Champion Children’s Rights Globally

Infants and children are citizens of the world. The global community is responsible for supporting parents/caregivers, families, and local communities in welcoming, protecting, and nurturing them.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Work to Acknowledge Privilege and Combat Discrimination

Discriminatory policies and practices that harm adults harm the infants and children in their care. Privilege constitutes injustice. Diversity-informed practitioners acknowledge privilege where we hold it, and use it strategically and responsibly. We combat racism, classism, sexism, able-ism, homophobia, xenophobia, and other systems of oppression within ourselves, our practices, and our fields.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Recognize and Respect Non-Dominant Bodies of Knowledge

Diversity-informed practice recognizes nondominant ways of knowing, bodies of knowledge, sources of strength, and routes to healing within all families and communities.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Honor Diverse Family Structures

Families decide who is included and how they are structured; no particular family constellation or organization is inherently optimal compared to any other. Diversity-informed practice recognizes and strives to counter the historical bias toward idealizing (and conversely blaming) biological mothers while overlooking the critical child-rearing contributions of other parents and caregivers including second mothers, fathers, kin and felt family, adoptive parents, foster parents, and early care and educational providers.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Understand That Language Can Hurt or Heal

Diversity-informed practice recognizes the power of language to divide or connect, denigrate or celebrate, hurt or heal. We strive to use language (including body language, imagery, and other modes of nonverbal communication) in ways that most inclusively support all children and their families, caregivers, and communities.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Support Families in Their Preferred Language

Families are best supported in facilitating infants’ and children’s development and mental health when services are available in their native languages.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Allocate Resources to Systems Change

Diversity and inclusion must be proactively considered when doing any work with or on behalf of infants, children, and families. Resource allocation includes time, money, additional/alternative practices, and other supports and accommodations, otherwise systems of oppression may be inadvertently reproduced. Individuals, organizations, and systems of care need ongoing opportunities for reflection in order to identify implicit bias, remove barriers, and work to dismantle the root causes of disparity and inequity.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Make Space and Open Pathways

Infant, child, and family-serving workforces are most dynamic and effective when historically and currently marginalized individuals and groups have equitable access to a wide range of roles, disciplines, and modes of practice and influence.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Advance Policy That Supports All Families

Diversity-informed practitioners consider the impact of policy and legislation on all people and advance a just and equitable policy agenda for and with families.

Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work with Infants, Children and Families

Marian Birch, DMH

Marian Birch is a retired clinical psychologist and infant mental health specialist who lives in Port Angeles, WA. She received a Doctorate in Mental Health from the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California San Francisco in 1983. Her teachers included Erik Erikson and Mary Main. Dr. Birch spent several years as a post-graduate trainee at the Infant-Parent Program  founded by Selma Fraiberg at UCSF. Her supervisors there included Jeree Pawl and Alicia Lieberman. Dr. Birch practiced for 12 years in San Francisco, where she taught and supervised in numerous clinical training schemes. Dr. Birch also served as the Clinical Director of the IMH Certificate Program at the UW School of nursing from 2001-2004. From there she has engaged in a variety of projects to support families with young children including developing a dyadic intervention called BabyLink and intensive home-visiting program called the CARE Project. Since her retirement, she has learned to play the harp, studied Chinese, and done lots of kayaking, snowshoeing, gardening, yoga and cooking in the home she and her husband built in the foothills of the Olympic Mountains.

Abigail Bocanegra, MA, LMFT, Mental Health Consultant

Bio to come.

