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MEET THE COLLABORATIVE
Reflective Supervision Collaborative
The Reflective Supervision Collaborative is a diverse group of highly-experienced infant and early childhood professionals with a special focus on reflective supervision in the multiple systems servicing infants, young children, and families. The group is focused on:
- Creating a unified voice on the core processes and practices of reflective supervision
- Providing long-term training intensives on reflective supervision and leadership
- Developing a think tank focused on the application and integration of reflective supervision in multiple settings, across multiple disciplines and with diverse populations
- Convening professionals interested in strengthening reflective supervision practices
Below are the wonderful members whose dedication to this process has allowed for powerful exchanges, new learning and the emergence of a vibrant set of materials. Simply click on a member’s name to read their biography!
RSC Members
LEADERSHIP
Mary Claire Heffron, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with an extensive history in the field of infant and early childhood development and mental health. She trained at the Infant Parent Program at UCSF department of psychiatry and has worked at infant mental health and development settings in the San Francisco Bay area including UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland where she directed the Harris Early Childhood Mental Health Training Program, the Fussy Baby Program, a clinical internship program, and the programs extensive local and national consultation and training activities. In 2019-20 Dr. Heffron was a Fulbright Scholar at Babes Bolyai University in Romania. Currently Mary Claire facilitates a community-based training program in Monterey County, participates in the Fussy Baby training network, and serves on the Reflective Supervision Collaborative (RSC) leadership team. Mary Claire has co-authored a widely used reference book and a video series on reflective supervision, and many articles on relational health, intervention, and reflective supervision practice.
Mary Claire is a Zero to Three Graduate Fellow, a founding member of the California Association for Infant Mental Health, a member of the leadership team of the California Center for Infant Family and Early Childhood Mental Health and a member of the Harris Professional Development Network.
Sherryl Scott Heller, Ph.D., a licensed psychologist, has worked in the area of infant and early childhood mental health and development for over 25 years. She has been a faculty member in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health at Tulane University for most of her career. In her time there she has worked with the Infant Team, directed by Charley Zeanah and Julie Larrieu, where she led a team focused on supporting foster families caring for infants and young children. In 2009 she co-edited a book on reflective supervision with Linda Gilkerson that came out of the consultation work she provide through the Zero to Three Pathways program to Early Head Start programs in Louisiana. Sherry has been a member of the leadership team for Tulane’s TIKES program since 2005. This program provides mental health consultation to childcare programs statewide; Sherry provides reflective supervision to many of the TIKES consultants and leads their research and evaluation efforts. She spent several years directing the Tulane Building Early Relationships and Supports home visiting program, where she became and remains a member of the Fussy Baby Network at Erikson and a FAN trainer. During her 2012 Zero to Three Fellowship Sherry focused on developing the Provider Reflective Process Assessment Scales (PRPAS), a measure that assesses reflective capacity in early childhood providers. Her commitment to supporting early childhood providers extends to work creating and providing professional trainings. Sherry presents regionally, nationally, and internationally on topics such as: the DC:0-5 Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders in Infancy and Early Childhood, early childhood mental health, mental health consultation, the Fussy Baby Network FAN model and reflective practice.
Sherry is a Zero to Three Graduate Fellow, a founding member of the RAINE group, serves as the Training Director of the Reflective Supervision Collaborative (RSC), is an expert faculty member for the SAMSHA funded Center of Excellence on Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation at Georgetown University and a faculty member at the Institute for Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health at Tulane University.
Rowena Mudiappa, LCSW, is the Founder of Transformed Relationships-Relaciones Transformadas, a bilingual Licensed Clinical Social worker who has served children ages 0-5, their parents and staff in Michigan and North Carolina. Rowena’s passion is to address trauma through supporting caregiver child relationships so that families can heal and thrive. Growing up in Sri Lanka Rowena learned about the importance of community and the impact of historical trauma on communities and the cycle of intergenerational trauma. Rowena’s desire to learn about intervening to heal from trauma led her to get her Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and a minor in Gender Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago and then a Masters in Social Work at the University of Chicago with a concentration on trauma and violence prevention. Rowena was endorsed as an Infant Family Specialist in Michigan in 2012 and then as an Infant Mental Health Mentor Clinical in North Carolina in 2022. Rowena began providing Reflective Supervision/Consultation in 2016 and began providing training regarding Reflective Supervision/Consultation to Infant and Early Childhood professionals in 2022. Rowena is fortunate to continue to support staff, families and children have strong relationships, heal from trauma and thrive in many facets as she leans on what she has learned from the invaluable lessons that staff, families and children have taught her and as she learns alongside those who have gone before her in this work.
Salam Soliman, Psy.D., IMH-E® is the Director of the Center of Prevention and Early Trauma Treatment at the National Service office for Nurse Family Partnership and Child First. In that role, she oversees a Category II National Child Traumatic Stress Network Center which include replication of the Child First model, providing evidence-based trainings and consultation services in communities across the US and helping create systems that work to support families and young children. Prior to that, she had been the Connecticut State Clinical Director and National Clinical Advisor for Child First, Inc. She came to this position after having trained and worked internationally in hospitals, courthouses, public schools, universities, and outpatient clinics. Her work has primarily focused on children, with a particular interest in disrupted attachments and the long-term effects of trauma on children. Dr. Soliman is a licensed clinical psychologist and is also endorsed as an infant mental health mentor. Salam served as an Adjunct Clinical Professor at Pace University and later as the Director for Counseling Services for New York University in Abu Dhabi.
Salam is involved in many national initiatives including the development of a Reflective Supervision Curriculum. In collaboration with Louisiana State University Health Center and School of Medicine, Salam is also the Coordinator for the NCTSN Disaster and Terrorism Northeast Coalition for Connecticut. She also serves as a Board Member for APA Division 39, Section II and a consultant to the ANCHOR program at KHH Hospital in Singapore.
