Below are the biographies for CAP’s “Art of Social Change: Child Welfare, Education, and Juvenile Justice” Fall 2006 speakers. Click on the relevant speaker’s name to link to his/her biography:
Sept. 7: Bernadine Dohrn; Robert Schwartz
Sept. 14: David Meyer; Audrey Smolkin
Sept. 21: John King; Linda Nathan; Rick Weissbourd
Sept. 28: Susan Cole; Michael Gregory; Dan Losen; Rhoda Schneider
Oct. 5: Marianne L. Ehrlich; Heather Weiss
Oct. 12: Eileen Crummy;Cecelia Zalkind
Oct. 19: Sara Dillon; Charles Nelson; Eric Rosenthal
Nov. 2: Joseph P. Ryan; Meghan Wheeler
Nov. 9: Judy Cockerton; Kerry Homstead; David Chilinski
Nov. 16: Mark Soler; Marsha Levick
Nov. 30: Barry Feld; Lael Chester; Josh Dohan; Marjory German
Dec. 7: Cheryl Dorsey; Matt Klein
Bernardine Dohrn
Bernardine Dohrn is Director of the Children and Family Justice Center and Associate Clinical Professor at Northwestern University School of Law’s Bluhm Legal Clinic. The CFJC is a holistic children’s law center and a national policy center for the comprehensive needs of adolescents and their families, providing critical analysis of youth law and the legal administration of justice, educating the public, and preparing professionals who advocate for children. She is author/co-editor of A Century of Juvenile Justice (2002); author/co-editor of Zero Tolerance: Resisting the Drive for Punishment (2001); author of Look Out Kid, It’s Something You Did: The Criminalization of Youth in Valerie Polakow, ed., The Public Assault on America’s Children (2000); All Ellas: Girls Locked Up (2004); Something’s Happening Here: Children and Human Rights Jurisprudence in Two International Courts, UNLV Law Journal (forthcoming); and The Lesser Culpability of the Juvenile Offender: Trial in Adult Criminal Court, Incarceration with Adults, and Excessive Sanctions, Emory Law Review (forthcoming). She is also a visiting professor, teaching Human Rights each year at the University of Chicago and Vrije University in Amsterdam. Dohrn writes and lectures on international law and children’s human rights, the criminalization of youth, zero tolerance and school law, the juvenile death penalty, and children’s asylum/immigration claims.
Robert Schwartz
Robert Schwartz co-founded Juvenile Law Center in 1975 and has been its executive director since 1982. He has represented dependent (abused or neglected) and delinquent children in Pennsylvania juvenile and appellate courts; brought class-action litigation over institutional conditions and probation functions; testified in Congress before House and Senate committees; and spoken in over 30 states on matters related to children and the law. From 1992-98, he was chair of the Juvenile Justice Committee of the American Bar Association’s Criminal Justice Section. In 1993 he also co-authored the American Bar Association’s report, America’s Children at Risk; and in 1995 he helped author a follow-up report on youth’s access to quality lawyers, A Call for Justice. In addition to managing Juvenile Law Center, he is responsible for its MacArthur-funded work on juvenile justice reform in Pennsylvania, and for its California Endowment-funded work on health care for delinquent girls in California. Schwartz is a member of the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice. As part of the Network, he co-edited Youth on Trial: A Developmental Perspective on Juvenile Justice (University of Chicago Press: 2000). From 1996-99 he was a gubernatorial appointee to the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency; since 1991 he has been a gubernatorial appointee to PCCD’s Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Committee, the state advisory group which distributes federal funds in Pennsylvania and advises the Governor regarding juvenile justice policy. Schwartz is chair of the Advisory Committee to Human Rights Watch’s Children’s Rights Division, and president of the Board of the Philadelphia Youth Network, which promotes youth employment. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Andrew Hamilton Award, presented by the Philadelphia Bar Association “for exemplary service in the public interest,” the Reginald Heber Smith Award, presented by the National Legal Aid and Defender Association, the Stephen M. Cahn Juvenile Law Award, 2004, presented periodically by the National Association of Counsel for Children, for career achievement, and the Livingston Hall Award, presented by the American Bar Association. Schwartz is a graduate of Haverford College and Temple University School of Law.
David Meyer
David Meyer is Mildred Van Voorhis Jones Faculty Scholar and Professor of Law and the University of Illinois. He earned his B.A. in History with Highest Honors and his J.D. magna cum laude from the University of Michigan, where he was also Editor-in-Chief of the Michigan Law Review. After law school, he served as a law clerk for Judge Harry T. Edwards of the D.C. Circuit and Justice Byron R. White of the U.S. Supreme Court. He also served as a legal advisor at the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal in The Hague, and practiced law in Washington, D.C., and Chicago before joining the Illinois faculty in 1996. He has written widely on topics at the intersection of constitutional law and family law, and is a coauthor of a new family law casebook, Contemporary Family Law.