Gloria Castro, PsyD 

Gloria Castro is a clinical psychologist and Certified Sexual Assault Counselor. Dr. Castro was granted the Fraiberg-Harris Fellowship to complete her postdoctoral training at the Infant-Parent Program, UCSF. Dr. Castro's clinical work has focused on infant mental health and mental health daycare consultation. She has experience conducting comprehensive psychological assessments and developmental neuropsychological assessments for children ranging in age from infancy to adolescence. Dr. Castro is currently working at Child Trauma Research Program on the implementation of Child-parent Psychotherapy during pregnancy and the perinatal period. Dr. Castro provides psychotherapy to pregnant women with history of traumatic experiences throughout pregnancy, labor, delivery and post-partum at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital (ZSFGH), UCSF. She provides infant mental health services to families and newborns at the NICU and has provided mental health services at the High Risk Pediatric Kempe clinic at ZSFGH. She has worked with children, adolescents, and families in various clinical venues including Rape Trauma Services and North Peninsula Family Alternatives (YMCA), in San Mateo County where she developed and implemented a mental health program for immigrant families. She consults, supervises, and trains mental health providers who work with immigrant families and their children who have experienced significant trauma. Dr. Castro has a strong interest on the impact of immigration on family systems, the intergenerational transmission of trauma, and the impact of trauma on children?s development. Prior to the Infant-Parent Program and Child Trauma Research Program, she worked at the Children's Hospital, National Medical Center in Mexico City and at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM). She has presented on national and international conferences, and forums on the topics of parenting in a different culture and on the impact of immigration on the sense of self and motherhood identity. In addition to her work at UCSF, Dr. Castro has taught at Argosy University, American School of Professional Psychology. She also served on the Advisory Board.

Joy Coculluela, MFA, RSME, Cmt

Joy Cosculluela is a somatic educator, performing artist, and choreographer born in the Philippines and migrated to the SF Bay Area. Joy is artistic director of Wayfinding Performance Group, an ensemble of multicultural artists, and has directed Homing Devices, All that Remains, The Space Between, and Soil. Joy’s works explore themes of home, belonging, and resilience against a backdrop of decolonization and shared humanity. Joy trained and performed with dance pioneer Anna Halprin in Seasons, Spirit of Place, Parades and Changes, and many more. She has presented her practice of weaving embodied creativity, the healing arts, and love for the land in national conferences such as ISMETA and Nature Talks. Joy enjoys collaboration and has worked together with numerous Bay Area artists. She is artistic director of Performance Lab SF and leads classes for adults exploring embodied creativity, nature, and well-being. She has presented “Around the Kitchen Table,” a virtual performance project in response to the Covid pandemic. Joy holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College and teaches movement-based expressive arts and the Life/Art Process® at Tamalpa Institute in Kentfield, CA.
www.wayfindingperformance.com. www.tamalpa.org

Mindy Davis, LICSW

Mindy is a Clinician in Private Practice serving primarily children 0-6 years old.  She also provides Clinical and Reflective Supervision in the community to various professionals serving children 0-6.  Mindy currently is participating in meetings to help launch Clark County's Safe Baby Court. Mindy also is a trainer for Attachment Vitamins (parenting program) and the ASQ-3 and ASQ-SE2. In the past,  Mindy has worked as a Clinician and Clinical Supervisor in community mental health for 20 years.   She has presented at statewide Conferences and locally in the Vancouver area on Mitigating the Effects of Toxic Stress and Trauma in Children 0-6 years old.

Helen Egger, PhD

Dr. Helen Egger is a child psychiatrist, early childhood mental health epidemiologist, and digital health innovator. With her daughter, Rebecca Egger, she co-founded Little Otter, an early childhood digital mental health company providing high-quality, family-centered, and accessible mental health care for children ages 0-14 years old and their families. 

Founded in the Spring of 2020, Little Otter has raised > $26M in venture-backed funding and is currently available in CA, CO, NC, and FL with plans to be available nationally by early 2023. 

Prior to joining Little Otter, Dr. Egger was Chair of the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at NYU Langone Health and Director of the NYU Child Study Center. She also founded the WonderLab, a digital child mental health research lab.

Before NYULH, Dr. Egger was tenured faculty at Duke. She founded the Early Childhood Mental Health Lab in the Center for Developmental Epidemiology. As creator of the gold-standard preschool mental health interview and seminal studies, Dr. Egger has shaped the science and practice of preschool mental health. She also led an engineering/child psychiatry initiative that created the first pediatric ResearchKit study, Autism & Beyond. At Duke, Dr. Egger served as Vice-Chair and Chief of the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. 

Dr. Egger attended Yale College and Yale School of Medicine. She completed her adult, child, and post-doctoral research training at Duke University School of Medicine.

