As painful as the role reversal between parent and child may be for you, assume it is worse for your mother or father, so take care not to demean or humiliate them.

Avoid hospitals and emergency rooms, as well as multiple relocations from home to assisted living facility to nursing home, since all can cause dramatic declines in physical and cognitive well-being among the aged. Do not accept the canard that no decent child sends a parent to a nursing home. Good nursing home care, which supports the entire family, can be vastly superior to the pretty trappings but thin staffing of assisted living or the solitude of being at home, even with round-the-clock help.

Please join the Center for American Progress as author Jane Gross discusses her experiences with her own family in a discussion about her book, A Bittersweet Season.

Copies of A Bittersweet Season will be available for purchase at the event

School finance reform is a critical component of broader education reform. The U.S. Department of Education has recognized the importance of school finance by creating a new commission on Equity and Excellence, charged with making recommendations for restructuring school finance systems to achieve equity in the distribution of educational resources and further student performance. Since 90 percent of school funding is provided by state and local sources, state school finance systems are significant levers in any meaningful reform effort. The state of Rhode Island recently undertook the difficult process of reforming its school finance system and emerged with a new funding formula that incorporates many best practices in school finance. This case study is an encouraging example of stakeholder collaboration and provides valuable lessons for other states that are considering school finance reform.

Join the Center for American Progress for a conversation about the importance of school finance reform and its implications for achieving greater equity and increased student achievement. We will launch the conversation with comments by Christopher Edley, co-chair of the Equity and Excellence Commission. We will release a case study of the evolution and enactment of school finance reform in Rhode Island by Kenneth Wong, and will also release a new publication by Diana Epstein on measuring inequity in school funding.

Immigration reform opponents persist in leveling sensational—and often patently false—claims meant to scare the public about border violence and insecurity. The reality, however, is that surges in manpower, technology, and physical infrastructure have fundamentally enhanced the Border Patrol’s ability to prevent and intercept unauthorized migrants and smugglers.

Illegal immigration flows at our southern border have slowed dramatically and recent reports highlight that violent crime rates along the U.S.-Mexico border have been falling for years and that border cities of all sizes have maintained crime rates below the national average.

This panel of distinguished experts and officials will help separate fact from fiction in the debate over border security. The participants will discuss how far we’ve come since the border buildup began 18 years ago and what additional steps we need to take to enhance the integrity and safety of our border.

EVENT FULL: This event is now full and we can no longer accept RSVPs. Please watch the live webcasthere.

As 2012 approaches, much attention has been focused on the key parts of the coalition that swept President Barack Obama into office. Within that coalition, African Americans were seen as a reliable voting block on the left. But is that still true? With persistently high unemployment and continuing economic woes within the black community, is there room for the right to make inroads? How has the election of the nation's first black president changed the course of the civil rights movement? And as African Americans migrate from northern cities to states like Georgia and Texas, what will this reverse migration mean for 2012 and beyond? Will the increasing numbers of black immigrants and young biracial African Americans have a dramatic effect on the policy agenda of the black community?

Please join us for a dynamic conversation about the African American community and its importance and place in the electorate.

Oceans cover more than 70 percent of the Earth's surface and support a web of life so vast and unknown that a 10-year census effort completed in 2010 found 20,000 new species and estimated that at least 750,000 yet undiscovered creatures could dwell in the depths. Interactions with ocean species are fundamental to life on land as well, including human life. While sea creatures have sustained us for millennia, today we are failing dramatically in our responsibility to take care of them. Pollution, overfishing, and human-induced global climate change are destroying habitat, decimating populations, and causing extinctions of entire species.

We invite you to join the Ocean Program of the Center for American Progress to hear the stories and see the breathtaking images of the species that populate our oceans, thrill our souls, and help sustain life on this blue planet. We will hear from a panel of renowned ocean experts, each of whom has a new book about ocean life in various forms.

Copies of Demon Fish, Citizens of the Sea, and For Cod and Country will be available for purchase at the event.

While Latinos are often seen as a monolithic community that is Catholic and socially conservative, the reality is far more nuanced and complex. Unlike conventional wisdom, Latino Catholics tend to actually be more progressive than Latino evangelicals on key social issues such as LGBT equality and reproductive rights and justice. And while the majority of Latinos are Catholics, an increasing number are becoming evangelical. There are also marked generational differences as well as differing views depending on whether one is an immigrant or U.S. born. What are the policy and political implications of these differing identities and views? And what efforts are underway in the Latino community to examine these issues through a family values or moral/faith lens?

Please join the Center for American Progress for an insightful discussion with leadings scholars and practitioners to explore the diversity of the Latino community, their views on key social issues, and the impact these views have on the policy and political world.

Protecting U.S. national security in the 21st century will require all the tools of American power – military, diplomatic, development, and homeland defense. Our defensive and preventative programs, however, continue to be funded at a fraction of the Pentagon’s nearly $700 billion budget and are at risk of further cuts.

Please join keynote speaker Thomas R. Nides, Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources, for a discussion of the Obama administration's efforts to achieve a true national security budget for the United States. Deputy Nides has been at the forefront of pushing for new, innovative budget measures for State and USAID operations.

Following Deputy Nides' remarks, featured panelists Miriam Pemberton and Lawrence Korb will discuss a new report on the FY 2012 Unified Security Budget. This report argues that combining the budgets of the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, and State into one Unified Security Budget would enable us to rebalance our security portfolio and better protect American interests at home and abroad. CAP senior fellow Richard Verma will moderate the discussion.