Audrey Smolkin
Audrey Smolkin M.P.P., is the Director of Research and Policy Analysis at the Center for Adoption Research. She received her Master’s degree in public policy at the University of Chicago. She served as a senior legislative analyst at the Administration for Children and Families. Beyond work to estimate the federal costs of various welfare and child welfare legislation, she also was the lead budget and policy analyst on the major child care expansions of the Clinton Administration. She has nearly ten years experience in policy evaluation, with a concentration on children and family polices. She is currently lead evaluator of the Center for Adoption Research’s major Administration for Children and Families sponsored grant. In addition she is responsible for overseeing the statewide Adoption Attitudes Survey, the evaluation of the Baby Safe Haven Legislation, evaluation of the Greenfield Court/Child Welfare intervention, and the evaluation of the Foster Care Evaluation Services Clinic.John King is a Co-Founder and former Co-Director for Curriculum & Instruction of Roxbury Preparatory Charter School, a nationally recognized urban college preparatory public school that closed the Massachusetts racial achievement gap and was recognized by the U.S. Department of Education as one of eight of the highest-performing charter schools in the country. Mr. King is now working with Uncommon Schools, Inc. to replicate Roxbury Prep in New York City. Prior to co-founding Roxbury Prep, Mr. King taught high school history at City on A Hill Charter School in Boston and Saint John’s School in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He holds a B.A. in Government from Harvard University and an M.A. in the Teaching of Social Studies from Teachers College, Columbia University. Mr. King is currently pursuing a law degree from Yale Law School and a doctorate in Education Administration at Teachers College. In addition, Mr. King serves on the faculty and board of directors of New Leaders for New Schools, a national non-profit organization that trains results-oriented urban principals.
Linda Nathan
Linda Nathan, Ed.D. is the founding headmaster of the Boston Arts Academy, the city’s first and only public high school for the visual and performing arts. Under her leadership, the school has won state, national, and international recognition, including a Massachusetts Compass Award, a “Breaking Ranks” award from the National Association of Secondary School Principals, and a Mentor School award from the Coalition of Essential Schools. BAA sends well over 90 percent of its graduates—all residents of the city of Boston—to college.Linda was instrumental in starting Boston ‘s first performing-arts middle school, and was a driving force behind the creation of Fenway High School, recognized nationally for its innovative educational strategies and school-to-work programs. She is also a co-founder and board member of the Center for Collaborative Education in Boston, a nonprofit education reform organization dedicated to creating more equitable and democratic schools. She was named 1990 Teacher of the Year by Channel 5 “Chronicle” in Boston, and from 1995 to 1998 she served on the National Academy of Science’s Commission for the Science of Learning. In 2003, Linda received the Nadia Boulanger Educator’s Award from the Longy School of Music for her work in arts education; in 2006 she received the first Fidelity Inspire the Future Award given to community leaders who inspire the next generation of artists and arts advocates. She was recently named a Barr Foundation Fellow, Class of 2007.Linda’s articles on school reform and arts education have appeared in Phi Delta Kappa, Educational Leadership, Horace, and other publications. Fluent in Spanish, she has worked on issues of school reform in Puerto Rico , Brazil , Argentina and Colombia . In March 2006, she presented to the first UNESCO World Conference on Arts Education in Lisbon, Portugal. She is a lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education where she teaches a course titled “Building Democratic Schools.” She is also currently writing a book about urban education and the arts.Linda Nathan earned a bachelor’s degree at the University of California, Berkeley, a master’s degree in education administration at Antioch University, a master’s of performing arts at Emerson College, and her doctorate in education at Harvard University.
Richard Weissbourd
Richard Weissbourd is currently a Lecturer in Education at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and Kennedy School of Government. His work focuses on vulnerability and resilience in childhood, moral development and effective schools and services for children. For several years he worked as a psychologist in community mental health centers as well as on the Annie Casey Foundation’s New Futures Project, an effort to prevent children from dropping out of school. He is a founder of several interventions for at-risk children, including ReadBoston and WriteBoston, city-wide literacy initiatives, led by Mayor Menino, a new pilot school that begins with children at 3 years old, and Project ASPIRE, a social and ethical development intervention in three Boston schools. He has advised on the city, state and federal levels on family policy and school reform. He has written for numerous scholarly and popular publications. He is the author of The Vulnerable Child: What Really Hurts America’s Children and What We Can Do About It (Addison-Wesley, 1996), and is currently working on a book on moral development (Houghton Mifflin, 2007).