Lauren Hipp, MPA

Lauren brings nearly a decade of experience in the field of early childhood, where she has worked to advance racial equity through large-scale grassroots organizing and mobilization campaigns, policy development, advocacy, and implementation. Working both across Washington State and at the national level, Lauren has aimed to ensure that policy and programmatic solutions are driven by those communities who are furthest from justice -- by using collaborative leadership strategies, capacity-building training, transparent and accessible communication approaches, and inclusive strategic planning methodologies. Lauren directed a cross-issue policy and advocacy portfolio to advance early childhood mental health and perinatal mental health at the state and national level, led state and national early learning campaigns for MomsRising and led the Policy and Community Partnership efforts for a state-wide public-private partnership focused on early childhood. She holds a Masters of Public Administration from the Evans School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington. Lauren also serves on the the Board of Directors for the Washington State Budget and Policy Center, and is a founding member of the Womxn of Color in Education Committee.

Lee Johnson III, PhD

Lee Johnson III, Ph.D., CHES®, IMH-E® is Senior Policy Analyst for Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health at ZERO TO THREE (ZTT). Before joining ZTT, Dr. Johnson served as a director at the Alabama Department of Early Childhood Education, extending leadership to early childhood mental health and federal and state-funded home visiting efforts. Dr. Johnson is a former early childhood educator, health educator by training, and a newly minted public health Ph.D. His dissertation focused on the impact of early adverse experiences on the mental & physical health outcomes of Black boys & men and the power of relationships, solidified his selection for the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) Doctoral Scholars Dissertation Fellowship (2019-2020). In the same year, he became a National Black Child Development Institute (NBCDI) Policy Fellow (2019-2020). Dr. Johnson's NBCDI Policy Fellowship project, Supporting Resilience in Black Families: Advancing Racial Equity in Early Childhood Mental Health Policy (2021), acknowledges the developmental threat our society poses to the health and mental health of Black children and recognizes the need for racially equitable policies and approaches that empower Black families. Lee holds his B.S. in early childhood education, M.A., and Ph.D. degrees in public health from The University of Alabama.

Keoki Kauanoe 

Keoki Kauanoe is a native Hawaiian single-father of 4, the Director of Father Engagement at Family Education and Support Services, where he is a Master Trainer for the nationally recognized Nurturing Fathers Program, holds certifications in multiple parenting curricula and is a certified trainer for the QPR Gatekeeper Program. He also sits on the Washington State Interagency Fatherhood Council, The Board of the Equity in Education Coalition and The Thurston Asset Building Coalition.

When not at work or volunteering in his community, Keoki enjoys volunteering at his youngest son's elementary school, light saber duels and Minecraft and Lego builds with his youngest.

Connie Lilas, RN, MFT, PhD

Connie Lillas is the Director of the NeuroRelational Framework (NRF) Research To Resilience Institute (www.nrfr2r.com) with a background in high-risk maternal-child nursing, family systems, developmental psychoanalysis, early intervention, infant mental health, and is a National Graduate ZERO TO THREE Leadership Fellow. Connie has a private practice, specializing in dual diagnosis across both developmental delays and mental health concerns for infants, children, teens, and their families. In addition, she trains locally, nationally, and internationally on the NeuroRelational Framework (NRF, 2009) based upon her co-authored book —Infant/Child Mental Health, Early Intervention, and Relationship-Based Therapies: A NeuroRelational Framework (NRF) for Interdisciplinary Practice, which is a part of W. W. Norton’s Interpersonal Neurobiology Series (www.the-nrf.com). While there are currently four active NRF communities in the US and one in Canada, her work in Los Angeles County focus’ on the largest child welfare system in the US wherein the NRF’s curriculum on toxic stress is being used to train Dept of Child and Family Social Workers. She currently specializes in training cross-disciplinary teams in national and international communities, wherein a common language and shared approach using the NRF can be used for holistic health care outcomes.

Lisa Mennet, PhD, LMHC, IMH-E® (IV)

Lisa Mennet is the Cooper House owner and clinical director emeritus. She began her clinical career at Ryther Child Center, then studied at the Center on Infant Mental Health at the UW, and was later a clinical instructor there. She’s taught infant mental health principles at the UW schools of Social Work and Nursing, and for the Washington DSHS. Lisa earned a certificate in child psychoanalytic psychotherapy from SPSI, and a doctorate in Infant Mental Health from UW. Her particular area of interest is the impact of trauma on early relationships. Lisa provides reflective consultation and supervision to professionals and is trainer for the FAN model.

