By Mady Colby, BSW intern with Iowa ACEs 360

I am currently in my final year of earning my bachelor’s in social work, and until a few months ago, I didn’t know what Adverse Childhood Experiences are. I have been in college for about 5 years, during which time, I have taken many psychology, human development, and social work classes; yet, it wasn’t until the end when I finally learned how ACEs can impact children mentally and physically.

During my mental health and well-being class, we started a unit called ACEs and neurobiology. My professor asked us to take a test and add up our ACE scores with no further explanation on what the scores meant. It was later revealed to us that individuals with an ACE score of 6 or more have roughly 20 years taken off their life expectancy. The class erupted with, “We are going to die in our 60’s?!”.

My professor consoled us and explained that individuals with an ACE score of 6 or more are at greater risk for turning to unhealthy coping mechanisms like smoking, alcoholism, and drug use to cope with the trauma they have experienced during their childhood, and that the reduced life expectancy is an average among a wide population. That was when I realized that ACEs have a big impact on people’s lives even outside of their childhood and this impact is not talked about enough. 

The idea of adding “360” to our name started at our coalition’s beginning, when those coming together to raise awareness of the original ACE Study wanted to acknowledge the full-circle view we needed to have of how to respond to the study’s findings and of everyone who should be involved.

But as we shared the ACE Study findings widely, we created the wrong kind of narrative that has led to public stigma around those who have had ACEs and blame on parents for what their children have experienced. We failed to effectively communicate how our polices, systems, and practices can cause the trauma children face and how Black, Indigenous, People of Color, and those with low-incomes are often most impacted. ACEs doesn't just impact everyone, it impacts some groups of people more. 

A widening group of voices and perspectives are pushing the conversation about ACEs in new directions. We are learning more and more about what it means to respond to ACEs, and more important, to create the conditions for healthy development and for all individuals to thrive in our communities.

The combined forces of the pandemic, calls for racial justice, and economic crisis have brightly exposed deeply rooted issues that we know have long existed in our communities and systems and called on us to acknowledge these issues and move toward greater action. Our team especially has been reflecting on this period of time and the harmful narrative we have contributed to. We are rethinking where we need to target our attention to have greater impact in more holistically and comprehensively addressing ACEs.

​Here we share three areas where we see the ACEs conversation expanding and where you can go to learn more. We will dive deeper into these areas over the next several months.