Speaker Recommendatos

You can bring in a poet from Poetry for Personal Power. As a lead speaker or as a 4 min adjunct right before the speaker to bring up audience energy. 

Hi Kerry,  We have a cadre of trainers at the National Council for Behavioral Health who are experts in effectively engaging with cross sections of community providers, including the groups listed in your post, around resilience, motivating for positive change and trauma-informed care.  Please let me know if you would like more information. 

Karen Johnson

Karenj@thenationalcouncil.org

Hello, I provide guest lectures and professional development on the topics you mentioned and have presented to similar audiences in and around Philadelphia.  I would welcome a chance to speak with you more about this. Karamifflin@gmail.com

Kerry I would highly recommend Dr. Michael Penn. He is a Clinical Psychologist and Professor of Psychology at Franklin & Marshall College.  His research interests and publications include works in the pathogenesis of hope and hopelessness, the interpenetration of psychology and philosophy, the relationship between culture and psychopathology, and the epidemiology of gender-based violence.  Professor Penn has lectured widely around the world and has been invited to serve as a consultant and speaker at United Nations-related conferences in several countries.  He also serves the UN Leader’s Programme, which trains Director-level United Nations officers.  Professor Penn has authored and co-authored many publications, one of which is Strength and weakness of character: Psychological health and resilience. In M. J. Celinski & K. M. Gow (Eds.), Continuity versus creative response to challenge: The primacy of resilience and resourcefulness in life and therapy. New York, NY: Nova Science Publishers.   In 2004 Penn was appointed to the Board of Directors of the Pennsylvania Higher Education Assistance Administration by Governor Edward Rendell and served on that board for three years. He currently serves on the Boards of the Authenticity Institute and the Tahirih Justice Center in Washington, D.C.  

He is also a personal friend and colleague. 

 

-Rebecca Tavangar, M.A., N.C.C., P.C. | Contemplative Psychotherapist www.contemplativeinquiry.com

 

Hi Kerry, I am a child psychotherapist working with children who have experienced trauma and their families who taught elementary school, mostly in the inner city for over two decades. Currently, I speak to teachers and parents in the western Massachusetts area about trauma, how it impacts children, and how to help them. I would be happy to speak to your group.

 

Thanks, Leslie! I’ll add you to the list of potential speakers.

In March, we had nearly 450 professionals from the 4 state area (MD, WV, PA, VA) to hear Dr. Vincent Felitti, Patsy Sellars (Casey Family Programs) and Dr. Jerry Yager (Child Trauma Academy) talk about the ACE study, impact on brain development, impact on learning, etc. In August, we followed that up with a screening of Paper Tigers and hosted a few staff from Woodbridge, DE schools to talk about how they implemented TIC practices and the difference it has made as well as a local mental health provider with deep ties to TIC work and stewardship. We are gearing up for our Spring event where we will pull it all together with a screening of Resilience and follow up conversation on how to create enviornoments that help build resilience and motivate change.

I would recommend me.  As a zero I know what a wonderful thing it is to grow up being supported in every way.  I have worked every day to pass that legacy on to my children and inspire others to be hungry for that kind of feeling.  I am not a clinician.  I have felt and seen the effects of unconditional love.  I present the subject in a very simple way in 3 parts.  First, the Science of ACEs.  Second,  the Impact of ACEs on all of us.  And third, and most importantly,  the Hope and Joy found in resilience.  I am disappointed here in Nashville Tennessee that the name and focus of the program is called Building Strong Brains.  In a day long meeting of the ACE Awareness Foundation, not one speaker used the word Heart or Caring.  They focused exclusively on the architecture of the brain.  Yet, without heart and caring,  the message is dry and cold.  I  drive sometimes for Uber and Lyft as a way to pay forward the love my parents gave me so unconditionally and gave away over 500 of my  books to help inspire people to read out loud together with their families. I tell them that I don't have all the answers,  but discussions will start that are essential to the familial intimacy that prevents ACEs.  You can imagine the feeling I get when a dad called me from American Samoa asking for 20 more books after his son sent him the copy I gave him in the car!  That kind of Psychic Compensation is priceless!   If you don't know what a lifetime of love feels like...how do you inspire people to reach for it?  I  go back 2 years ago to my first hearing about ACEs on NPR.  Reading that doctors were brought to tears by the results of the first round of responses hit dead center in my heart.  I have heard the sadness and felt the pain of my children's friends who were hungry for the connection we shared with our kids.  My life changed forever after a third grade teachers conference where the teacher asked me to write down what we said and did that allowed our son to watch over the entire classroom with a spirit that said "shouldn't we all watch over each other?"  In 22 years of teaching she had never seen anything like it.  At 31,  that son and my other children are still doing that.  If you don't know what that feels like. ..how do you inspire change?  I'm not bragging,  I simply try to honor the kindness and generosity of spirit my folks gave me.  You can see and feel it with our whole tribe.  I wish everyone could feel safe in their own skin like we did.  I know each of my 3 siblings thought they were THE FAVORITE!   That is the magic of great parenting. ..honoring the difference in each of your children and talking and listening enough to know who they are inside. I would PROUDLY give away my books to anyone that would pay for printing and shipping...about  $5.  It has never been about money. ...but changing the history of a family. ..one heart at a time. God bless my parents for that gift!  There is NOTHING that compares to speaking and touching hearts.