Ayannakai Nalo, LCSW

Ayannakai Nalo is a CPP rostered licensed clinical social worker and has been working with children and families for 30 years. Ms Nalo is an early childhood mental health consultant and provides training, technical assistance, and consultation to public health systems, hospitals, and community, state, and national organizations in the areas of infant mental health, early intervention, mental health consultation, reflective supervision and issues of diversity and inclusion. 

Additionally, The California Center for Infant-Family and Early Childhood Mental Health has endorsed Ms. Nalo as an Infant-Family and Early Childhood Mental Health Reflective Practice Facilitator Mentor. As a member of the Harris Foundation TENETS Work Group, Ms. Nalo also trains organizations and mentors individuals in the implementation of the TENETS across infant and early-childhood mental health providers and public health fields. She integrates diversity-informed principles from TENETS and other sources into reflective supervision and infant mental health services.

Carmen Rosa Noroña, LICSW, MSW, MS.Ed., IECMH-E®

Carmen Rosa is the Child Trauma Clinical Services and Training Lead at Child Witness to Violence Project at Boston Medical Center. She 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 (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. 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

Anne Stone, MA

Anne Stone is the Early Childhood Innovation Director at the Washington State Department of Social and Health Services, Economic Services Administration.  A central part of that role is as the director of the Washington Interagency Fatherhood Council which launched in 2018.

Anne has 30 plus years of experience in the child and family services field as an innovator and change agent in youth and family crisis, child healthcare transformation, early childhood systems, poverty reduction, and fatherhood inclusion, as a funder, non-profit executive director, community consultant, crisis counselor, and state agency innovator.

She has a strong value around affecting root causes of family struggle such as racism, poverty and bias, using human centered design grounded in early brain science to inform system and policy change. She works to reduce burdens of families needing to be “empowered” to survive toward fixing broken systems so that families can access what they need to flourish.

As the Washington State First 1,000 Days Initiative founder she works with a variety of broad based community coalitions to walk with them as they seek ways to find families experiencing high levels of stress as early as possible after the birth of a child, triage their need and resiliency, and seek to create a coordinated community response that reduces that stress we know is so detrimental to developing young brains.

When not working her focus is on her family with a new grandbaby on the way, gardening during COVID 19 to grow food and sooth the soul, paddling and hiking with her partner of 35 years.

Arietta Slade, PhD

Arietta Slade is Professor of Clinical Child Psychology at the Yale Child Study Center.  An internationally recognized theoretician, clinician, researcher, and teacher, she has written widely on the development of parental reflective functioning, as well as the implications of attachment and mentalization theory for child and adult psychotherapy, and for relationship-based infant mental health practice. She is a Co-Founder and Director of Training of Minding the Baby®, an evidence-based interdisciplinary reflective home visiting program for high-risk mothers, infants, and their families, at the Yale Child Study Center and School of Nursing.  Dr. Slade is a winner of the Bowlby-Ainsworth Award from the New York Attachment Consortium, and author, with Jeremy Holmes, of Attachment in Therapeutic Practice (Holmes & Slade, SAGE Publications, 2018), and editor of the six volume set, Major Work on Attachment (Slade & Holmes, SAGE Publications, 2014), of Mind to Mind: Infant Research, Neuroscience, and Psychoanalysis (Jurist, Slade, & Bergner, Other Press, 2008), and Children at Play (Slade & Wolf, Oxford University Press, 1994).  Currently, she and her Minding the Baby® colleagues are writing a book on reflective parenting (Forthcoming, Guilford, 2021). She has also been in private practice for nearly 40 years, working with individuals of all ages.

Kandace Thomas, MPP, PhD

Kandace Thomas, MPP, PhD, works to help individuals, programs and systems of care experience transformation by learning, doing and being. Currently, Kandace is the Executive Director of First 8 Memphis, an organization working to build Memphis and Shelby County Tennessee’s early care and education system. As the inaugural Executive Director, Kandace is building a start-up organization partnering with the community to implement its early childhood plan. Prior to joining First 8 Memphis, Kandace was a senior program officer at the Irving Harris Foundation where she worked with organizations integrating early childhood development and child trauma-informed best practices for children from birth to age eight. Kandace led the creation of the Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work With Infants, Children and Families, a framework and approach to help organizations and systems integrate a diversity, equity and inclusion principles into their work. Kandace has research, policy and practice interests in contemplative self-care, intergenerational trauma, building power to influence public policy and diversity-informed practice.

