1. family and parenting
2. adoption

Concurrent Session Options for REFCA Conference 2015 Morning Session Option: Faith Communities in Action By Dr. Ruth McRoy, Dr. Kathleen Belanger & Bishop W.C. Martin Presenters in this session will share a best practice and lessons learned from a faith community in rural Texas about how to recruit and engage foster and adoptive parents from faith communities. Ruth G. McRoy holds the Donahue and DiFelice Endowed Professorship at Boston College Graduate School of Social Work. Prior to joining the Boston College faculty, McRoy was a member of the University of Texas at Austin School of Social Work faculty for 25 years and held the Ruby Lee Piester Centennial Professorship. As part of the federally funded AdoptUSKids project, which is operated through a cooperative agreement with the Children’s Bureau, McRoy and her research team at the University of Texas at Austin, recently completed two nationwide studies (2002-­‐2007) on barriers to adoption and factors associated with successful special needs adoptions. She serves on the board of the Society for Social Work and Research (SSWR) and on the Board of Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of Boston. Also, McRoy just completed her term as Board Member and President of the North American Council on Adoptable Children (NACAC) Board and is a Senior Research Fellow and member of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute Board. Kathleem Belanger is Professor of Social Work at Stephen F. Austin State University (SFASU) in Nacogdoches, TX. She has taught social work and helped develop and evaluate non-­‐proWit programs for more than 25 years. She initiated SFASU’s Title IV-­‐E Child Welfare Professional Development Project (CWPDP), a partnership with Texas Dept. of Family and Protective Services, the university and the East Texas Foster Parent Association. Belanger has worked with the state of Texas to address racial disproportionality, and with the National Advisory Committee on Rural Social Services and 1 of 11
National Advisory Committee on Cultural Competence, Racial Disproportionality, and Disparity of Outcomes (CWLA). She serves on the Rural Policy Research Institute’s Human Services Panel and is a columnist for the Rural Monitor, a publication of the Rural Assistance Center. Her research, publications and presentations focus on rural issues, spirituality and faith based services, foster care and adoption, and racial disproportionality in child welfare. Bishop WC Martin has served the community of Possum Trot, Tx., as pastor of Bennett Chapel for more than 20 years. In 1997, he and his wife, Donna, adopted 2 children and began a miraculous adventure that has become one of the premier adoption stories in America. Over 76 kids have been adopted out of the Texas foster care system and into families in his community. Bishop Martin and his wife have appeared on such programs as Oprah, Dateline NBC, and Good Morning America. Morning Session Option: Family Finding At It’s Best Facilitated by Lauren Frey with panelists Mary-­‐Harris Miller, Pat O’Brien, & James Lister This session will discuss best practices for permanency outcomes for older foster children through family ;inding. Lauren Frey, MSW, LICSW is the managing member of 3P Consulting LLC, assisting public and private child welfare agencies achieve timely and permanent exit to family for all youth in foster care. As a senior permanency consultant in child welfare, she excels in developing innovative practice models, implementing collaborative teaming approaches, engaging youth, parents and family members together with professionals in decision-­‐making, preventing “aging out” by creating family for older youth, promoting family placement options that reduce reliance on residential care and supporting organizational change. Most recently as the Project Director for Permanency Services at Casey Family Services in New Haven, CT, Lauren was a key leader in the design and implementation of Lifelong Families, a foster care practice model achieving permanency for treatment-­‐level youth. Her 35 years of professional 2 of 11
experience in child welfare include. Lauren is also the adoptive mother of three adult daughters and a son who all joined her family after “aging out” of foster care. Most recently as the Project Director for Permanency Services at Casey Family Services in New Haven, CT, Lauren was a key leader in the design and implementation of Lifelong Families, a foster care practice model achieving permanency for treatment-­‐level youth. Her 35 years of professional experience in child welfare include. Lauren is also the adoptive mother of three adult daughters and a son who all joined her family after “aging out” of foster care. James Lister, MBA is Executive Director of Plummer Home -­‐ a group home for adolescent males, community prevention and supported apartment programs and treatment foster care. Under his leadership, Plummer has made the innovative shift toward permanency outcomes to prevent youth from "aging out" without a safe, supportive and lifelong family network. Pat O’Brien is the Founder and former Executive Director for 18 years of You Gotta Believe! The Older Child Adoption & Permanency Movement, Inc., a nationally acclaimed organization that placed teens and young adults in foster care into permanent homes before they aged out of care. Currently, Pat produces and hosts You Gotta Believe’s “Adopting Teens and ‘Tweens Radio Forum” every Sunday night from 6:30-­‐7 p.m. (Eastern) on 1240 AM in New York and live-­‐
