Breadcrumb
- Federal Resources
Federal Resources
Advancing the Homeland Security Mission through Academic Programs and Training
DHS sponsors a variety of training institutions focused on building partnerships and facilitating programs for training practitioners in homeland security fields. FEMA’s National Preparedness Directorate consists of three training branches that offer training and educational advancement opportunities for federal, state, tribal, local, and whole community practitioners:
- Emergency Management Institute (EMI): EMI educates individuals on how to prepare for, protect against, respond to, recover from, and mitigate the potential effects of disasters and emergencies. Students may be able to apply for college credit upon completion of their courses.
- Center for Domestic Preparedness (CPD): Facilitating training through DHS training partners, CDP focuses on identifying, developing, testing, and delivering training specifically to state, local, and tribal emergency response providers.
- National Training and Education Division (NTED): NTED manages and administers the National Domestic Preparedness Consortium (NPDC), which is comprised of seven training partners — including institutions of higher education — whose membership is based on addressing emergency first responders' counter-terrorism preparedness needs.
Individuals with Disabilities and Others with Access and Functional Needs
The Ad Council and FEMA launched a public service advertisement (PSA) as part of a series of videos that illustrate how people with disabilities can take charge to prepare themselves and their families for emergencies. The new PSA, which will be available on the Ad Council’s and FEMA’s YouTube channels, as well as in the FEMA media library, emphasizes the Ready.gov campaign’s four building blocks of preparedness: Be Informed, Make a Plan, Build a Kit, and Get Involved.
Resource: Youth Preparedness Catalogue — Disaster Preparedness Education Programs and Resources
This catalogue (PDF, 108 pages) identifies existing national, regional, and state-level programs, curricula, and resources for individuals interested in promoting youth preparedness education.
Share with Youth: How Youth Can Move the Needle of Emergency Preparedness
This blog post highlights the accomplishments of Hailey Starr, a FEMA Youth Preparedness Council member from the Muckleshoot reservation in the Pacific Northwest. Hailey describes what she has done to improve the level of preparedness on the reservation where she lives, including producing a video on active shooter awareness, creating emergency backpacks for the community elders, and coordinating an emergency preparedness fair.
Resource: Children and Disasters
This web page aims to help state, local, and tribal governments, as well as stakeholders responsible for the temporary care of children, integrate children’s disaster-related needs into preparedness, planning, response, and recovery efforts.
Resource: 2017 National Seasonal Preparedness Messaging Calendar
This resource highlights important messages, organized by month and season, which can be used to promote preparedness all year. Individuals engaged in preparedness efforts can adapt these materials to fit the needs of local areas in order to promote readiness and safety in their communities.
Academic Achievement Trajectories of Homeless and Highly Mobile Students: Resilience in the Context of Chronic and Acute Risk
As featured by the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, the University of Minnesota released a study, Academic Achievement Trajectories of Homeless and Highly Mobile Students: Resilience in the Context of Chronic and Acute Risk, which examined academic achievement of students identified as homeless or highly mobile as compared with other students in the federal free meal program, reduced price meals, or neither. This study was partially federally funded by the National Institute of Mental Health and the National Science Foundation.
Director’s Blog: What Caused This to Happen?
Written by NIMH Director Dr. Thomas Insel, this blog post explains the mixture of genetic and environmental factors that underly mental illness and cites recent research that suggests “bad luck” may play a role in the development of psychopathology.
NIMH Strategic Plan Aims to Focus, Accelerate Mental Health Research
NIMH has issued a new Strategic Plan for Research, which updates the strategic objectives of its 2008 plan, with a focus on balancing the need for long-term investments in basic research with urgent mental health needs. The plan includes four strategic priorities which will guide the institute’s research for the next five years:
- Define the mechanisms of complex behaviors
- Chart mental illness trajectories to determine when, where, and how to intervene
- Strive for prevention and cures
- Strengthen the public health impact of NIMH-supported research
The Anatomy of NIMH Funding
In response to calls for transparency, this blog post and corresponding white paper (PDF, 13 pages) written by NIMH director Thomas Insel provide insight into the NIMH budget, including what is funded, who is funded, and how funding decisions are made.
The Teen Brain: Still Under Construction
This brochure describes changes in the brain that occur during the teen years, and the significance of this stage of development.
Boys More Likely to Have Antipsychotics Prescribed, Regardless of Age
New research funded by NIMH analyzed antipsychotic prescription data between 2006-2010. The data show that, in children ages 1-6, boys were more than twice as likely as girls to receive an antipsychotic prescription. This pattern held true for boys and girls ages 7-12, before narrowing for those ages 13-18, and finally becoming more comparable for young men and women ages 19-24.
Share with Youth: Teen Depression
Youth-serving professionals can use this resource, developed for teens, to educate young people about depression. It contains information about the signs and symptoms of depression, places to turn to for help, effective treatments for depression, steps teens can take to feel better, and the impact depression can have on relationships.
Director’s Blog: The Brain’s Critical Balance
Written by NIMH Director Thomas Insel, this blog post highlights one of early projects of the BRAIN Initiative, launched to support scientists as they conduct research on the brain, consciousness, and behavior. This project involves scientists at NIMH and the University of Maryland who are trying to understand how the activity of individual neurons integrates into larger patterns of brain activity
Recent Event: Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder
This Twitter chat featured Dr. Ellen Leibenluft, Chair of the Section on Bipolar Spectrum Disorder and expert on severe irritability in children, who answered questions on disruptive mood dysregulation disorder submitted by Twitter users.
Resource: Child and Adolescent Mental Health
This web portal provides information on mental health conditions and disorders among children and teens, including warning signs, latest news, videos, hotlines, and clinical trials.
Report: Testing Interpretation Bias Training (IBT)
This report describes a new, large-scale study that will test IBT, a computer game designed to diminish the tendency of children with disruptive mood dysregulation disorder (DMDD) to view ambiguous faces as angry. This study will also test cognitive behavioral therapy in conjunction with IBT in an effort to establish the first non-drug interventions for those with DMDD.
Ask Suicide-Screening Questions Toolkit
This free resource can help nurses and physicians in settings like emergency departments, inpatient medical/surgical units, and outpatient clinics/primary care identify youth at risk for suicide.
Depression and College Students
This webpage provides answers to college students’ questions about depression. It addresses the types, signs and symptoms, and treatment of depression, as well as co-occurring disorders and where to find help. The webpage also features information on suicide, including the warning signs and what a person should do if they or someone they care about is considering suicide.
Adolescent Development Explained
This web section explains the five domains of adolescent development and the changes that are a normal and necessary part of adolescence. It also describes different ways that adolescents experience these changes, how adults can respond in supportive ways, and how to seek professional help if needed.