Gil Tippy, PsyD

Gil Tippy, author of Respecting Autism with Stanley Greenspan, MD, offers Evaluations, Direct Services, and Consulting to private individuals and organizations. He is the Clinical Director Emeritus of  Shrub Oak International School, in Westchester County, NY. He is a Clinical Psychologist, licensed in the State of New York, with his Psychology license in California in process. He is the Chief Clinical Advisor of the Envision Center in Verona, NJ and is an Expert DIR/Floortime Provider and Teacher. He lives and has a private practice, Respectrum Developmental Services, as well as a not-for-profit, Dirty Hands Developmental Alliance, in Sonoma County, California.

Lindsay Usry, MPH

Lindsay Usry is the Director of Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (IECMH) at ZERO TO THREE. She guides ZERO TO THREE’s policy agenda on infant and early childhood mental health (IECMH) and leads related technical assistance projects and collaborations, working at the state and federal levels to increase access to and utilization of high-quality mental health services for young children and their caregivers. She formerly served as Director of Special Projects for the Institute of IECMH at Tulane University School of Medicine, where she is on faculty. She also served as the Louisiana Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems Coordinator for the LA Department of Health and Hospitals, Office of Public Health. Her work has focused primarily on the translation and dissemination of research on IECMH and development to inform policy and programming decisions.

Ms. Usry received her BS in Neuroscience from the College of William and Mary and her Master of Public Health from Tulane University. She is a member of the board of the Maryland-DC Association of Infant Mental Health, and formerly sat on the Louisiana Governor’s Children’s Cabinet Advisory Board. She has previously worked with the U.S. Government Secretariat for Children in Adversity at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) as well as The World Bank. She has worked on international and domestic public health initiatives and also taught elementary special education.

Martina Whelshula, PhD

Martina Whelshula is a member of the Arrow Lakes Nation of the Colville Indian Reservation. Her educational and experiential background is diverse and focuses primarily in the fields of education and behavioral health. She possesses a doctoral degree in Traditional Knowledge, a Master of Arts degree in Counseling Psychology, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communication Studies, with an additional certification for Chemical Dependency Professional. Dr. Whelshula has worked extensively with Native American communities nation-wide in the areas of local and national policy development, education, and behavioral health. Dr. Whelshula’s professional experience has ranged from Research Director for national Indian health policy development for Congressional review, P-12 tribal language instructor in the public-school system, Head Start Director for the Colville Tribe to Tribal College President. She is an educator, trainer, and consultant specializing in education and intergenerational trauma impacting indigenous communities. Dr. Whelshula’s most recent work is the development of integrative cultural therapeutic model addressing trauma, mental health and substance use disorders for tribes. Dr. Whelshula served for nearly seven years as the Executive Director of a Native American inpatient treatment program for drug and alcohol addicted youth. Her successes during her tenure include: National iAward for revolutionary behavioral health care (honorable mention), Washington State Co-Occurring Disorders and Treatment Conference’s Innovative Program of the Year, Potlatch Foundation’s Educational Leadership Award, Washington State Public Health’s 2013 Health Champion for Empowering Healthy Communities, Harvard University Medical School’s online BASIS Editorial Board, and the Spokane Regional 2014 AGORA Business Award for the Large Nonprofit Category. In addition to her work experience, Dr. Whelshula served on Gonzaga University’s Indian Education Advisory Board, as Chair of Spokane’s NAACP Education Committee, the Chair pro-tem for the Washington State Native American Education Advisory Committee with the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, a member of the Washington State Native American Think Tank, member of the Washington State Multi-Ethnic Think Tank, and formerly with the Washington State Board of Education’s Equity Committee.