streamed at www.am1240wgbb.com. Pat is also enjoying the job experience of his life as a recruiter for Wendy’s Wonderful Kids, the signature program of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, with Connecticut-­‐based Klingberg Family Centers. Pat is also a Senior Consultant with the National Center on Adoption and Permanency, President of the New York State Citizens’ Coalition for Children, and he serves on the Advisory Board of the Treehouse Foundation. 3 of 11
Morning Session Option: The Power of Play in Healing by Steve Gross This session will demonstrate play as a tool for growth with children in foster care. It will prepare attendees to utilize play when engaging with children. Steve Gross, M.S.W., is the Founder and Chief Playmaker of the Life is good Playmakers, a 501(c)(3) public charity. He has devoted his career to the service of our most vulnerable children. A pioneer in utilizing exuberant, joyful play to promote resiliency in children and their caregivers, and a leader in the Wield of psychological trauma response, Gross is committed to the healthy development of children facing the most challenging circumstances. The vision of the nonproWit he founded is a world where all children grow up feeling safe, loved and joyful. In order to make this vision a reality, the Life is good Playmakers partners with frontline professionals – such as teachers, social workers and child life specialists – who dedicate their lives to helping children overcome poverty, violence and illness. These Playmakers use the power of play to build healing, life-­‐changing relationships with the children in their care. This foundation of playfulness allows children to engage the world with passion and joy while giving them the courage and creativity to see possibilities and solutions in the face of adversity. To date over 3,500 certiWied Playmakers have cared for more than 210,000 children throughout the United States and Haiti. Steve’s talents have been called upon to respond to some of the greatest catastrophes of our time, including the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, earthquakes in Haiti and Japan, and the 2012 Newtown school shooting. At the heart of his work, Steve helps others access their own playfulness so that they can build resilience and bring greater joy, connection, courage and creativity to their work and their lives. Morning Session Option: Why attachment matters and what you can do about it By Dr. Sally Popper This session will present long-­‐time research on the effects of attachment as well as unsecured attachment, with a focus on children in foster care and treatment options. Sally Popper, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist and Clinical Consultant of A Home Within, Northampton, MA. She has worked in private practice and in various institutions, focusing her clinical work on families with children who have histories of trauma and loss, especially foster and adoptive families. She is supporting the Re-­‐Envisioning Foster Care in America Movement, and provides volunteer psychological services to the Treehouse community. She is also working on the Treehouse sponsored Re-­‐envisioning Foster Care in America 4 of 11
initiative. She has trained extensively on the local and national level, and is teaching two one day workshops on clinical implications of attachment and of complex trauma in the summer of 2013. She has coauthored an article on the importance of speciWic training for therapists who treat foster children. Morning and Afternoon Session Option: The Future of Foster Care Facilitated by Anthony Barrows with panelists: Sixto Cancel, Amnoni Meyers, Lexi Gruber & Rodney Walker This session will draw on the experiences of former foster youth who are leading advocates in foster care reform to learn about innovations in foster care and ways to engage as former foster youth. Anthony Barrows is a Vice President at ideas42, a non-­‐
proWit that uses behavioral science to create innovative solutions to the world’s toughest social problems. Before joining ideas42, Anthony worked for more than ten years in the public and non-­‐proWit child welfare sphere in Northern California and the six New England states. He held roles in direct service, supervision, training, advocacy, and system improvement. Anthony is also a practicing artist, and has been active in arts organizing and arts-­‐oriented youth programming. Anthony holds a BA in Philosophy and Art from UMass Boston, an MFA in Printmaking from the San Francisco Art Institute, and an MPA from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government where he was a Gleitsman Fellow at the Center for Public Leadership. Sixto Cancel Sixto is a current a VCU student who grew up in the US foster care system and is founder of Think of Us, which works to create positive life outcomes for vulnerable youth. He has been named a Millennial Maker by BET and recognized as one of the Top 24 Changemakers under 24 in the country by the Campaign for a Presidential Youth Council and Sparkaction. In high school he founded and secured funding for Stellar Works, a SAT and remedial education program for students in foster care. Sixto currelty serves as a Youth Innovation Advisors to Dell Inc. As a Young Fellow at Jim Casey Youth Opportunity, Cancel has had a national voice advocating for youth aging out of foster care. Cancel has participated in over 20 conferences around issues facing youth including the Harvard Law, the Clinton Global Initiative and the Center for Enterprise Development. Cancel has 5 of 11