CURRENT FACULTY
Shannon Bekman, Ph.D., IECMH-E® is a licensed clinical psychologist in Denver, Colorado. She has been supervising and training professionals and students in child development, psychology and infant/early childhood mental health for over 15 years. Shannon is a clinical assistant professor in the department of psychiatry at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and a member of ZERO TO THREE’s Academy of Fellows. She is passionate about serving young children who have experienced abuse, neglect, trauma, and/or loss and collaborating with all disciplines that touch the lives of very young children. Her expertise is in infant and early childhood social/emotional development, infant/early childhood trauma, and various dyadic child-parent psychotherapies. She is one of Colorado’s Child-Parent Psychotherapy trainers and has a private practice, Bekman Psychology, where she provides reflective supervision/consultation and perinatal, infant and early childhood mental health clinical services. She has published on the topics of assessment, diagnosis and treatment of infant and early childhood mental health concerns.
Valerie Bellas, Ph.D. (she/her) is a licensed clinical psychologist with over 18 years of experience in Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (IEMCH). She has provided reflective supervision and individual and group consultation across disciplines and contexts, as well as IECMH training and workforce development. She is committed to address the impact of racism, xenophobia, and other interpersonal and institutional forms of oppression on children, families, communities, practitioners, and systems.
Valerie is a Psychologist at Services to Enhance Early Development (SEED) at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital, Oakland, where she works in collaborative teams of mental health providers, developmental and peer specialists, child welfare workers, and public health nurses to support children, birth to six, and their biological and resource families in child welfare. She served as Lead Instructor for the IECMH Post-Graduate Certificate Program, a two-year certificate program with the primary goal of diversification of the IECMH workforce, through California State University, East Bay and Alameda County Behavioral Health Care Services.
She received her training at Child Witness to Violence Project at Boston Medical Center, Infant Team and Quality Start Childcare Consultation at the Tulane School of Medicine, and Reflective Facilitators In Training through the Irving B. Harris Early Childhood Mental Health Training Program. She is dedicated to paying forward the gifts of reflective practice generously shared with her by her reflective supervisors and mentors along the way.
Deborrah Bremond, Ph.D., MPH is a licensed mental health professional specializing in infant and early childhood mental health. She trained at the Infant Parent Program at UCSF department of psychiatry and in a variety of early childhood mental health settings. Dr. Bremond helped direct the implementation of CA First 5 in Alameda County for 11 years. She has a broad range of experience conceptualizing, developing, and implementing integrated service delivery models for families with young children. She has sought to integrate the importance of early social and emotional development into early care and education sites, neonatal follow-up programs and primary pediatric care settings. The past 10 years she has worked as a consultant on several projects; WestEd, Center for Early Intervention, The Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corporation, CA Project Launch (2009-2013), and Save the Children. She helped develop and teach the curricula for the Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health course at California State University East Bay. She is co-author of The Learning Curve (imhlearningcurve.org) a self-assessment tool that helps one explore their knowledge of early child development and to figure out areas for self-improvement.
Deborrah a Zero to Three Harris Graduate Fellow, a member of the California Association of Infant Mental Health and a CA Endorsed Reflective Practice Mentor. She received her doctorate from the Wright Institute and later a Masters in Public Health, Maternal and Child Health from University of California Berkeley.
Ms. Deborah Chalmers (Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor-LCPC) is a clinically trained, reflective practice practitioner with many years of experience in the field of infant mental health. Served as an independent early childhood mental consultant for 15 years in the field before moving into her current position as the Director of Infant/Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation, at Illinois Action for Children in Chicago, Illinois. Where she has been for the past 10 years. Co-managing alongside two program managers, a team of Infant/Early Childhood Mental Health Consultants, who provide early childhood mental health consultation across the early childhood education community (licensed childcare centers and family childcare homes-Cook County (Chicago) and its’ surrounding suburbs, IAFC Early Learning program and its community-based education partners, and school districts in the southern suburbs with pre-school programming). Ms. Chalmers is a former graduate of Erikson Institute Infant Mental Health Certificate Program and holds a certificate in Infant Mental Health, in addition to many other advanced degrees.
Elvia Cortes, PhD, is the founder and executive director of FINE Infant Program, an early intervention program, leading in-home visitors and mental health practitioners providing direct services to children 0-3 years and their families in California. Dr. Cortes has provided mental health and behavioral support to families of young children and adolescents in various clinical settings including in-home, outpatient and inpatient treatment programs. She collaborates with in-home visitors, including Tribal home visiting programs, to evaluate interventions and practices used during service delivery and leadership. Throughout her extensive experience, Dr. Cortes continues to work on program design and implementation through professional development and Reflective Practice consultations to support young practitioners entering the field of Early Intervention and leadership. Dr. Cortes supports programs to integrate Reflective Practice in their work setting by fostering supportive, respectful, and professional work environments leading practitioners to experience professional growth. Dr. Cortes is an inaugural member of the California Association of Infant Mental Health and serves as the Clinical Intervention Committee Community of Practices Chair. She is a consultant with WestEd’s IECMHC Consultant Project and serves as a Co-Facilitator of the Division of Early Childhood (DEC) Infant Mental Health Community of Practice (CoP). She completed a Masters of Marriage, Family, and Child Therapy and her PhD in Infant and Early Childhood Development with an emphasis in Infant Mental Health and Developmental Disorders. Her doctoral concentration is in Reflective Practice. She is an Assistant Professor at Riverside Community College in the Early Childhood Department and is currently completing a second Master’s degree in Social Work through USC on the Family, Children, and Youth track. Dr. Cortes has presented at numerous international and national conferences including the World Association of Infant Mental Health (WAIMH) congress, Infant Development Association (IDA), and Division of Early Childhood (DEC) conference.
