can help deepen our understanding, and points towards promising opportunities to re-design environments so that all children can grow up in homes and neighborhoods free of hazards and rich with opportunity. Corey Zimmerman, our Chief Program Officer, moderated a discussion around these themes between Dr. Lindsey Burghardt (Chief Science Officer) and Dr. Dominique Lightsey-Joseph (Director of Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging Strategy) which has been adapted for this episode of the Brain Architects podcast.

IDEAS Framework Toolkit

In April, we hosted a webinar about the recently released IDEAS Impact Framework Toolkit—a free online resource designed to help innovators in the field of early childhood build improved programs and products that are positioned to achieve greater impact in their communities. During the webinar, we provided an overview of the site and had the opportunity to hear from two organizations in the field about how they leveraged the toolkit and its resources to shape their work: Valley Settlement and Raising a Reader. This episode of the Brain Architects podcast features highlights from the webinar. If you’re interested in hearing a full walk through of the toolkit by the Director of our Pediatric Innovation Initiative, Dr. Melanie Berry, please head over to our YouTube channel to view the full webinar recording.

Building Resilience Through Play

These days, resilience is needed more than ever, and one simple, under-recognized way of supporting healthy and resilient child development is as old as humanity itself: play. Far from frivolous, play contributes to sturdy brain architecture, the foundations of lifelong health, and the building blocks of resilience, yet its importance is often overlooked. In this podcast, Dr. Jack Shonkoff explains the role of play in supporting resilience and five experts share their ideas and personal stories about applying the science of play in homes, communities, and crisis environments around the world.

COVID-19 Special Edition: Mental Health Vital Signs

The devastating toll of the pandemic has underscored the critical importance of connecting what science is telling us to the lived experiences of people and communities. In March of 2020, we recorded episodes exploring the impact the coronavirus pandemic could have on child development. Now, a year later, we wanted to continue these conversations and discuss what we’ve learned, what needs to change, and where we go from here.

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