been quoted on NPR’s “Tell Me More,” Fox News, and HufWington Post. As a policy council member he provides recommendations to the Acting Assistant Secretary for the Administration for Children and Families under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He also currently serves on the Board of Directors for the National Foster Care Coalition and on advisory boards for noteworthy organizations including the Center for the Study of Social Policy and American Institute of Research. Morning Session: One Generation Helping Another: The Treehouse Intergenerational Community Model Facilitated by Dr. Harold Grotevant with three generations of residents living at the Treehouse community This session will provide insight into lessons learned through living in the Treehouse multi generation neighborhood Hal Grotevant holds the Rudd Family Foundation Chair in Psychology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. His research focuses on relationships in adoptive families, and on identity development in adolescents and young adults. More generally, his interests include child and adolescent development and family dynamics.Impacting Policy -­‐ Morning Session Option: The Strengthening Families Act By Kim Stevens This session will review the newest congressional act directly in;luencing foster care. 6 of 11
Afternoon Session Option: Collaborating Across Silos: a multidisciplinary case study Facilitated by Mary LeBeau and Judge Lillian Miranda with panelists Kathy Harrison, Karen Zilberstein, Beverly Swetcky, Jaime Caron, and Andrew Rome This panel will bring together leaders in a variety of disciplines which interact with a child’s case in foster care, and through a case study, demonstrate the need for collaboration. Mary LeBeau specializes in providing intensive, on-­‐site, collaborative consulting to public child welfare agencies to strengthen agency management, internal operations, policy, front line practice and supervision. She most recently held the position of Senior Associate for The Annie E. Casey Child Welfare Strategy Group. Mary was also the Practice Manager for CWSG, responsible for overseeing the identiWication and development of speciWic front-­‐
line practice reform strategies focusing both on practice skill content and practice implementation methodologies. Previously, as a Project Manager for the Casey Center for Effective Child Welfare Practice at Casey Family services, Mary managed and coordinated technical assistance with the goal of improving the quality of child welfare services nationwide, particularly for youth in transition and in treatment foster care. Mary has worked in child welfare for more than 31 years, often in non-­‐proWit special needs adoption agencies. Before coming to Casey, she managed statewide permanency mediation services in collaboration with the Massachusetts Trial Court, for children and families involved in the child welfare system. She is a trained mediator and a licensed independent clinical social worker. Karen Zilberstein is a child and family therapist and Clinical Director of A Home Within in Northampton, MA, a nonproWit that provides long-­‐
term psychotherapy for individuals who have experienced foster care. She serves as an Adjunct Associate Professor at Smith College School for Social Work, where she teaches and coordinates the Child Development Team. Her publications include articles on child therapy, the treatment of foster and adopted children, and the clinical implications of attachment and complex trauma in children. Kathy Harrison has been a full-­‐time foster parent for more than twenty years. A foster mother to over 150 children, she has written two critically-­‐acclaimed books about her experiences. Another Place at the Table and One Small Boat: The Story of a Little Girl, Lost Then Found tell of her experiences on the front line of social services, sheltering children of abuse, neglect, and trauma. 7 of 11
Afternoon Session Option: Fathers In Training: Positive Fatherhood Training Initiative By Michael Kyles The workshop will discuss a curriculum for Fatherhood Development and its implementation in Western Massachusetts. Michael Kyles is the program manager with the Fathers in Trust program at the Children’s Study Home, serving Western Massachusetts. Afternoon Session Option: More Effective Child Advocacy Facilitated by Charles Lerner with CASA leaders from programs around Massachusetts During this session panelists will share current observations and challenges from leading Court Appointed Special Advocate programs across Massachusetts. Panelists include Charles Lerner from Boston CASA, Randee Laikind from Western MA CASA, Sue Ellen Scrogin from Worcester CASA, Connie Ricketts from Lawrence CASA, and Cassandra Hildreth from SpringWield CASA. Trauma Informed Post Adoption Services by Adam Pertman & Sarah Greenblatt This session will present innovations in adoption services. Sarah B. Greenblatt, MSEd, MS, ACSW, currently serves as Director of the federally funded National Adoption Competent Mental Health Training Initiative at the Center for Adoption Support and Education (C.A.S.E.). Previously she worked at the Annie E. Casey Foundation with the Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative where she co-­‐authored issue briefs on adolescent brain development and the impact of trauma on youth in foster care; and where she supported Jim Casey Initiative Georgia and Connecticut sites in their efforts to assist youth in making a successful transition from foster care to adulthood. Ms. Greenblatt was the founding director of the Casey Center for Effective Child Welfare Practice at Casey Family Services where she focused on building strategies for funding and improving adoption-­‐competent child welfare and mental health 8 of 11