 

 

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Thanks so much for your reply, John! What a great story you have and you are clearly dedicated! We have hosted speakers to talk about the ACE study in the past (we flew out Dr. Felitti), brain development and how trauma impacts the process, automated and chemical responses to trauma, systems change to better support students who are impacted by trauma, self care for those who work with folks who experience trauma, etc. We are focusing this coming training on the theme of resilience and shaping environments to better boost motivation in individuals we serve.

I would recommend Dr. David Berceli to speak about TRE (Trauma release exercises) Very hopeful and empowering. more at www.treforall.com  

I'm a huge proponent of utilizing speakers who've had to overcome the same societal and cultural hardships of the children and families within the community you're working with.  No knock against clinicians who've studied resilience and have motivated social workers and others who work with children, but speakers who are located geographically and psychologically within the neighborhoods of children they serve are more relatable to community members in those neighborhoods and can be extremely effective in teaching other professionals who work with the same population. 

Agreed. We are short on good speakers in our community and have almost over utilized the ones we do have. We’ve been working to bring some bigger names out such as Dr. Vincent Felitti.

I would suggest Brian Farragher - he is co-author of the Sanctuary books with Sandy Bloom!  Currently he is executive director of a residential boys center (a Catholic organization that includes an on-site school, social workers, teachers, etc.) and he is partnering with Dr. Robert Macy to work with our local child welfare, children's shelter to move them towards trauma informed practices!  It is experiential learning at its best! 

 

Here is a snippet from the Amazon book description:

At its heart, The Sanctuary Model represents an organizational value system that is committed to seven principles, which serve as anchors for decision making at all levels: non-violence, emotional intelligence, social learning, democracy, open communication, social responsibility, and growth and change. The Sanctuary Model is not a clinical intervention; rather, it is a method for creating an organizational culture that can more effectively provide a cohesive context within which healing from psychological and socially derived forms of traumatic experience can be addressed. Chapters are organized around the seven Sanctuary commitments, providing step-by-step, realistic guidance on creating and sustaining fundamental change.

"Restoring Sanctuary" is a roadmap to recovery for our nation's systems of care. It explores the notion that organizations are living systems themselves and as such they manifest various degrees of health and dysfunction, analogous to those of individuals. Becoming a truly trauma-informed system therefore requires a process of reconstitution within helping organizations, top to bottom. A system cannot be truly trauma-informed unless the system can create and sustain a process of understanding itself.

I hope this is useful!

Karen Clemmer

Thank you, Karen. I am familiar with the Sanctuary Model. I’ll add him to the list for consideration ☺

I am in the Harrisburg PA area. I am by no way an expert but am a family doctor and have presented a 4 hour workshop to our local school district regarding ACEs, trauma informed approaches and resiliency. It was a very hands on and participatory program and was very well received. I am available to help as you see fit and I am happy to share our powerpoint with you if desired. 

Hi - I have worked with several elementary schools in Philadelphia, training teachers on the impact of trauma on learning; and "Trauma 102", about implementing trauma-sensitive practices in school cultures.  I have also worked with the same schools, as well as with Need-in-Deed, to teach elementary students how brains and bodies respond to stress, how to self-regulate using various coping skills (and the safety cards of Sandra Bloom), and how to practice regulation/calming self and classroom via guided meditation and creative/mindful visualization.  

I would also recommend Andre Wright - the director of Give and Go Athletics (as well as a behavioral health worker with CCTC), who knows first hand the value of resilience and the critical need for a supportive adult in a child's life:  andre@giveandgoathletics.org.  

My email:kryscooperLCSW@gmail.com

AND: Chris Blodgett from the University of Washington spoke to the School a District of Philadelphia about his research in Walla Walla and Spokane; stressing the importance of school-involvement.

Finally, Peter Hill, who was raised in Philadelphia, founded the language immersion preschool on the Lakota Sioux reservation in South Dakota.  He can speak powerfully about the generational legacy of trauma and the resilience of the Sioux.

I'd have to dig to find his email.

Peter Hill's work was featured on Aces Connection in August:

I wanted you to see this article from the Minneapolis Fed: https://www.minneapolisfed.org...4E2E899021FBD04A7AF9

 

Hi!