Susan Cole
Susan Cole is the director of the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative, a Lecturer and Clinical Instructor at Harvard Law School and Program Director at Massachusetts Advocates for Children. Ms . Cole’s work is rooted in psychological and educational research that links exposure to domestic violence and/or abuse with a host of learning and behavioral difficulties at school. She is the founding director of The Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative (TLPI), a collaboration between Harvard Law School ‘s Legal Services Center and Massachusetts Advocates for Children (MAC), a non profit children’s rights organization. TLPI’s goal is to ensure that children affected by family violence succeed in school. Ms. Cole, TLPI staff, and students use legislative, administrative, and individual case advocacy, policy analysis, and where necessary, litigation, to further an advocacy agenda that can enable schools to become “trauma-sensitive” environments where all children can focus, behave, and learn. Ms. Cole is the lead writer of Helping Traumatized Children Learn, a ground breaking book published in 2005 that sets forth a policy agenda to address the educational needs of this vulnerable population. She is a coauthor of Educational Rights of Children Affected by Homelessness or Domestic Violence, published in 2006. A third book is due out in 2007.Students in the TLPI clinic engage in policy activities with the legislature and executive branches of government and represent clients in special education and related matters . The Initiative takes on cases that enforce children’s rights to receive services at school to help them overcome the trauma-related aspects of any disabilities the student may have.Prior to serving as director of TLPI, Ms. Cole was legal director and director of the Children’s Law Support Project at MAC for 18 years . She also served as a trial attorney for the National Labor Relations Board and as an associate at a small firm. She was deeply affected by her teaching experiences in the Watertown public schools before entering law school. Ms . Cole holds a J . D . from Northeastern University , a Master’s in Special Education from the University of Oregon , and a B . A . from Boston University .
Michael Gregory
Michael Gregory is a Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School and a Senior Clinical Fellow at the Hale and Dorr Legal Services Center (LSC), where he works as part of the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative (TLPI). TLPI is an innovative partnership between LSC and Massachusetts Advocates for Children, the mission of which is to ensure that children traumatized by exposure to violence succeed in school. He is the co-author of TLPIýýs landmark report and policy agenda Helping Traumatized Children Learn, and is also a co-author of Educational Rights of Children Affected by Homelessness and/or Domestic Violence, a manual for child advocates. As a former teacher, Michael observed first hand the challenges that traumatized children often face in school environments, and he became a lawyer in order to effect systemic change on behalf of this vulnerable group. He was the recipient of a Skadden Fellowship in 2004 which allowed him to begin his work as an attorney with TLPI. Michael graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in American Civilization from Brown University in 1998. He also received a Master of Arts in Teaching from Brown University in 1999. He graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School in 2004.
Dan J. Losen
Dan J. Losen (J.D., M.Ed.) is a Senior Education Law and Policy Associate with The Civil Rights Project (CRP). His work at CRP concerns the impact of federal, state and local education law and policy on students of color. His efforts have focused on addressing the school to prison pipeline, on implementation concerns about the No Child Left Behind Act, and on racial inequity in special education. The Civil Rights Project was actively engaged in the reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the regulations and guidance that have followed. As part of his special education work he has formed a collaborative initiative between CRP and Professor Martha Minow and Harvard Law School called the Civil Rights Remedies Initiative and will soon begin working with the State of Massachusetts and the Metro Center at NYU to help design and replicate effective ways to address racial disproportionality in special education in New York and Massachusetts. Upon graduating law school, Mr. Losen practiced education law for economically disadvantaged students as a legal services advocate in Massachusetts. Before becoming a lawyer, Mr. Losen taught in public schools for 10 years, including work as a school founder of an alternative public school. Relevant written work includes: the book, “Racial Inequity in Special Education,” co-edited with Gary Orfield; the chapter, “The Role of Law in Policing Abusive Disciplinary Practices: Why School Discipline is a Civil Rights Issue,” co-authored with Christopher Edley, Jr., for the book, “Zero Tolerance: Resisting the Drive For Punishment in Our Schools;” the chapter, “Graduation Rate Accountability under the No Child Left Behind Act and the Disparate Impact on Children of Color,” for the book, “Dropouts in America: Confronting the Graduation Rate Crisis” and the law review article, “Challenging Racial Disparities: The Promise and Pitfalls of the No Child Left Behind Act’s Race-conscious Accountability” published in Howard Law Journal.