Dana Cox has worked in the field of child health and development for 40-years, as both a Registered Nurse/Public Health Nurse and an Early Childhood Special Educator. Dana received her BS in Nursing from San Francisco State in 1984, and her MA in Early Childhood Special Education from Santa Clara University in 2004. She was a Napa Infant-Parent Mental Health Fellow in 2010, and completed the first Napa Fellowship’s Reflective Supervision, Consultation and Facilitation Academy in 2015. She is endorsed in California as a Mental Health Specialist (0-5) and Reflective Practice Mentor.
Dana’s career path has been diverse and includes experience in pediatrics, maternal-child health, early intervention, home-visiting, and supporting the inclusion and belonging of young children with disabilities in early education settings. Dana has been involved in adult education for most of her career including serving as faculty at several institutions including Cabrillo College, Santa Clara University, and the EPIC (Education Preparation for Inclusive Education) Credentialing Program. She has consulted for a range of programs including UCSF Child Care Health, First-5, and most recently worked with WestEd’s Supporting Inclusive Early Learning Programs, and the IECMHC Network.
Dana is the parent of three adult children, including identical twins, one who has cerebral palsy. She is also a grandmother of two young children. Her interests include hiking, birding, and nature journaling.
Adriana Cuestas, PsyD is Colombian, bilingual (Spanish/English) licensed clinical psychologist. Dr. Cuestas is CA-CIFECMH Endorsed as an Infant-Family and Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist and as a Reflective Practice Mentor. She is a graduate fellow and faculty member of the Infant-Parent Mental Health Fellowship, in Napa, CA, through UC Davis and adjunct faculty at The Reiss-Davis Graduate School for the doctorate program in Psychodynamic Child Psychology and Psychotherapy.
Dr. Cuestas is the author of the children’s book “Violet’s first big goodbye”, co-authored with her daughter, also available in Spanish “Violeta y su primer gran adiós”. Dr. Cuestas serves the board of the California Association for Infant Mental Health CalAIMH as the president-elect. Currently, Dr. Cuestas is the Director of Early Childhood Mental Health Clinical Services at Allies for Every Child where she co-developed and co-directs the Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program, oversees the delivery of early childhood mental health services,
advances transdisciplinary consultation and reflective practice, and strengthens/develops partnerships with other agencies in the community.
At Allies, Dr. Cuestas is the Head of PRESENCE, a Federal Grant awarded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) that focuses on expanding Allies for Every Child’s delivery of Early Childhood Mental Health Services to Children and Families and strengthens Early Childhood interdisciplinary workforce capacity in the Los Angeles area.
Dr. Cuestas also provides consultation services and reflective practice.
Dr. Valerie Dallas is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and qualified supervisor in Florida. Dr. Dallas holds a doctoral degree from the University of Kentucky in Social Work with a clinical concentration. Dr. Dallas has served as faculty at Florida State University’s Center for Prevention and Early Intervention Policy, where she provides training on the Foundations of Infant Mental Health and is one of Florida’s Child Parent Psychotherapy trainers. In addition, she offers statewide clinical coordination for the Early Childhood Courts and provides Reflective Supervision/Consultation to the Young Parents Project. With 20 years of clinical experience and being trained in Child Parent Psychotherapy, TF-CBT, and EMDR, Dr. Dallas also has a clinical private practice called Halo Counseling and Consultation LLC, which supports those who are pregnant or parenting young children aged 0-5 and facing challenges in the child-parent relationship. Dr. Dallas’ research interests include adolescent parents and social justice-informed infant mental health practice. She is the 2023 recipient of the Dr. Neil Boris Mentorship Award from the Florida Association of Infant Mental Health. She is a member of the Irving Harris Professional Development Network, the National Association of Black Social Workers, Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Incorporated, and one of Tallahassee’s 25 Women to Know (2019).
Sarah Fitzgibbons, Ed.D. LMHC, MT-BC, IMH-E® is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, Board Certified Music Therapist, and Infant Mental Health Mentor- Clinical. She has spent 25+ years practicing, researching, supervising, teaching, and developing programs in the field of Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (IECMH), with a specific expertise in infants and young children impacted by trauma, loss, attachment disruptions, child welfare, and parent-child relationship assessments. Sarah works as the Vice President of Programs and Practices at The Society for the Protection and Care of Children (SPCC) in Rochester, NY where she oversees multiple IECMH aligned programs, and professional development initatives, teaches IECMH course work at the University of Rochester, provides reflective consultation for professionals, and serves as the Board Co-Chair for the New York State Association of Infant Mental Health (NYS-AIMH). Sarah actively works with other local, state, and national IECMH leaders to advance the field, ensure fidelity, change policy, and increase capacity through initiatives and collaborative efforts. Sarah is deeply committed to cultivating and nurturing IECMH expertise across our community and state through relationship based, culturally sensitive practice, teaching, reflective supervision, and consultation. She is currently involved in research and publication projects related to reflective supervision, identity, race, power, privilege, and formally expanding inclusivity definitions of RSC. Sarah holds a bachelor’s degree in music therapy from Nazareth University, a master’s degree in transpersonal counseling psychology from Naropa University and completed post-master’s training in IECMH through the University of Colorado (The Kempe Center). She earned her doctoral degree from the University of Rochester’s Warner School of Education, in Counselor Education & Supervision, with her dissertation: The Relationship between Reflective Supervision and Practitioner Reflective Capacity. Sarah has been most deeply challenged, enriched, and inspired as an IECMH leader through her role as a daughter, a mother of her two children, a partner, through moments of connection with others, and legacy of her ancestors.