I'd like to recommend Jennifer Pearson at Reaching IN...Reaching OUT (RIRO) in Toronto. RIRO has been helping to build resilience in adults and young children since 2002 through its evidence-based resiliency skills training programs for service providers and parents  (www.reachinginreachingout.com ). Jennifer is a terrific public speaker and trainer as well as a clinician with many years working in the area of resilience promotion.

Thank you so much for the wonderful recommendations! I’ll pass them on to my director.

Thank you so much! I’ll pass that on to my Director!

Hello,

 

Please consider me as a speaker "to talk about resilience and motivating positive change to an audience of teachers, child protection workers, social service workers, faith community members..." With my forthcoming book: Self-Compassion for Teens (PESI Publishing & Media) coming out later this year, I train educators, clinicians, and parents all over North America. The uniqueness of my approach is that youth leaders co-created and co-lead the workshops with me, as a means of demonstrating engaged pedagogies, which are healing and resilience building in and of themselves. As a clinical & forensic psychologist, educator, and author, I bring a unique lens and cross section on resilience and motivating positive change.

Kind regards,

Lee-Anne Gray, PsyD
Author, forthcoming book: Self-Compassion for Teens (PESI Publishing & Media)
Author, The Happy Family: 10 Strategies for Bringing More Happiness Into Your Home
Contributing Author, Pedagogies of Kindness and Respect
EMDR Certified Clinical Psychologist, License #19540
President & Chief Executive Officer, The Connect Group, a 501(c)3 corporation connecting communities with innovative educational solutions since 2011. 
Co-Founder, The Connect Group School, EmpathicEducation for a CompassionateNation
~Huffington Post
Twitter: @DrLeeAnneG & @ConnectGrp

Kerry Fair posted:

If you could recommend a speaker to talk about resilience and motivating positive change to an audience of teachers, child protection workers, social service workers, faith community members...who would it be?

Lots of great suggestions here. My take is slightly different, because all of these suggestions are cognitively based lectures that might give better understanding. Resilience isn't a notion though, it's a capacity of the nervous system. My suggestion would be someone who not only understands how ACEs impact brain development, but also looks at the influence of generational stress, and then trains you with a tool that actually builds resilience in the nervous system. Something tangible you have once the presenter is gone. 

Hi Kerry.

While you make a valid point about the types of presentations that may empower service providers, I can't agree that resilience is just a better tuned up nervous system. While our nervous system obviously plays a major role in an individual's capacity for a resilient response to adversity, this is a very individualistic perspective embedded within earlier research on resilience.

I believe the top people in resilience research would argue that resilience is so much more. It is a transactional process embedded within a social ecology. Reaching IN...Reaching OUT was asked by the Ministry of Child & Youth Services in Ontario, Canada to develop a synthesis review on resilience. As part of that work, we developed a definition that pulls together the most up-to-date research and perspectives on resilience.

Definition of resilience: Here is the link to a brief FAQ sheet we wrote on what resilience is and is not -- see "Resilience in 8 Q&As" at: http://www.reachinginreachingo...20Answers%202010.pdf

I hope this will be helpful to anyone working to support resilience in children and adults.

Re presentations about resilience: I agree with Kerry that leaving people with some tangible strategies they can use to support resilience is really important. However, it is not really possible in a short period of a presentation to do the kind of skills training that makes major shifts and changes. In this case, if I had to choose what things were most important, I'd vote for:

1) emphasizing that RELATIONSHIPS are the KEY to RESILIENCE;
2) that children often learn best through ADULT ROLE MODELING during everyday interactions;
3) if ADULTS ROLE MODEL CALMNESS AND PATIENCE using deep breathing techniques (3 deep breaths and repeat as necessary) , this can help children and adults gain greater self-regulation which, in turn, contributes to building a "culture of resilience" at home, classroom and playground.

Cheers,

Darlene Kordich Hall, PhD
Reaching IN...Reaching OUT
www.reachinginreachingout.com 

Hi, Kerry: Whomever you choose, I think it would be critical that they're steeped in ACEs science (the epidemiology of ACEs, the neurobiology of toxic stress, the long-term biomedical and epigenetic consequences of toxic stress, and resilience research). Having that new foundational understanding of human development changes the lens on any solutions.

I would recommend Dr. Kenneth Hardy and/or Dr. Joy DeGruy.

I'm the author of The Bullying Antidote, which starts with ACES and provides solid, evidence-based positive parenting tools for preventing them!  My co-author is Dr. Louise Hart, author of The Winning Family and On the Wings of Self-Esteem, who spoke to large audiences worldwide in the 1980s and 1990s. She is retired now but I have inherited her materials, methods, and sparkling personality... Uplift Programs is our family business!

I would suggest myself or any of the SEDNET project managers in Florida.  We do trainings on Trauma Informed Care in the forms of overviews and follow up strategies to create trauma informed schools and classrooms.

When I do my trainings, I include my story of personal trauma as well as my son's experience.  I have been told it brings realism to my trainings.