Rhoda E. Schneider
Rhoda E. Schneider, J.D., is General Counsel and Senior Associate Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Education, a position she has held for over 25 years. A graduate of Wellesley College and Boston University Law School, she has served twice as Acting Commissioner of Education for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. She has been a guest lecturer on law and education at several universities and many professional conferences. She co-chairs the School Law Institute at Teachers College, Columbia University and is the editor of School Law in Massachusetts (MCLE, 2003).
Marianne L. Ehrlich
Marianne L. Ehrlich, President and Chief Executive Officer of Healthy Family Initiatives, has extensive experience in health care and social services administration. She was the founding director and leader for ten years of the Patient Relations Service at St. Luke’s Episcopal and Texas Children’s Hospitals, and the Texas Heart Institute, Houston, Texas. During her tenure with these institutions, she also served on and was elected president of the board of directors of the National Society of Patient Representatives, chartered under the American Hospital Association She was the motivating force behind and founding president of the Texas Society of Patient Representatives under the auspices of the Texas Hospital Association. Ms. Ehrlich subsequently provided leadership for six years as Associate Director and chief operating officer at the Houston Child Guidance Center, at that time Houston’s largest private, non-profit, outpatient provider of mental health services to children and their families Ms. Ehrlich was an invited guest speaker at the first White House Conference on Consumerism in Health Care during the Reagan administration, and has been decorated by the Government of Italy for her humanitarian efforts at the international level. She has written and spoken extensively related to the needs of children and adults in the context of social and cultural issues impacting health care services and delivery. In her current role as President & CEO of Healthy Family Initiatives, she leads an organization that seeks, pilots and integrates into the community innovative prevention models, has recently been named one of seven federal demonstration project sites in the country to pilot a best practices approach to strengthening families, and for many years, has implemented one of the largest Healthy Families programs in Texas.
Heather Weiss
Heather Weiss, Ed.D., Founder and Director of the Harvard Family Research Project (HFRP), is a Senior Research Associate and Lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. From its beginning in 1983, the HFRP’s mission has been to help create more effective practices, interventions, and policies to support children’s successful development from birth to adulthood. A key feature of HFRP’s work is our concept of ‘Complementary Learning,’ which holds that for children and youth to be successful, there must be an array of learning supports that are linked and that work toward consistent learning and developmental outcomes for children from birth through adolescence. Examples of nonschool learning supports include early childhood programs, out-of-school time programs and activities, libraries and other community-based institutions, and families and communities. Dr. Weiss writes, speaks, and advises on programs and polices for children and families and serves on the advisory boards of many public and private organizations. She is a consultant and advisor to numerous foundations on strategic grantmaking and evaluation. She also co-teaches a course on Complementary Learning at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.
Eileen Crummy
Eileen Crummy was appointed Director of the New Jersey Division of Youth and Family Services (DYFS) in February 2006. DYFS is New Jersey’s public child welfare agency charged with ensuring the protection, safety, permanency and well being of New Jersey’s children. Ms. Crummy has worked for DYFS for over 31 years. She holds the distinction of being only the second DYFS Director to have begun her career as a caseworker and risen through the ranks to lead the agency. Ms. Crummy has served as a senior administrator for child protection and adoption service programs. She has received national recognition for her work in public agency adoption. She serves as a member of the National Advisory Workgroup for the Collaboration to Adopt US Kids and has served as Vice President of the National Association of State Adoption Programs. As DYFS Director Ms. Crummy is taking a lead role in the implementation of child welfare reform in New Jersey.
Cecelia Zalkind
Cecelia Zalkind is the Executive Director of the Association for Children of New Jersey (ACNJ), a statewide child advocacy organization. ACNJ advocacy priorities include child welfare reform, early care and education and support for low-income families. Ms. Zalkind is the Chairperson of the state Adoption Services Advisory Committee, which has been instrumental in advocating for adoption services in New Jersey. She is the author of numerous reports on children’s issues, including You have the Right!, a handbook on the legal rights of children in New Jersey, and a series of reports on children in the foster care system. Ms. Zalkind has her B.A. and M.A. from New York University and her J.D. from Rutgers Law School. She is also an adjunct professor of family and adoption law at Seton Hall Law School.
Sara Dillon
Sara Dillon teaches International Trade Law, EU Law and International Children’s Rights at Suffolk University Law School. Prior to this, Professor Dillon taught for seven years in the Law Faculty at University College Dublin, where she was also active in environmental issues. She has a PhD in Japanese from Stanford University and JD from Columbia University Law School. More recently, Professor Dillon has written and spoken on international adopton and human rights. She is the parent of two internationally adopted children.
