International Awareness of Issues and Trends Reflection

               Throughout the course, Issues and Trends, we have been challenged to research professional organizations of interest on a global scale.  I chose to research the international organizations: The Global Fund for Children, KidsRights, and the Alberta Family Wellness Initiative.  After exploring my own readings and my peer’s blog posts, I have reflected on my growth and ideas about the international early childhood field through my personal, professional, and local lenses.  Conducting research on a worldwide scale is humbling and eye opening all at the same time.  Through my lenses, I learned that I am not along in my challenges and successes as an early childhood professional, many share my experiences and feelings locally, nationally, and worldwide.   Additionally, I have been exposed to amazing advocation opportunities that I would have never stumbled upon myself without intentionally pursuing the information.  

            Personally, I closely identified with the purposes of the Global Fund for Children (GFC).  The Global Fund for Children determines valid research groups, allocates monies to local organizations, and continually works with the local organizations to ensure they are creating partnerships among organizations and people, “not dependencies” (GFC, 2018).  Throughout the past eight weeks, I have found my passion for utilizing research to justify the social changes that need to take place in the early childhood field.  Personally, I believe that is how organizations can make lasting differences.  Investing in our local services that are committed to providing the best for the community and their children and families.  

Professionally, I feel like I have grown a great amount in the knowledge I have gained in the various organizations in place to support children and families.  Not only did I learn about the organizations themselves, but I also gained insight about the children and families they serve and why.  For example, the KidsRights organization is designed to empower children to advocate for their own rights (KidsRights, 2018).  This was a profound concept for me to consider professionally.  I have been stuck in the mindset that adults need to make the changes, leaving the children to be passengers, rather than the drivers.  Children’s opinions and voices deserve to be heard as well.  The purpose of the KidsRights organization is to give a voice to the children who are voiceless.

            Locally, I was quite surprised that my international research connected directly to the happenings in my own community.  Upon my investigations into the Alberta Family Wellness Initiative, I found a media segment discussing the use of the Adverse Childhood Experiences screening tool (ACEs) in Canada to determine the severity of risk factors in children and the impacts they may have on adulthood outcomes.  Dr. Anda (2014), presented this information to a panel encouraging all professionals who work with children to use and consider this tool, with an emphasis on assessing the children and family members ACEs scores to get the best picture of the child’s development and level of overall family health.  I recently attended a meeting locally with early childhood and medical professionals.  We discussed this exact tool and made implementation plans for rolling it out to our school district.  The information we gathered was astounding, especially the ACEs scores of the parents of the children we were serving.  It was an intriguing lesson to learn locally, we immediately started thinking more about family and parent support/education services we should be offering into the future.

            Finally, the information I gathered from my peers was just as invaluable to be exposed to.  I got insight on what other professionals are interested in and focused on in making a difference.  Conversating about our challenges and successes in our field was the most beneficial.  To hear what others are doing or are aspiring to do has fueled my own passions in making a difference on a local and global level.  I believe that the early childhood field should aspire to form an international common goal to advocate for children’s overall well-being with access to quality educational experiences, quality health services, and committed resource agencies.

References

Alberta Family Wellness Initiative (2018). What we know: ACEs resources. Retrieved from http://www.albertafamilywellness.org/resources/results?search-term=&topic_filter=aces

Anda, Robert. (2014, October). The ace study: Building self-healing communities. Retrieved from http://www.albertafamilywellness.org/resources/video/the-ace-study-building-self-healing-communities

The Global Fund for Children. (n.d.). (2018). Retrieved from https://globalfundforchildren.org/ 

KidsRights. (n.d.). (2018). Retrieved from https://kidsrights.org/