Tala Ghantous, LCSW is a bilingual, Arabic/English speaking, licensed clinical social worker who lives and works in Oakland, CA, a multicultural town in the San Francisco Bay area. For the last 20 years, she has specialized in early childhood mental health services offered to families and communities impacted by a multitude of psychosocial stressors impacting early development. Tala infuses her formal training in the child-parent psychotherapy trauma model, the Facilitated Attuned Interactions (FAN) model for emotional regulation, and the Circle of Security model to strengthen the relationship between children and their caregivers and support the development of young children. Tala partners with multidisciplinary agencies to help support and integrate a reflective model into their supervisory structures and provides training, consultation, and clinical supervision as well. Tala uses her experiences as an immigrant and parent and avid reader to help families create their own narratives for healing.
Linda Gilkerson, Ph.D., LSW is a Professor at Erikson Institute where she directs the graduate and certificate training programs in infancy and infant mental health and is Executive Director of Fussy Baby Network. Linda has combined developing and directing graduate training programs in infancy with designing and leading relationship-based services for parents of infants and providing professional development to the infant/family field. In 1980, while on faculty at Wheelock College, she started Project Welcome in Boston, federally funded model demonstration program to bring developmental care to NICUs and provide support to premature babies and their parents during and after hospitalization. Moving to Chicago, she directed the Infant Care Program at Evanston Hospital for seven years where, with her colleagues, she developed a family administered version of the Brazelton which begins prenatally to engage parents with their new baby and their experience of themselves as parents. She joined the faculty of the Erikson Institute in 1986, where she became director of their infant training programs.
For nearly two decades, Linda led her team at Erikson in developing the Fussy Baby Network, an infant mental health informed prevention program for families with infants with crying, sleeping and feeding challenges. She is the developer of the FAN (Facilitating Attuned Interactions), an approach to family engagement and reflective practice which started in the Fussy Baby Network service program in Chicago. The FAN now is shared widely through a national and international network of FAN training programs and is used in a range of settings including home visitation, infant and early childhood mental health consultation, early intervention, primary health care and child welfare. She was part of the original group at Zero to Three who began to focus the field on reflective supervision and has worked to incorporate reflection into all aspects of her work in professional education and service delivery. The Supervisor FAN blends both administrative and reflective supervision to provide an integrated approach to supervision for the multiple responsibilities that the frontline supervisor holds. Her research and publications focus on relationship-based approaches to intervention and supervision. She was a long-time board member of Zero to Three and led or served on many early childhood task forces in Illinois. She is a grandmother, learning all over what it means to be a parent!
Brenda Jones Harden, PH.D. is the Ruth Harris Ottman, Class of ’45, Professor of Child and Family Welfare, at the Columbia School of Social Work. She directs the Prevention and Early Adversity Research Laboratory, where she and her research team examine the developmental and mental health needs of young children who have experienced early adversity and toxic stress, particularly those who have been maltreated, are in foster care, or have experienced other forms of trauma. A particular focus is preventing maladaptive outcomes in these populations through early childhood programs. She has conducted numerous evaluations of such programs, including early care and education, home visiting services, and parenting interventions. She is currently working on an evaluation of the effectiveness of MD’s Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program.
Brenda is a scientist-practitioner who uses research to improve the quality and effectiveness of child and family services, especially in the areas of home visiting, infant/early childhood mental health, and child welfare. She has been a trainer and a consultant with various national and local early childhood programs, on mental health issues and reflective supervision. She has been a faculty member of Infant Early Childhood Mental Health programs in DC, MD, and CT and has provided infant/early childhood mental health training to other state and local organizations. She is currently evaluating the effectiveness of MD’s Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program. She has published widely on the delivery of early childhood mental health services.
Brenda is currently the President of the Board at Zero to Three, and is a graduate fellow of Zero to Three. She serves on various federal, state, and local advisory boards related to early childhood development, mental health, and preventive programs. She received a PhD in developmental and clinical psychology from Yale University and a Master’s in Social Work from New York University.
Georgette Harrison, EdM, LPC is the Director of Clinical and Community Partnerships for the Child Guidance Center of Southern CT. In this capacity, she supervises clinicians working with young children and families, collaborates with community stakeholders, and provides individual and dyadic therapy in English and Spanish to Latinx families. Prior to her tenure at the Child Guidance Center of Southern CT, she served as the Training Director for Child First, a national, evidence-based two-generation model that works with young children and families who have been exposed to toxic stress. In that role, she helped develop, coordinate and deliver in-person and distance learning trainings for Child First staff in Connecticut, Florida and North Carolina. Her areas of practice and research interest are the impact of child and caregiver trauma histories on infant and early childhood relationships, as well as how caregiver experiences of good-enough parenting can be accessed and used in the service of healing caregiver-child relationships.
Ms. Harrison earned her Master of Arts and Master of Education in Counseling Psychology from Teachers College, Columbia University, and holds an Infant-Parent Mental Health Post-Graduate Certificate from the University of Massachusetts, Boston. She is a Licensed Professional Counselor in the state of Connecticut, an internal agency trainer for the Attachment-Regulation-Competency trauma treatment model, a rostered Child-Parent Psychotherapy clinician, an American Psychoanalytic Association Fellow, as well as a Circle of Security Parenting Facilitator. She also writes a column titled “Good-Enough Parenting” for a local newspaper.