Charles A. Nelson
Charles A. Nelson, Ph.D., holds the Richard David Scott Chair in Pediatric Developmental Medicine Research at Harvard Medical School and in general pediatrics at Children’s Hospital, Boston (where he also serves as Director of Research in Developmental Medicine). He has a long-standing theoretical interest in the effects of early experience on brain and behavioral development. His empirical research has tended to focus most on the ontogeny of memory and of face recognition. He served on the National Academy of Sciences panel that wrote from Neurons to Neighborhoods, and from 1997-2005, directed the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Early Experience and Brain Development. Dr. Nelson has an honors degree in Psychology from McGill University, a master’s degree in psychology from the University of Wisconsin and his Ph.D. from the University of Kansas in developmental and child psychology.
Eric Rosenthal
Eric Rosenthal is the founder of Mental Disability Rights International (MDRI), an advocacy organization dedicated to the international recognition and enforcement of the rights of people with mental disabilities. He has served as the organization’s Executive Director since 1993. Rosenthal has trained activists and conducted human rights investigations in psychiatric institutions, mental retardation facilities, prisons, jails, and orphanages in seventeen countries of Europe, the Middle East, and the Americas. He is the co-author of country reports on Romania (2006), Turkey (2005), Peru (2004), Kosovo (2002), Mexico (2000), Russia (1999), Hungary (1997), and Uruguay (1995). MDRI reports have been covered by the news media throughout the world. Rosenthal has been featured on ABC News Good Morning America, World News Tonight, and Nightline (May 10, 2006) and profiled in the Washington Post (August 18, 2002 and January 18, 2000). An in-depth analysis of Rosenthal’s work was published in The New York Times Magazine (January 16, 2000). Rosenthal has published numerous op-eds and academic articles on the international human rights of people with mental disabilities. Eric Rosenthal has served as a consultant to the World Health Organization (WHO), UNICEF, and the UN Special Rapporteur on Disability, and he has participated in the work of the UN Ad Hoc Committee drafting an international disability rights convention. In 2005, Rosenthal was elected Vice President of the US International Council on Disability (USICD). Rosenthal serves on the International Watch Advisory Committee of the US National Council on Disability (NCD). On behalf of NCD, Rosenthal co-authored US Foreign Policy and Disability (September 2003). The report led to legislation to make US foreign assistance programs accessible to people with disabilities. Rosenthal received a BA with honors from the University of Chicago in 1985. He received his law degree cum laude from the Georgetown University Law Center in 1992. As of 2007, Rosenthal will be an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown.
Joseph P. Ryan
Joseph P. Ryan, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor in the School of Social Work and a Faculty Fellow with the Children and Family Research Center at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Dr. Ryan received an MSW from the University of Michigan and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. Dr. Ryan’s research focuses on the experiences and outcomes of families entangled with the public child welfare system and at least one other social service context (e.g. substance abuse, juvenile justice). He is currently the principal investigator on several longitudinal studies including Illinois Alcohol and Other Substance Abuse (AODA) Waiver Demonstration. The AODA waiver utilizes an experimental design to test an innovative approach for substance abusing caregivers in the child welfare system. Dr. Ryan’s research is supported with grants from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Silberman Family Foundation, and the State of Illinois. Dr. Ryan’s recent publications include Integrating Substance Abuse Treatment and Child Welfare Services: Findings from the Illinois AODA Waiver Demonstration in Social Work Research, Integrated Services for Families with Multiple Problems: Obstacles to Family Reunification in Children and Youth Services Review, and Child Maltreatment and Juvenile Delinquency: Investigating the Role of Placement and Placement Instability in Children and Youth Services Review.
Meghan Wheeler
Meghan Wheeler joined the National Drug Court Institute; the education, research and training division of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, as Project Director in June 2001 where she manages the activities and functions related to the Family Drug Court Planning Initiative and Family Drug Court Technical Assistance Project. Ms. Wheeler also currently serves as a Court Appointed Special Advocate in Richland County Juvenile Court, Ohio, where she is a volunteer advocate for children involved in dependency cases. Ms. Wheeler has developed and delivered presentations and provided training and technical assistance for national, regional, state and local conferences and events on topics related to the substance abuse and the courts. Previously, Ms. Wheeler managed the statewide drug court implementation project for the Supreme Court of Ohio. Ms. Wheeler’s work with drug courts began with her position as Treatment Coordinator for Richland County, Ohio. Prior to this Ms. Wheeler was employed by the Abraxas Foundation, a residential treatment facility for adolescent males involved in the juvenile justice system. Ms. Wheeler has experience in both juvenile and adult treatment and court systems related to clinical intervention, supervision, case management, program management and policy development. Ms. Wheeler received her Master of Science degree in Administration of Justice and Bachelor degree in Psychology and Criminal Justice from Mercyhurst College, Erie, Pennsylvania. Ms. Wheeler is a past adjunct professor at Ashland University in the area of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse.