Haruko Watanabe, LMHC, IMH-E®

Haruko is a Washington Association for Infant Mental Health endorsed Infant Mental Health Mentor and Program Manager at Navos Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Program in King County, WA. Haruko began studying parent-child interactions in 1998 under the mentorship of Dr. Kathryn Barnard, and has worked with families with young children within various systems (e.g. child-welfare, early intervention, childcare/early learning, mental health) since 2003. In addition to her Child-Parent Psychotherapy work with Medicaid eligible families, she provides reflective supervision/consultation and early childhood mental health consultation to providers serving young children and their families in King County. Haruko is committed to engaging in shared learning with colleagues and communities to explore how impacts of trauma and racism show up in everyday practices and systems functioning, and ways to promote relationship-based healing in communities and organizations. Her clinical perspective and consultation/mentoring practices have been informed by her personal experiences as an immigrant and having lived in three different countries. She is a former Board Member for the Washington Association for Infant Mental Health and a part-time instructor at UW Barnard Center on Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health's Advanced Clinical Training Program.

Kristin Wiggins

Kristin has more than 20 years experience in government affairs, strategic advising, and policy analysis. Her lobbying work focuses predominantly on early learning, children’s behavioral health, and issues that impact children, youth, and families. Due to her multi-dimensional experience as legislative staff, non-profit leadership, a teacher (including working with special needs populations) and education advisor, and a mental health peer support worker she has a strong comprehension of the levers of change at the community, budget, and policy levels. Kristin is a volunteer in her children’s public schools and enjoys outdoor adventures with her family, fitness, and gardening.

Siemone Smith MA, LPC

Siemone has worked in the Infant Mental Health field for over 10 years, with a focus on Trauma Informed practices. She has worked in Chicago’s Englewood area providing trauma focused therapy and support services to families throughout the community and families involved with child protective services. She currently works for Erikson Institute’s Fussy Baby Network, providing support services to families who have concerns with their infants/toddlers. Siemone also works as a Child-Parent Psychotherapy clinician.

Kandace Thomas, MPP, PhD

Kandace Thomas, MPP, PhD, works to help individuals, programs and systems of care experience transformation by learning, doing and being. Currently, Kandace is the Executive Director of First 8 Memphis, an organization working to build Memphis and Shelby County Tennessee’s early care and education system. As the inaugural Executive Director, Kandace is building a start-up organization partnering with the community to implement its early childhood plan. Prior to joining First 8 Memphis, Kandace was a senior program officer at the Irving Harris Foundation where she worked with organizations integrating early childhood development and child trauma-informed best practices for children from birth to age eight. Kandace led the creation of the Diversity-Informed Tenets for Work With Infants, Children and Families, a framework and approach to help organizations and systems integrate a diversity, equity and inclusion principles into their work. Kandace has research, policy and practice interests in contemplative self-care, intergenerational trauma, building power to influence public policy and diversity-informed practice.

Gil Tippy, PsyD

Gil Tippy, author of Respecting Autism with Stanley Greenspan, MD, offers Evaluations, Direct Services, and Consulting to private individuals and organizations. He is the Clinical Director Emeritus of  Shrub Oak International School, in Westchester County, NY. He is a Clinical Psychologist, licensed in the State of New York, with his Psychology license in California in process. He is the Chief Clinical Advisor of the Envision Center in Verona, NJ and is an Expert DIR/Floortime Provider and Teacher. He lives and has a private practice, Respectrum Developmental Services, as well as a not-for-profit, Dirty Hands Developmental Alliance, in Sonoma County, California.

Martina Whelshula, PhD

Martina Whelshula is a member of the Arrow Lakes Nation of the Colville Indian Reservation. Her educational and experiential background is diverse and focuses primarily in the fields of education and behavioral health. She possesses a doctoral degree in Traditional Knowledge, a Master of Arts degree in Counseling Psychology, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Communication Studies, with an additional certification for Chemical Dependency Professional. Dr. Whelshula has worked extensively with Native American communities nation-wide in the areas of local and national policy development, education, and behavioral health. Dr. Whelshula’s professional experience has ranged from Research Director for national Indian health policy development for Congressional review, P-12 tribal language instructor in the public-school system, Head Start Director for the Colville Tribe to Tribal College President. She is an educator, trainer, and consultant specializing in education and intergenerational trauma impacting indigenous communities. Dr. Whelshula’s most recent work is the development of integrative cultural therapeutic model addressing trauma, mental health and substance use disorders for tribes. Dr. Whelshula served for nearly seven years as the Executive Director of a Native American inpatient treatment program for drug and alcohol addicted youth. Her successes during her tenure include: National iAward for revolutionary behavioral health care (honorable mention), Washington State Co-Occurring Disorders and Treatment Conference’s Innovative Program of the Year, Potlatch Foundation’s Educational Leadership Award, Washington State Public Health’s 2013 Health Champion for Empowering Healthy Communities, Harvard University Medical School’s online BASIS Editorial Board, and the Spokane Regional 2014 AGORA Business Award for the Large Nonprofit Category. In addition to her work experience, Dr. Whelshula served on Gonzaga University’s Indian Education Advisory Board, as Chair of Spokane’s NAACP Education Committee, the Chair pro-tem for the Washington State Native American Education Advisory Committee with the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, a member of the Washington State Native American Think Tank, member of the Washington State Multi-Ethnic Think Tank, and formerly with the Washington State Board of Education’s Equity Committee.

