Rust and Kissinger win coveted “Merzie”

After long consideration, a jury (of one, your honorable scribe) has chosen Susanne Rust and Meg Kissinger of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal as the winners of a prestigious “Merzie” in the category of Investigative Reporting for an article titled “EPA drops ball on danger of chemicals to children”, posted on March 29, 2008. This article…

The Posit Brain Plasticity Institute

Over the past decade, I have visited a large number of the great (and lesser) research institutions in the world where scientists are focused on practical (therapeutic) extensions of brain plasticity research. Especially over the past year, I’ve witnessed a great ground-swell of activity generated by scientists employing the principles of brain plasticity to drive…

Eating crow

Some months ago, after my grand-daughter Leila’s school in Oakland, California burned down and its rebuilding seems to be drowning in a bureaucratic swamp, I predicted that it would NEVER be rebuilt in time to begin the 2007-8 school year on time. I was wrong. The Oakland Unified School District and the contractors that they…

“What you do matters” ALSO applies (of course) if you’re a young’un!

The extent of confusion about the relationships between what infants and young children spend their time doing, the development of their behavioral abilities, and the genesis of their ‘interests’ and ‘personality’ is massive, both in the lay and scientific communities. l was reminded of this once again when I read the comments of scientists (the…

Abby has her ups and downs

I thought that I’d give you a brief update on how little Abby is doing. As you may remember, my daughter’s 4-year-old niece suffered from several minutes of asphyxiation in a playground accident. She emerged from a week-long coma with clear physical and behavioral signs of subcortical brain damage. Abby is now a month out,…

What’s it all about?

I initiated this blog for two reasons. First, I sought to provide neuroscience-related information to care-givers and to citizens who might benefit from a brain plasticity-informed perspective. There is an ongoing revolution in brain science that bears powerful implications for our understanding of human neurological and psychiatric impairments and disease, and that informs us about…

Struggling high-school-age readers break out!

We often receive feedback from school administrators, teachers, and therapists like that expressed in the note below. Because they are anecdotal, they usually die in my email Inbox. I thought that I’d post one, just so you get the flavor of what has been a common message: “I have been in the public and private…