Judy Cockerton
Judy Cockerton is the Founder and CEO of the Treehouse Foundation. Since becoming a foster parent in 1999, Judy has focused on promoting creative solutions to care for the nearly 10,000 children who are in foster care across the Commonwealth. In addition to raising her children, Judy devotes her time and energy to establishing Treehouse’s first intergenerational community, designed to support families adopting children from the foster care system. Long considered a dynamic leader, Cockerton is honored to advocate for children and families and to be collaborating with such fine minds and talents on these exciting projects. A California native who moved to Boston in 1974, Judy taught hearing impaired children for 10 years before purchasing “No Kidding! A Toy Store” in Brookline, Massachusetts. For the next 17 years, she created what was considered by many to be the greatest resource for quality children’s playthings in the Greater Boston area. Under her guidance, No Kidding! expanded, added a site in Mattapoisett, Massachusetts, and won numerous awards for “Best Specialty Toy Store” as well as for the myriad of community service programs No Kidding! instituted. Judy received her BA from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon in 1973, where she double majored in Spanish and Special Education. She received her Masters in Education from Lesley College in 1978.
Kerry Homestead
Kerry Homstead is the Easthampton Community Facilitator of the Treehouse Foundation. Since starting in a small agency created to address the neglected needs of at-risk adolescent girls, Kerry has provided and developed a range of programs and services for many different populations including young parents, teens in foster care, at-risk youth, and families affected by domestic violence. Her longevity in the human service community and experience in watching as trends in child welfare, health and education come and go provide her with an invaluable perspective on the promise of Treehouse. Kerry has done research for Casey Family Services at the Smith College School for Social Work, and also had the opportunity to work on adult education and literacy as well as girls’ health issues.
David Chilinski
David Chilinski, AIA has worked closely with the Treehouse Foundation to build a community design to facilitate the Foundation’s mission. David is a leading force in Prellwitz-Chilinski Architectural (P/CA) firm’s vision toward building “places” that enlighten and enrich people’s lives. He is a thoughtful protagonist for the “24 hour city,” and has brought passion to urban projects with community involvement. As President and co-founder of P/CA in 1982, David has been practicing Architecture, Interiors and Urban Design for more than 25 years.His experience includes master planning, mixed-use Urban Villages and Town Center , the design of Commercial and Retail developments, Housing, Educational/Academic buildings, and Urban redevelopment projects. He has programmed and designed Interior Architecture for a wide range of corporate and institutional clients as well as a number of very successful entrepreneurs.David holds a National Council of Architectural Registration Boards Certificate, with registration in: Massachusetts , Colorado , Connecticut , Florida , Georgia , Louisiana , Maryland , Missouri, New Hampshire , New Jersey , New York , Pennsylvania , Rhode Island , Tennessee , Texas and Virginia. He holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.Mark Soler is the Executive Director of the Center for Children’s Law and Policy (CCLP), a new public interest law and policy organization focused on reform of juvenile justice and other systems that affect troubled and at-risk children, and protection of the rights of children in such systems, through a range of activities including research, writing, public education, media advocacy, training, technical assistance, administrative and legislative advocacy, and litigation. CCLP capitalizes on its location in Washington, DC, by working in DC, Maryland, and Virginia, as well as in other states and on national efforts such as the MacArthur Foundation’s Models for Change and the Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative. From 1978 until February, 2006, Mark was Senior Staff Attorney, Executive Director, then President of the Youth Law Center, a national public interest law firm. At the Youth Law Center, he and his colleagues worked in more than 40 states on juvenile justice, child welfare, health, mental health, and education issues, and litigated successfully in l6 states on behalf of children whose rights have been violated in juvenile justice and child welfare systems. He has written more than 20 articles and book chapters on civil rights issues and the rights of children, and has taught at Boston College Law School, the Washington College of Law at American University, Boston University School of Law, the University of Nebraska Law School, and San Francisco State University. He has received awards for his work from the American Psychological Association, American Bar Association, Alliance for Juvenile Justice, and Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.