Dr. Camille Humes is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor (LCPC) in the state of Illinois, a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) in the state of Michigan, and a credentialed Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist (I/ECMH-C). She holds an Endorsement ® from the Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health (MIAIMH), where she recently served on the Board of Directors. She also served on the Board of Directors for the National Board for Certified Counselors (NBCC) as Secretary and Chair of the Ethics Committee. For over twenty years Dr. Humes has worked as a Counselor, Infant/Early Childhood Mental Health Consultant, and leader in the mental health profession, advocating both nationally and internationally to inform policies and guide programming that supports mental health services. She is a facilitator for the Illinois Association for Infant Mental Health (ILAIMH) Infant/Early Childhood Mental Health Credential and has been a presenter for the organization. She is an author, professor, and a regular grant reviewer for the United States Department of Education. Dr. Humes serves as a consultant for the Illinois Department of Human Services Division of Early Childhood and the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services. She enjoys speaking to audiences about various topics, including ethics in leadership and consultation. Her passion for supporting program development and strategic planning parallels her devotion to educating and mentoring other professionals.
Kadija Johnston, LCSW is a licensed clinical social worker who has been a practitioner in the field of infant and early childhood mental health since 1985. She is the past Director of the Infant-Parent Program at the University of California, San Francisco (U.C.S.F.), one of the nation’s longest standing, and the west coast’s first, early childhood mental health programs. Ms. Johnston pioneered the Program’s approach to Mental Health Consultation. The approach she developed serves as a model for other organizations, locally, nationally and internationally. She has disseminated the model through TA and training in 22 states and internationally.
Currently, Ms. Johnston is on faculty at Georgetown University’s Center for Child and Human Development where she is contributing her expertise and experience in early childhood mental health consultation to the SAMHSA supported Center of Excellence in ECMH Consultation and the National Center for Health, Behavioral Health and Safety.
Kadija is active in national organizations involving early childhood mental health, including the Irving B. Harris Foundation Professional Development Network for Training and Diversity in Leadership in the Early Childhood Mental Health Field. She is a founding member of the Reflective Supervision Collaborative and RAINE, a Southwest Human Development sponsored group of national experts advancing practice, policy and research in ECMH Consultation.
Kadija writes and lectures nationally on early childhood mental health consultation. In addition to numerous articles, she co-authored the book Mental Health Consultation in Child Care: Transforming Relationships With Directors, Staff, and Families.
In the next phase of her journey, Kadija is committed, and devoting energy to instilling equity, diversity and inclusion principles with greater intentionality and more explicitly in her personal and professional practices.
Melesa Love, LCSW, IMH-E, PMH-C is a licensed clinical social worker, a certified perinatal mental health professional, and an endorsed infant mental health specialist. Melesa was born and raised in rural MS. Melesa moved to Indianapolis, IN in the fall of 1996 where she and her family resided for 17 years. Melesa completed her BSW in 2000 and her MSW in 2002 from Indiana University School of Social Work. Melesa has 24 years of clinical experience working with and on behalf of youth and families. Melesa worked several years in community mental health organizations within a multi-disciplinary team providing case management and counseling in effort to mitigate ACES. For more than 8 years, Melesa worked as a social worker and therapist in Indianapolis Public Schools working with at-risk youth and families. For more than 7 years, Melesa supervised evidenced-based home visiting programs in Indiana and Tennessee that served pregnant parents and their littles ages 0-5. Melesa has also worked as a medical social worker in community health clinics serving marginalized pregnant mothers ages 14-24 to promote healthy birth outcomes and healthy attachment. Melesa is a former board member of the Postpartum Support International-TN chapter.
In 2019 Melesa opened her practice, Melesa Love Therapy Services, PLLC located in Franklin, TN. Her practice specializes in perinatal mental health, complex trauma, and relational wellness. Melesa is trained in a variety of modalities; TF-CBT, CPP, EMDR, Therapyplay and EFT. As an independent consultant, Melesa provides clinical supervision and reflective consultation for perinatal and infant and early childhood providers. In 2020 Melesa began working contractually with the Association of Infant Mental health as a reflective consultant. In 2023, AIMHiTN named Melesa as a Regional/ Collective Lead. In this role, Melesa trains and develops reflective consultants in the state of TN. Melesa also serves on several work groups and special projects to support the growth and expansion of services on behalf of TN littles ages 0-5.
Sarah Martinez is a member of the faculty at the Erikson Institute in Chicago where she is Co-Director of the Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Certificate Program and Director of the Master of Early Childhood Education Program with emphasis on Early Intervention and Infant Mental Health. Sarah holds a master’s degree in clinical psychology from the Illinois School of Professional Psychology and a master’s degree in early childhood special education from the University of Illinois at Chicago. Sarah’s bachelor’s degree is in special education from Vanderbilt University. Sarah is a member of the board of directors of the Illinois Association for Infant Mental Health, where she has served as president and secretary. Sarah is a frequent presenter on topics of infant and early childhood mental health, attachment, reflective practice, and parent child relationships.
Trudi N. Murch, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, Director of Services for Children with Disabilities. Dr. Murch is Director of Services for Children with Disabilities at Southwest Human Development (SWHD). Department programs include disability services to Head Start classrooms; the Children’s Developmental Center (Early Intervention), Nurse Family Partnership, and the High Risk Pregnancy community nursing NICU follow-up program. She has taken a lead role in development of the Smooth Way Home program, which supports families as they transition home from the NICU.
Trudi has worked with the leadership team at Southwest Human Development (SWHD) to fully implement the Reflective Supervision Model across the agency, which is a large, community-based agency serving approximately 140,000 children and their families. SWHD offers over 40 comprehensive programs in the areas of child development and mental health; Easterseals disabilities services; early language and literacy; Head Start/Early Head Start; family support and child welfare; and professional development. SWHD employs over 900 staff, and has a strong commitment to assuring that all staff are offered the opportunity to learn about and benefit from Reflective Supervision. The agency is also dedicated to infusing the principles of reflective practice and relationship-based work into administrative processes and structures.
