What's Happening

By The ETR Team |  February 8, 2024

In honor of National Condom Month, we’re here to discuss innovative research on condom misuse and effective strategies in condom education. What are the most common errors high school students make about condom use? Thanks to some recent research by ETR and our partners at Public Health, Seattle & King County, we can share some insights on that question.   

By The ETR Team | August 31, 2023

When it comes to evaluating and disseminating research, many organizations will often play multiple roles in the process. For example, in the field of public health, organizations may develop a new product or curriculum, serve as the evaluator to test the effectiveness, or take the lead in disseminating the findings or product to a large-scale audience. In any of these roles, there is a potential for real or perceived conflicts of interest.

By The ETR Team | June 26, 2023

At a time when violent anti-trans rhetoric is extremely prevalent, helping trans youth foster resilience can dramatically change their health outcomes both now and later in their lives. We’re thrilled to share a few science-based tips that you can use with the trans youth you serve from the Queer and Transgender Resilience Workbook by Anneliese Singh, PhD, LPC, which is now available in the ETR Store.

By Sarah Han, MPH & Rebecca Braun, DrPH, MPH | December 14, 2022

The INSPIRE+ project empowers and collaborates with California youth to design innovative, creative, and youth-led solutions that address unhealthy substance use and promote community healing, using ETR’s Trauma-Informed Youth-Centered Health Design framework. 

By The ETR Team | October 26, 2022

Evidence-based pregnancy and STI prevention programs are programs that have been shown, in at least one program evaluation, to have a positive effect on reducing unplanned pregnancy or associated behavioral risk factors, such as delaying sexual activity, or increasing condom or contraceptive use. Providing young people with evidence-based pregnancy and STI prevention programs is one strategy to help address the disparities that persist in the United States. With schools and service organizations facing limited time and resources, these programs serve as an effective option for reducing risk behaviors.

By Jill Denner, PhD | July 15, 2022

Addressing inequities requires wisdom from a range of people. Here at ETR, one of our values is that science is foundational which means all our work is informed by research—some of it is even generated or synthesized by our own team of scientists. Read more about how ETR is a bridging organization between research and practice.

By John Shields, PhD, MSW | July 1, 2022

The US Department of Education released new proposed Title IX regulations on June 23^rd, 2022, the 50^th anniversary of Title IX, the landmark civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on sex in K12 and post-secondary schools. Read more about these new regulations and our recommendations from our K12T9 team.

By Rebecca Erenrich, MPH and Kristin Kennedy, MS, MPH, CPH | May 27, 2022

The United States is experiencing rising rates of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infections, fueled by the nation’s growing opioid crisis. This issue is particularly acute in Appalachia, where the increase in injection drug use led to a more than three-fold rise in new cases of hepatitis among young people between 2006 and 2012. As we close out Hepatitis Awareness Month, recognized each year in May, ETR remains committed to raising awareness, reducing stigma, and combatting the spread of HCV. As part of our fight for health equity, ETR offers science- and evidence-based resources on sexual health and safer drug use and works and maintains a portfolio of community-driven projects rooted in harm reduction, including HepConnect.

By Stephanie Guinosso, PhD, MPH | March 9, 2022

Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) and toxic stress represent an urgent public health issue in the United States. In this new blog post, experts from ETR and the California School-Based Health Alliance describe emerging practices and barriers and facilitators to implementing trauma-informed care, ACE screening, and care coordination for the prevention and treatment of toxic stress in school-based health centers.

By ETR and Roots Community Health Center | February 24, 2022

In this conversation, ETR’s Black Family Wellness team is joined by the Roots Community Health Center (RCHC) team to discuss the need for utilizing a holistic community-led approach to address systemic racism in health care and support the holistic health of Black women who are pregnant.

By Sarah Han, MPH | November 19, 2021

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the lives of teens and young adults in countless ways. However, as public health researchers, practitioners, and advocates, we still don’t know much about how the pandemic has affected the romantic and sexual relationships of teens and young adults. Last month, a study examining the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on young people’s relationships was published in BMC Public Health, shining a light on this important, yet understudied, issue.

By Michael Everett, MHS, EdD | October 14, 2021

What is the cause of the great Health Literacy divide and disconnect between academic research and the communities that are often times the focus of such research? As we recognize Health Literacy Month this year, let’s explore health equity through the journey from health consciousness to health promotion. As we seek out ways to improve the accessibility of research, resources, and ultimately our health messaging, we must also focus on centering our communities and challenging old paradigms that perpetuate narratives of shame over strength.

By Amy Peterson, PhD | September 2, 2021

Our 2021 Kirby Summit explored the relationship between sexually explicit media (SEM), like pornography, and young people's sexual health outcomes (including attitudes and behaviors). Here is what we learned in our research, including listening sessions and literature review.

By Rebecca Braun and Emma Schlamm | July 26, 2021

The YTH Initiative is thrilled to announce the launch of a ZonaSegura chatbot! Meet Eli - the first and only trauma-informed, English and Spanish-language chatbot co-designed by youth to navigate and prevent teen dating violence in Honduras. With funding from the Twilio.org Crisis Response and Prevention Initiative, Eli was built to address a need for real-time, two-way support for violence prevention and crisis response, identified through an impact evaluation of the initial ZonaSegura intervention implemented in Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Given the recent rise in gender-based violence both in Honduras and globally, due in part to the COVID-19 lockdowns, a tool like Eli could not be more timely.

By John Shields, PhD, MSW | May 14, 2021

How well are K-12 schools doing in implementing Title IX regulations? ETR’s K12T9 Initiative conducted an analysis of 100 randomly selected regular public school district websites from the 19,406 districts downloaded from the US Department of Education to research more into the availability of Title IX information on district websites -- and here is what we found.

By Melissa Perri, Sarah Flicker, Adrian Guta, and Marilou Gagnon | May 10, 2021
Social and Behavioural Health Sciences, Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto

Internationally, comprehensive sex-ed programs have garnered promising results. Ontario, Canada’s largest province, recently implemented a new, responsive and controversial provincial sex-ed curriculum. An interdisciplinary team of public health, sociology and education scholars collaborated to learn more about the implementation challenges faced by health and physical education teachers. We sought to gain feedback on how recent curricular changes have altered the ease and effectiveness of delivery and get educators’ opinions on recommendations for improving future sex-ed curricula changes. 

By Laiah Idelson, MSPH & Stephanie Guinosso, PhD, MPH | February 2, 2021

The YTH Initiative at ETR has led the field in Youth-Centered Health Design for the past decade. We recently joined forces with our colleagues at ETR and broader communities to create Trauma-Informed Youth Centered Health Design (TIYCHD), an approach that interweaves trauma-principles into the YCHD approach. Our TIYCHD framework was designed in collaboration with experts in design, trauma and mental health, youth engagement, and public health through a community consultation with twelve participants and expert interviews with forty others.

By Gillian Silver, MPH, CHES | January 8, 2020

My very first day working at ETR fell on our organization’s All Staff Retreat. It was an energizing day that allowed our growing staff to share priorities and interests, and to embrace a growth mindset in how we approach our work. An idea explored by Carol S. Dweck, adopting a growth mindset helps us move through challenges by identifying the opportunity within them. Inspired by my introduction to the organization, I wondered how the field of sexuality education can apply a #growthmindset to the topic of adolescent romantic relationships.