programs. Ms. Greenblatt also served as the Director of the National Resource Center for Foster Care at Permanency Planning at the Hunter College School of Social Work. Ms. Greenblatt holds master’s degrees in social work from Columbia University School of Social Work and early childhood educational administration from Leslie University; and a bachelor’s degree in child development and family relations from the University of Connecticut. Adam Pertman is President of the National Center on Adoption and Permanency (NCAP), which provides resources, training, consulting and advocacy to improve the lives of children, families and professionals. NCAP’s mission is to move the Wield from a “child placement” model to one that enables families to succeed. For the past decade, Pertman established himself as one of the most respected thought leaders in child welfare as head of the Donaldson Adoption Institute, which he built into the pre-­‐eminent research, policy and advocacy think tank in its Wield. He also served as Associate Editor of the scholarly journal Adoption Quarterly and is a widely published author, including of “Adoption Nation,” reviewed as “the most important book ever written on the subject.” Previously, he distinguished himself for over 20 years as a senior journalist with the Boston Globe, where he was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for his writing about adoption. Pertman has delivered hundreds of keynotes, trainings and other presentations internationally, and the research reports he instigated, helped to conduct and edited – along with his writing, testimony and advocacy – have been utilized to improve practice, shape policy, and educate professionals, students, the media and the public. His commentaries and interviews appear in broadcast and print media in the U.S. and worldwide, and he has received many awards for his work. Tragedies, Chronic Fear and Traumatized Systems: Lessons in transforming trauma By Dr. Victoria Kelly This workshop provides an overview of how chronic trauma becomes de-­‐stabilizing for staff and partners in the system. Dr. Victoria Kelly is the Director of the Delaware Division of Family Services in the Department of Services for Children, Youth, and Families. Prior to this appointment, she served as 9 of 11
the Deputy Director for the Division of Child Mental Health. Prior to public service, she served as the clinical director for several multi-­‐service private agencies. Dr. Kelly has over 30 years of experience in child welfare and mental health as a clinician and program administrator. She received her Doctorate in Clinical Psychology and Masters in Health Administration from Widener University. She received her Masters in Social Work from Louisiana State University. Dr. Kelly has been an Adjunct Professor at the Institute for Clinical Psychology at Widener University. She is a nationally recognized trainer and consultant in trauma and attachment. Afternoon Session Option: Value of Relationships presented by “You Gotta Believe Nobody Ages Out Initiative Youth Collaborative!” A group of youth who have experienced foster care will share how a variety of relationships have contributed to their lives and how communities and youth can build relationships. The You Gotta Believe! campaign created a speakers bureau of foster youth or former foster youth with the mission to stand up and speak out about the urgent need to Wind youth in care a family, to offer support to one another, to support youth currently in care, and to mentor youth with families. Afternoon Session Option for Youth only: Massachusetts implementation of Safe Families Act By Kim Stevens This session is designed for current and former foster youth to provide input on how the Safe Families Act will be implemented in Massachusetts. Kim Stevens was formerly the project manager for Jockey Being Family’s™ Community Champions Network project at North American Council on Adoptable Children. She now directs Advocates for Families First, an alliance of NACAC, Generations United, and National Foster Parent Association. In this role, Kim oversees advocacy efforts on a federal and state policy agenda, capacity building for caregiver support/advocacy organizations throughout the United States, and manages communications and messaging efforts to elevate the visibility and positive image of kin, foster, and adoptive families and the 10 of 11
children and youth they care for. In this capacity, she provides training and technical assistance, reviews and disseminates best practice models, provides consultation, serves on a number of national task forces, and manages the day-­‐to-­‐day activities of the project. In her 25 years of child welfare work, Kim has provided training and consultation on kinship care, foster care, adoption, parenting, positive youth development, advocacy and leadership, trauma and recovery, and youth permanency issues, both nationally and internationally. She and her husband, Buddy, have six children, four of whom were adopted from the public foster care system. 11 of 11