Trudi has had extensive experience in designing and delivering training programs to a wide range of infant and early childhood specialists in the areas of inclusion, early intervention program design, and reflective supervision. She has co-authored a text: Reflective Supervision and Leadership in Infant and Early Childhood Programs, published by the Zero to Three press. She and her colleague, Mary Claire Heffron have produced a set of video vignettes, along with a training manual, entitled: Finding the Words, Finding the Ways: Exploring Reflective Supervision and Facilitation.
Carmen Rosa Noroña, LICSW, MS.Ed., IECMH-E® is the Child Trauma Clinical Services and Training Lead at Child Witness to Violence Project at Boston Medical Center. Ms. Noroña is a Child-Parent Psychotherapy National Trainer, an expert faculty of the Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders of Infancy and Early Childhood Training (DC: 0-5) and one of the developers of the Harris Professional Development Network Diversity Informed Tenets for Work with Infants Children and Families Initiative and of the Boston Medical Center Family Preparedness Plan for Immigrant Families. Her practice and research interests are on the impact of trauma on attachment; the intersection of culture, immigration and trauma; diversity-informed reflective supervision and consultation; and on the implementation and sustainability of evidence-based practice in real world settings. She is a Co-Leader of the Department of Pediatrics Council of Social Justice, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Boston Medical Center. In addition, she serves as core faculty of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network’s (NCTSN) Being Anti-Racist is Central to Trauma-Informed Care Initiative, as a member of the NCTSN Steering Committee, and as a co-chair of the NCTSN Latin American Families Collaborative group. Ms. Noroña has adapted and translated materials for Spanish-speaking families affected by trauma and has also contributed to the literature in infant and early childhood mental health, diversity and immigration (https://diversityinformedtenets.org) and of the Boston Medical Center Family Preparedness Plan for Immigrant Families. Her practice and research interests are on the impact of trauma on attachment; the intersection of culture, immigration and trauma; diversity-informed reflective supervision and consultation; and on the implementation and sustainability of evidence-based practice in real world settings. She is a Co-Leader of the Department of Pediatrics Council of Social Justice, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Boston Medical Center. In addition, she serves as core faculty of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network’s (NCTSN) Being Anti-Racist is Central to Trauma-Informed Care Initiative, as a member of the NCTSN Steering Committee, and as a co-chair of the NCTSN Latin American Families Collaborative group. Carmen has adapted and translated materials for Spanish-speaking families affected by trauma and has also contributed to the literature in infant and early childhood mental health, diversity and immigration.
Rouba Otaky is a trilingual, (Arabic/English/Spanish), licensed clinical therapist, a California Center endorsed Infant-Family Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist, and Reflective Practice Facilitator. As an Indigenous Palestinian and Woman of Color, Rouba has continuously worked with immigrant/displaced and other historically marginalized communities. She is passionate about training and supporting reflective practice professionals in thinking critically and consciously about dismantling racism and decolonizing practices within the mental health field. She is currently a Program Manager for Healthy Families America in the East Bay as well as a community trainer, consultant, and facilitator and has over 15 years of experience working in program management, community collaboration, supervision, and therapy. Rouba infuses her formal training in infant mental health, the Napa Infant Parent program and Reflective Facilitation and Anti Racism to strengthen authentic relationships between agency/supervisor and supervisee to parallel and strengthen the relationships between children and their caregivers, while also leaning into uncomfortable conversations.
Nichole Paradis, LMSW, IMH-E® (She/Her/Hers) founded Paradis Consulting, LLC, providing reflective consultation and subject matter expertise in infant and early childhood mental health practices, policies, credentialing, leadership, and workforce development strategies. Nichole helped to found the Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health and was the Executive Director of the Alliance for five years. Through her work at the Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health and the Alliance, she spent 16 years helping to create, grow, and lead the Endorsement for Culturally Sensitive, Relationship-Focused Practice Promoting Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health in 36 US states, Ireland, and Australia. Altogether, she has 29 years of experience practicing IECMH in behavioral health, child welfare, home visiting, workforce development, reflective supervision/consultation, policy, and research.
Nichole is dedicated to reshaping professional development strategies to be more equitable and inclusive, especially reflective supervision/consultation. While working at the Alliance, she conceived the study that led to the formation of the Digging Deeper Collective, centering the voices of professionals from marginalized communities. The Collective’s findings are informing substantial changes in how reflective supervision is understood and implemented. Nichole has extensively written about IECMH and reflective supervision, co-authoring the chapter “Reflective Supervision: The State of the Field and Future Directions” in the 2024 WAIMH Handbook of Infant & Early Childhood Mental Health. Nichole also serves as Part-Time Faculty at Wayne State University School of Social Work and as a Lecturer at the University of Michigan School of Social Work.
Alison D. Peak LCSW is the Executive Director of Allied Behavioral Health Solutions in Nashville, TN. Alison has spent the majority of her career dedicated to two primary passions: integrated behavioral health services in primary care settings and Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health. Alison is privileged to be a member of ZERO TO THREE 2020-2022 Fellows and to work alongside state and national colleagues to further Infant and Early Childhood services and workforce development. Clinically, Alison is passionate about working with children who have histories of early trauma and their caregivers, Reflective Supervision, and utilizing RSC to build leadership capacity in systems.
