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Alice Ray has worked at the intersection of public education, public health and public safety for decades. For more than 25 years she has been braiding together creativity, technology and psychosocial theory to strengthen childrenʻs safety, learning and health. Prior to becoming involved with technology, she engaged in non-violent activism in the US and Central America; conceived and supervised development of Second Step, a violence prevention program that became the most widely used social-emotional learning program in the world, received an Executive MBA, provided consulting to 100+ nonprofits on making good works good business, and created a series of multi-award winning films and videos for children and youth. In 1997, she co-founded Ripple Effects, a woman-owned, social purpose, private company, to develop, test and distribute learner-directed software – and later toys - to address 400+ non-academic barriers to schools success, including trauma and injustice. The teen version is listed on the National Registry of Evidence-based Programs and Practices (NREPP) as a children's mental health and substance abuse intervention, with documented positive impact on resiliency assets, behavioral referrals, and academic achievement. Her Aspen Action Pledge resulted in the creation and testing of Bouncy, a BREATHING, plush personal service dog to help early learners – and their teachers deal with stress-reactive behavior. In four years of real world use and continued pilot testing it has far surpassed expectations, dramatically reducing stress related behavior and promoting attention and positive engagement, especially among very low income and special needs early learners. Bouncy is now the subject of a major Innovative Education Science R&D Grant, awarded to AIR. A Pahara-Aspen Education Fellow and a member of AGLN, Alice has received dozens of awards for humanitarian leadership, creative achievement and entrepreneurial success. She continues to Chair the Board at Ripple Effects. In 2022, she retired from her CEO role, to pursue long delayed personal writing projects.
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