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By Karin Coyle, PhD | December 19, 2016
Senior Research Associate, ETR

ETR is delighted to announce the release of our report on the 2016 Kirby Summit. If you work with adolescents to address sexual and reproductive health, I strongly encourage you to check it out.

Here’s why. We deliberately designed this invited Summit to challenge and disrupt what we thought we knew about adolescent health behaviors.

By Vignetta Charles, PhD | August 29, 2016
Chief Science Officer, ETR

Do you work with adolescents? Have you ever faced situations like these?

Sofia is an excellent student, popular on campus and a delightful member of your peer health educator program. She knows everything about birth control, STI prevention and making smart choices. She loves educating her peers. She and her boyfriend come to see you one afternoon and tell you they are pregnant.

By ETR | July 18, 2016
Note: We're posting about some of the presentations ETR researchers and professional development specialists are offering at the Office of Adolescent Health Teen Pregnancy Prevention Grantee Conference, July 19-20.

Learned anything new lately? Your brain is being bombarded by massive amounts of information every minute—sights, sounds, words, smells, sensations. What happens to all of that info? Thankfully, most of it is forgotten. Your brain takes a look at it and decides what to ignore and when to pay attention.

If you’re an implementer working with teens to build healthy skills for pregnancy prevention, you’ve got critical messages and skills you want these learners to attend to. What should you do? Use amazing brain science to make learning stick!

By Marcia Quackenbush, MS, MFT, MCHES | February 25, 2016
Senior Editor, ETR

ETR’s inaugural Kirby Summit has started. While it’s not entirely clear what’s going to come out of this two-day event, I am certain it’s going to be powerful and different.

The Summit honors Doug Kirby, one of the greatest researchers the field of sexual and reproductive health has ever seen. Doug was also a senior research scientist here at ETR before his untimely death in 2012, and a colleague and true friend to many of us.

Doug had an insatiable curiosity and a love of civil debate. He’d certainly approve of this Summit! 

By Debra Christopher, MSM | March 16, 2015
Director, Professional Learning Systems, ETR

What’s all the buzz about the brain?

The brain is our personal 3-pound universe. This small but powerful mass of neurons in your head allows you to read these words, comprehend their meaning, and, if you choose, integrate the meaning into long-term memory.

You may even decide to take some kind of action based on the content. Or, at any point in time, you may choose to scroll past this segment, even this entire column, if there is no cognitive “hook” for you.

All this in a matter of seconds. Astounding!

By Ahna Suleiman, DrPH | November 19, 2014

Every sex educator I know has stories about young people who’ve challenged their faith in our ability to change adolescent sexual behavior. For me, one of those stories is about a ninth grader named Rose.

By ETR | October 20, 2014

Do you have a sense of your biases and the ways they influence your thoughts and actions? There’s a good chance you’re less aware than you think you are.

By Debra Christopher, MSM

New research is giving us some powerful and creative ways to understand what our brains are doing (along with the brains of our students, trainees, clients, patients and colleagues). The principles of neuroscience can help us make a healthy difference in people’s lives.

Here are some of the books we’re reading right now that contribute to better understanding of how brains work. Highly recommended!