Abayea Pelt, BSW is the Director of Maternal and Child Health at Community of Hope, a community-based agency with federally qualified health centers and housing programs in Washington, DC. Abayea has a background in social work, public administration, and nonprofit management. In 2017, Abayea provided leadership in implementing the Facilitating Attuned Interactions approach to home visiting at Mary’s Center as part of a federal Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting innovation grant awarded to Georgetown University and DC Health. As part of this innovation award, Abayea was given the opportunity to become a Facilitating Attuned Interactions (FAN) trainer. Since that time, Abayea has trained leadership at the Baltimore Health Department within their Maternal Child Health division, as well as many other agencies and programs across the country in using reflective techniques in direct practice with families, as well as in supervision of program staff. In addition to being a FAN trainer, Abayea is also a national Healthy Families America Foundations for Family Support Trainer. Healthy Families America is a leading model of home visiting which uses an infant mental health framework to support child development and has a two generational approach to engage parents who have experienced childhood trauma. Abayea has experience in managing maternal health and early childhood home visiting programs since 2015. Besides these roles, Abayea is a Certified Lactation Counselor and an Infant Massage Parent Educator as well.
Abayea is a fourth generation native Washingtonian and she currently resides in DC with her husband Paul and her Labrador retriever, Samwise Gamgee.
Diane Reynolds, LMFT, is a trainer, consultant, coach, and facilitator dedicated to advancing trauma- and equity-informed reflective supervision and leadership. A California Center endorsed Infant-Family Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist and Reflective Practice Facilitator with over 28 years in the field, she created the Mindful Parenting Groups model in 2001. Over two decades, she introduced this relationship-focused parent-infant group model to Early Head Start, the child welfare community, and dually diagnosed moms in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties, as well as in Queensland, Australia.
Diane launched Reflective Praxis Consulting in 2017 to support growing need for professional development, organizational consultation, implementation support, and coaching in reflective practice, supervision, and leadership. She has introduced these transformative practices in primary and secondary educational settings, gang intervention, and home visitation programs. During the pandemic, Diane embraced the infinite horizon of virtual training possibilities, delivering hundreds of virtual hours of reflective practice content and experiential process, including grief work, resiliency and wellness activities, liberating structures, as well as poetry and inspiration to support Covid-exhausted hospital-based home visitation teams across Los Angeles County. Diane is currently engaged with the City of Long Beach Department of Health and Human Services to implement reflective supervision and leadership in support of their initiative to build a trauma-informed city.
Supporting the Reflective Supervision Collaborative in various roles since 2018, Diane has provided project management, virtual curriculum development, and design-build services for the RSC online training platform in anticipation of launching a scalable, accessible, virtual reflective supervision training for multi-disciplinary providers in the infant-family early childhood field.
Barbara Stroud, PhD, is a licensed psychologist with over three decades worth of culturally informed clinical practice in early childhood development and mental health. She is a founding organizer and the inaugural president (2017-2019) of the California Association for Infant Mental Health, a ZERO TO THREE Fellow, and holds prestigious endorsements as an Infant and Family Mental Health Specialist/Reflective Practice Facilitator Mentor. In 2018 Dr. Stroud was honored with the Bruce D. Perry Spirit of the Child Award. Embedded in all of her trainings and consultations are the activities of reflective practice, demonstrating cultural attunement, and holding a social justice lens in the work. Dr. Stroud’s book “How to Measure a Relationship” [published 2012] is improving infant mental health practices around the globe and is now available in Spanish. Her second book, an Amazon best seller, “Intentional Living: finding the inner peace to create successful relationships” walks the reader through a deeper understanding of how their brain influences relationships. Both volumes are currently available on Amazon. Additionally, Dr. Stroud is a contributing author to the text “Infant and early childhood mental health: Core concepts and clinical practice” edited by Kristie Brandt, Bruce Perry, Steve Seligman, & Ed Tronick.
Dr. Stroud received her Ph.D. in Applied Developmental Psychology from Nova Southeastern University, and she has worked largely with children in urban communities with severe emotional disturbance. Dr. Stroud’s professional career path has allowed her to work across service delivery silos supporting professionals in mental health, early intervention (part c), child welfare, early care and education, family court staff, primary care, and other arenas. She is highly regarded and has been a key player in the inception and implementation of cutting-edge service delivery to children Prenatal to five and their families; her innovative approaches have won national awards. She has held an adjunct faculty position at California State Long Beach, and maintained a faculty position in the Infant-Parent Mental Health Fellowship for 12 years. Currently, Dr. Stroud’s primary focus is professional training and private consultation from an anti-racist lens, with a focus on social justice, in the field of infant mental health. Dr. Stroud remains steadfast in her mission to ‘changing the world – one relationship at a time’.
To learn more visit: http://www.DrBarbaraStroud.com.
Rosario is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist with extensive clinical training in Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health. Over the past 15 years Rosario has worked with children & families using an evidence-practice and trauma-informed lens. Rosario is certified in various Evidenced Based Practices including: Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TFCBT), Standard Triple P – Child/Teen- Level 4, Triple P Pathways & Enhanced-Level 5, and Managing Adaptive Practices (MAP). Additionally, Rosario is a certified Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT) UC Davis Training Partner.
Currently, Rosario is the Family Well Being Manager at Child Care Resource Center (CCRC) where she oversees the Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health programs in the San Fernando Valley, Antelope Valley, and San Bernardino communities. At CCRC, Rosario supervises the Trauma Informed Care Services that are part of California’s Emergency Child Care Bridge Program, BEES Program (Building Early Education Strategies) which encompasses IECMHC services. In addition, Rosario oversees the Statewide TIC Program, San Bernardino Developmental Care Coordination, Planting Prosperity Program, and programs under the Child Youth Behavioral Health Initiative (CYBHI) – CPP and TFCBT.
Since 2020, Rosario has been a part of Georgetown University’s – Center of Excellence for Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (IECMHC) – a national technical assistance center dedicated to the advancement and impact of the field of IECMHC. In 2022, Rosario earned a Certification in IECMHC through Georgetown University, which provided advanced training for mental health clinicians in the specialized role of consulting in early childhood settings. Through training with Georgetown University, Rosario began mentorship and training with Dr. Eva Marie Shivers, Founder/Director of Indigo Cultural Center, Inc. in Phoenix, Arizona. Indigo is a non-profit “committed to the study of culture, the enactment of culture, the celebration of culture, and using strength in one’s culture to promote social justice and racial equity.
