What's New 

• The Center for Regional Change and Rabobank have partnered to develop The UC Davis CRC-Rabobank Rural Opportunity Index (ROI), a new index of community and regional opportunity for the 19 counties of California's Central Valley. The goal of the ROI is to guide investments by Rabobank and other organizations under the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) toward people and places with the greatest need, to foster thriving communities of opportunity for all Californians.
• The Healthy Youth/Healthy Environments Speakers Series presents Dr. Susan Bissell, UNICEF's Chief of Child Protection, who will give a presentation entitled "The Protection of Children in Our Globalizing World: Change, Challenge and Champions". The event will begin with a reception at 4:00 pm in 142 Hunt Hall. The presentation will be begin at 5:00 pm in 100 Hunt Hall. See flyer for more details.
• CRC faculty affiliate Dr. Nancy Erbstein has released a series of issue briefs on the topic of chronic absence in the Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD). Dr. Erbstein presented the briefs to the SCUSD School Board last week and they are now informing a new district-wide effort to engage school principals, social services, community-based organizations, local leaders, youth and families in addressing chronic absence. The series includes an overview of chronic absence and its financial and learning costs, characteristics of SCUSD's chronically absent students, populations and places that may benefit from additional support, and recommendations. The series can be accessed here.