Randy Ashford, LMHC, IMH-E®

I have worked as an early childhood therapist and consultant for a number of years, and in a variety of capacities. I have professional interests in trauma, equity, developmental neuroscience, and the human ecosystems where these phenomenon unfold, with a particular interest in early care and education settings.

"The ACT Program has been a wonderful opportunity to build a more holistic understanding of the many intersecting factors that influence early development, and to enrich therapeutic practices thanks to an incredible faculty and guest instructors, including well-known figures in the field of infant and early childhood mental health."

Maria Ayala, MSW LSWAIC

Born and raised in Sunnyside, a small town between Yakima and Tricities, which is three hours away from Seattle. Married my high school sweetheart. We have three children 17,14, and 4. I enjoy spending time with my family and traveling. I graduated from Heritage University with a Bachelor of Social Work (2007). In 2020 I received my Master of Social Work degree (MSW) from Walla Walla University. I spent 12 years of my career as a case manager working with diverse populations. I’ve been working in the mental health field since obtaining my MSW. My plan is to be licensed, LICSW, within a year.
My desire is to normalize mental health and end the stigma. I truly believe if we support and educate parents/caregivers during their children’s early years not only will they learn co-regulation skills to support their children, but their children will gain the skills they need to be able to self-regulate and cope. So hopefully by the the time they are in middle or high school they will need very minimal support.

One of my many projects is “Wellness Group” which I do voluntarily in my community. The Wellness group is for youth and parents/caregivers. Youth will gain a better understanding of mental health. Youth will learn skills to help them cope with daily stressors, understand different mental illnesses, the warning signs of someone struggling with their mental health, and so much more. Parents/caregivers will also be getting mental health education.

I currently work at Triumph as a Lead Mental Health Counselor. Triumph is a multifaceted community service provider offering a continuum of care for substance use and mental health disorder treatment. I also have a seasonal job. I am a facilitator for the Strengthening Families Program since 2019. The program is seven weeks and is offered in Spanish and English. I’ve been doing this for over two years.

As a new clinician, the skills I have gained and the knowledge I am taking away from the ACT program are immeasurable. It was incredible to have the opportunity to learn from amazing professors and clinicians. I am thankful for this program and look forward to applying what I learned.

Reflective Consultation FLYER JUN 2022 Meeghan Bergmann

I work as an Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist/Consultant at an Early Learning Center in Seattle, Washington that serves children and families impacted by homelessness. I have a passion for supporting the integration of an ECMH framework/relational way of being in early learning/child care settings in a way that is responsive to the unique needs of the staff, children and families of the specific early learning community. I work at a center that consistently strives to understand how systems of oppression are impacting the lives of the children, families and staff in our early learning community while seeking to be accountable to the ways that we individually and/or collectively uphold systems of oppression or move towards liberation. This orientation to the work has transformed my perspective and practice while supporting my commitment to equity in my professional as well as personal life. I am also a Promoting First Relationships Provider on a UW Research Project and facilitate Reflective Consultation groups for Early Childhood Providers. I have a passion for working collectively with our Washington ECMH community to increase access to reflective consultation groups for interested providers!

My seed project is working with Parent-Child Relationship Programs (PCRP) to offer affordable reflective consultation (RC) groups for Washington State providers with the hopes in the future there will be more matching of Consultants & folks looking for affordable RC groups in the future. An RC group is scheduled to begin in July and space is currently available. See the RC group information flier HERE and/or email Meeghan for more information. Thanks!