In her time off, Rosario continues to learn more about her own cultural identity through embracing ancestral stories and bringing that seasoning into her clinical practice. Rosario is married and is mom to Achilles (19), Jax (12) and 3 fur babies, Smokey, Scrappy, and Schnitzel.
EMERITUS
Brenda Jones Harden, PH.D. is the Ruth Harris Ottman, Class of ’45, Professor of Child and Family Welfare, at the Columbia School of Social Work. She directs the Prevention and Early Adversity Research Laboratory, where she and her research team examine the developmental and mental health needs of young children who have experienced early adversity and toxic stress, particularly those who have been maltreated, are in foster care, or have experienced other forms of trauma. A particular focus is preventing maladaptive outcomes in these populations through early childhood programs. She has conducted numerous evaluations of such programs, including early care and education, home visiting services, and parenting interventions. She is currently working on an evaluation of the effectiveness of MD’s Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program.
Brenda is a scientist-practitioner who uses research to improve the quality and effectiveness of child and family services, especially in the areas of home visiting, infant/early childhood mental health, and child welfare. She has been a trainer and a consultant with various national and local early childhood programs, on mental health issues and reflective supervision. She has been a faculty member of Infant Early Childhood Mental Health programs in DC, MD, and CT and has provided infant/early childhood mental health training to other state and local organizations. She is currently evaluating the effectiveness of MD’s Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation program. She has published widely on the delivery of early childhood mental health services.
Brenda is currently the President of the Board at Zero to Three, and is a graduate fellow of Zero to Three. She serves on various federal, state, and local advisory boards related to early childhood development, mental health, and preventive programs. She received a PhD in developmental and clinical psychology from Yale University and a Master’s in Social Work from New York University.
Christopher Watson, Ph.D., IMH-E® is the Founding Director of the Reflective Practice Center at the University of Minnesota. His work is centered on reflective supervision and reflective practice to support all those who work with infants and young children and their families. He led a national team of researchers and clinicians who are members of the international Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health in developing the Reflective Interaction Observation Scale (RIOS) to define and operationalize reflective supervision. The RIOS is used as a framework for practice as well as a research tool. Dr. Watson was principal investigator for an evaluation of Minnesota’s Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) project focused on developing statewide capacity in reflective practice.
Christopher and Martha Farrell Erickson, PhD, co-founded the interdisciplinary, post-baccalaureate Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Certificate Program at the University of Minnesota. He was director of the Minnesota Infant Mental Health Project and conducted the Minnesota Infant Mental Health Feasibility Study, interagency initiatives funded by the Minnesota Departments of Education, Health, and Human Services. He is endorsed in Infant Mental Health (IMH-[E]) by the Minnesota Association for Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health and is a certified Program for Infant Toddler Care (PITC) trainer.
Christopher has co-written training-of-trainer curricula, including PITC (Program for Infant Toddler Care) as a Curriculum, Talking Reasonably and Responsibly About Brain Development, and Violence Prevention and Intervention in Early Childhood. In addition, he has developed face-to-face and online training courses for early childhood professionals, including Supporting Stressed Young Children Through Relationship-Based Teaching and Bridging Education and Mental Health (BEAM). The BEAM framework combines behavioral and therapeutic approaches to addressing early childhood social-emotional development, mental health, and challenging behaviors.
Prior to his work at the University of Minnesota, Christopher was director of the California Education Innovation Institute, a statewide training program for educators and administrators based at California State University Sacramento.
Deborah J. Weatherston, Ph.D., IMH-E® is currently an infant mental health supervisor and consultant in private practice in Michigan. She co-developed and served as the first Executive Director of the Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health, Inc.®., a nationally and internationally recognized organization whose mission is to promote work force development through the competency-based Endorsement for Culturally Sensitive, Relationship-Focused Practice Promoting Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (2016-2018). Before that, she was the Executive Director of the Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health (2002-2016). She earned her graduate degrees from Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan where she co-developed and directed the specialized, interdisciplinary Graduate Certificate Program in Infant Mental Health through the Merrill-Palmer Institute, Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan (1988-2002).
Deborah has contributed to the infant mental health field with co-edited and co-authored books about infant mental health principles and practices: Infant Mental Health Services Supporting Competencies/Reducing Risks (1989/2002/2015) with Betty Tableman and Case Studies in Infant Mental Health: Risk, Resiliency & Relationships (2002) with Joan Shirilla. In 2009 and again in 2016, she co-edited with Dr. Joy Osofsky two special issues of the Infant Mental Health Journal that focused on Infant Mental Health practice, training, reflective supervision, and research. She has published articles in the Infant Mental Health Journal and the Journal for Zero to Three about practice and reflective supervision, among them: Reflective Supervision: Supporting Reflection as a Cornerstone for Competency (2010) with Bob and Barbra Weigand, Critical Components of Reflective Supervision: Responses from Expert Supervisors in the Field (2014) with Angie Tomlin and Tom Pavkov, and The Michigan Infant Mental Health Home Visiting Model (2020) with Julie Ribaudo and the Michigan Research Collaborative.
Deborah is a ZERO to THREE Graduate Fellow (1999-2000), a consulting editor for the Infant Mental Health Journal, past At-Large Board Member of the World Association for Infant Mental Health (WAIMH) (2012-2016) and served as Editor of WAIMH Perspectives in Infant Mental Health from 2012-2018.
For questions or to receive more information about the Reflective Supervision Collaborative, please email [email protected].
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