Marsha Levick
Marsha Levick is the Legal Director and co-founder of Juvenile Law Center, founded in 1975. Ms. Levick served as JLC’s first Executive Director until from 1975-1982. From 1982-1986, Ms. Levick was the Legal Director of NOW Legal Defense and Education Fund in New York City and Executive Director of NOW LDEF 1986-1988. Ms. Levick worked in private practice from 1989-1995, and then returned to JLC, where she now manages JLC’s litigation and appellate docket, focusing on the rights of children involved in the juvenile justice and child welfare systems. Most recently, Ms. Levick co-authored an amicus brief on behalf of over 50 advocacy organizations across the country in support of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision overturning the juvenile death penalty in March 2005. In addition to her work at JLC, Ms. Levick serves on the board of the National Juvenile Defender Center, the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana, and is a member of the steering committee of the Girls’ Justice Initiative. Ms. Levick is also completing a three year term as a member of the Board of Governors of the Philadelphia Bar Association. Ms. Levick is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Temple Law School, where she teaches juvenile justice and appellate advocacy. Ms. Levick was the 2006 recipient of the Women’s Professional Achievement Award given by the Women’s Law Caucus of Temple Law School. Ms. Levick is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and Temple University School of Law.
Barry Feld
Barry Feld is Centennial Professor of Law, University of Minnesota Law School, where he has taught since 1972. He received his B.A. in psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 1966; his J.D., magna cum laude, University of Minnesota Law School, 1969; and his Ph.D. in sociology, Harvard University, 1973. He has written eight books and about seventy-five law review and criminology articles and book chapters on juvenile justice with a special emphasis on serious young offenders, procedural justice in juvenile court, youth sentencing policy, and race. His most recent books include: Bad Kids: Race and the Transformation of the Juvenile Court (Oxford 1999), which received the Outstanding Book Award from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences and the Michael Hindelang Outstanding Book Award from the American Society of Criminology; Cases and Materials on Juvenile Justice Administration (West 2000; 2nd Ed. 2004); and Juvenile Justice Administration in a NUTSHELL (West 2002). Feld has testified before state legislatures and the U. S. Senate, spoken to legal, judicial, and academic audiences about many aspects of juvenile justice administration, and lectured on juvenile justice policy in Belgium, Sweden, the Netherlands, Spain, the People’s Republic of China, and Australia. He worked as a prosecutor in the Hennepin County (Minneapolis) Attorney’s Office and served on the Minnesota Juvenile Justice Task Force (1992 -1994), whose recommendations the 1994 legislature enacted in its revisions of the Minnesota juvenile code. Between 1994 and 1997, Feld served as Co-Reporter for the Minnesota Supreme Court’s Juvenile Court Rules of Procedure Advisory Committee.
Lael Elizabeth Hiam Chester
Lael Elizabeth Hiam Chester is the Executive Director of Citizens for Juvenile Justice (CfJJ), a nonprofit organization that advocates for a fair and effective juvenile justice system in Massachusetts . Previously she was an Assistant Attorney General in the Civil Rights/Civil Liberties Division of the Massachusetts Office of Attorney General, and was the Albert Martin Sacks Clinical Fellow at the Criminal Justice Institute at Harvard Law School . Ms. Chester graduated from Barnard College and Harvard Law School . Her prior work experience includes both litigating and researching juvenile justice, criminal justice and civil rights issues. She was honored to receive the Jay D. Blitzman Youth Advocacy Award in May 2004 for her extraordinary commitment to protecting the rights of juveniles. She currently serves as a member of the Governor’s Juvenile Justice Advisory Committee and is the Chair of the Disproportionate Minority Contact Subcommittee.
Josh Dohan
Josh Dohan – The Youth Advocacy Project (YAP) is a juvenile defender unit of the Massachusetts statewide public defender agency, the Committee for Public Counsel Services (CPCS). Joshua Dohan became a public defender in 1988 and joined YAP , at its inception, as its first staff attorney in 1992 and assumed the role of Director in 1999. Mr. Dohan is a returned Peace Corps volunteer, Ghana (1982-84). He is a graduate of Harvard College (1980) and Northeastern University School of Law (1988). He is the 1998 recipient of the Access to Justice Award from the Massachusetts Bar Association. Mr. Dohan is on the Board of Directors of Citizens for Juvenile Justice and is President of the Board for the Youth Advocacy Foundation. He is a founding Member of the Equal Justice Partnership, a member of the LeadBoston class of 2001, and a member of the Community Advisory Board of the Institute on Race and Justice. In 2001, the Youth Advocacy Project became the first Juvenile Defender organization to win the Clara Shortridge Foltz award for outstanding achievement from the National Legal Aid and Defender Association.
Marjory A. German
The Hon. Marjory A. German is an Associate Justice of the Suffolk County Juvenile Court. She is a member of the Massachusetts Judge’s Conference and is Vice President of the Mass. Black Judges Association. Prior to her appointment to the bench in February of 1999 she was the Attorney in Charge of the Roxbury Defenders for over five years where she administered and managed a large community public defender office. From 1986 to 1993 she was a trial attorney with the Committee for Public Counsel Services, during which time she supervised attorneys in the Boston Juvenile Court, the Dorchester District Court and the Boston Municipal Court.