“The ACT program provided a high quality, thoughtful, accessible clinical foundation that I had been longing for as an early career provider that integrated early childhood mental health and diversity informed practice. A relational way of being and learning was embodied in the ACT community by instructors and cohort members which will continue to impact me throughout my ECMH journey.”

Dotty DeVaney

Letha Gillisse

Bessie Green, LCSW

Bessie is a mental health clinician at a domestic violence shelter. She works with families at the shelter and involved with child welfare.

"The ACT program gave me the foundation I was looking for to feel confident as a clinician with infants and young children and their families. I am so grateful to have had this wonderful experience in this amazing learning community."

Krista Haller

Rikki-Rachelle Hinz, LMHCA

Rikki has worked with young children and their families for 15 years in various capacities. She firmly believes, "None of us are well, until all of us are well," (Vienna Rye) and this is the driving force of her purpose & passion in this work. A brief summary of experiences & identities that inform how she shows up in this work: she is a white, cis-gendered queer woman, with the lived experience of having a high ACE score. She completed her BA in Early Childhood and Family Studies at the UW and spent many years working as an infant/toddler, and preschool teacher before going back to the UW for graduate school for a Master's in Applied Child & Adolescent Psychology. She has worked as an IECMH consultant, IMH specialist, and currently works as an IMH therapist for the Early Supports for Infants and Toddlers Program at Kindering.

Her seed project, "Connect, Reflect, Be: In Nature" is about reimagining reflective practice through connection with colleagues on a human level, while engaged in movement through greenspaces. 

"The ACT program was an incredibly valuable and worthwhile experience for me. The experience of being held in such unconditional positive regard by instructors and peers led to transformative growth for me. Perhaps the most precious gift I received from the program was an ease in the tension between the personal self and the professional self that had existed within me for so long- my experience in this program taught me that they are one. I feel like I can now bring my whole self into my work with confidence."

Bryana Kowalski

Mary-Virginia Maxwell

Jennifer Rees

Sonia Reyes

Kimberlee Shoecraft

Danielle Williams

Jennifer Wootsick

DCYF Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (IECMH-C) Program Fee Waiver

The Washington State Department of Children Youth and Families (DCYF) Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (IECMH-C) Taskforce has made available a limited number of ACT Program Fee Waivers of up to $8000 + Books (Full Program Fee Waivers) for professionals whose responsibilities are (full-time) or includes infant and early childhood mental health consultation services and who:

     * Are from underrepresented social and experiential backgrounds and have experience with overcoming adversity and/or a demonstrated commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion.

     * Are among the first generation in their family to attend college, experienced socio-economic or educational disadvantage are affiliated with of one of the national minority organizations linked on the US Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health website.

     * Have a demonstrated interest and/or active role in advancing access to (health, mental health, and human services) resources for under-served populations.

Eligibility Requirements

You must:

     * Apply for admission and be accepted into the Advanced Clinical Training (ACT) Program

     * Complete the IECMH-C Program Fee Waiver Application which includes a Statement of Financial Circumstance

     * Live and/or practice in Washington State with all or part of your role as an infant and early childhood mental health consultant

Self-Funded Financing Options

In addition to the option to paying the Program Fees in 3 installments (see above), below are some additional options that we are providing as suggestions for informational purposes only. We are not making recommendations for any type of financial service; it is the responsibility of the prospective ACT Program clinicians to make their own financial decisions.

Loan and Credit Options: Loan and credit options may work for you, however, you must be aware that each option will have its own benefits and costs and that it may cost more to finance your education due to charged interest and fees.

Bank Loans: There are several banks that offer personal loans or home equity loans. We strongly encourage potential ACT professionals to carefully read and understand loan parameters for payment, interest charged, and early payment penalties of any loan.

Credit Cards: We identified at least one credit card from Bank of American in 2020 that had a no interest requirement for the first 15 months. Once at 15 months interest (typically between 14% and 24% depending on card and applicant credit score) would be charged on the remaining balance at 15 months. While this card is available in the summer of 2020, the terms and conditions may change it is the responsibility of the applicant to review and accept any terms and conditions.