Judge German is a graduate of The University of Michigan’s Undergraduate and Law schools. She has been a guest lecturer at Boston University, a faculty member for the Massachusetts Continuing Legal Education new lawyer training, a panel member for Public Interest Law at Harvard University and a planning committee member for the National Town Hall Video Conference for the State Courts. She has co-chaired a Massachusetts Juvenile Justice training conference, participated in panels for the Massachusetts Bar Association, the Woman’s Bar Association, and the National Legal Aid and Defender Association.
Judge German has taught classes in Black history in the Arlington Schools and participated in forums in Boston schools. She has originated a Changing Lives Through Literature program for juveniles in Dorchester Trial Court, as well as coordinated a remedial reading program in Chelsea Trial Court. Additionally, she spoke at community events in Arlington, Boston, Lexington and Melrose.
Cheryl L. Dorsey
Cheryl L. Dorsey, M.D., M.P.P. PRESIDENT, ECHOING GREEN An accomplished social entrepreneur with expertise in health care, labor issues and public policy, Cheryl Dorsey was named President of Echoing Green in May 2002. She is the first Echoing Green Fellow to lead global nonprofit, which has awarded more than $25 million in start-up capital to over 400 social entrepreneurs worldwide since 1987. Dorsey received her own education at Harvard-Radcliffe Colleges where she earned a degree in history and science in 1985. In 1992, while training to be a pediatrician at Harvard Medical School, she received an Echoing Green Fellowship. With it, she launched the Family Van, a community-based mobile health unit that provides basic health care and outreach services to at-risk residents of inner-city Boston neighborhoods. As a public policy innovator, Cheryl served as a White House Fellow from 1997-1998, serving as Special Assistant to the U.S. Secretary of Labor, advising the Clinton Administration on health care and other issues. She was later named Special Assistant to the Director of the Women’s Bureau of the U.S. Labor Department, where she helped develop family-friendly workplace policies and spearheaded the labor secretary’s pay equity initiative. Most recently, Cheryl served as the first Director of Public Health Initiatives at Danya International, Inc., where she developed products and services aimed at substance abuse treatment and prevention, child and family services, minority health and community outreach. Cheryl serves on the Board of Directors for Coro New York Leadership Center and Grantmakers for Effective Organizations (GEO). Cheryl has received numerous awards and honors for her commitment to public service, including the Pfizer Roerig History of Medicine Award, the Robert Kennedy Distinguished Public Service Award and the Manuel C. Carballo Memorial Prize. She holds a B.A. in History and Science from Harvard-Radcliffe Colleges, an M.D. from the Harvard Medical School and an M.P.P. from the John F. Kennedy School of Government. She writes and speaks widely on minority affairs, social justice, social entrepreneurship and maternal and child health issues.
Matthew Klein
Matthew Klein is the Executive Director and first staff person of Blue Ridge Foundation New York, a private foundation associated with the investment firm Blue Ridge Capital. Blue Ridge Foundation New York helps to develop effective strategies for connecting people living in high poverty communities to the opportunities, resources, and support that they need to fulfill their full potential. The Foundation works by incubating start-up nonprofits in order to accelerate the development and achievements of high-potential organizations in New York City. Matt also serves as an adjunct professor of entrepreneurial studies at NYU Stern School of Business, where he teaches a practicum on social venture investing. Matt’s experience prior to Blue Ridge includes work in non-profit management and civil rights law. Matt is a co-founder of Leadership, Education, and Athletics in Partnership (LEAP), a nationally recognized youth development agency operating in high-poverty neighborhoods throughout Connecticut. During Matt’s tenure LEAP grew from a start-up to a multi-city agency serving over 700 children daily and garnered multiple awards for innovation and effectiveness. In his legal work, Matt focused on issues of equal opportunity, clerking for such organizations as the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. and the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. He also served as a law clerk in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York for the Honorable Robert L. Carter, one of the principal litigating attorneys in the landmark Brown v. Board of Education lawsuit. Matt currently serves on several boards, including the Steering Committee of the New York City Youth Funders Network (Chair, 2004), the Stewart Satter Social Entrepreneurship Fund at NYU Stern School of Business, iMentor (founding member), and Groundwork, Inc. (founding Chair). Matt has been a fellow of the Echoing Green Foundation and the Next Generation Leadership program of the Rockefeller Foundation, and he is a member of the bar in New York and Massachusetts. Matt attended the Boston Public Schools, Yale College and Yale Law School.