FOSTER CARE AND CHILD WELFARE RESOURCES

DATA/REPORTS
ACADEMIC/RESEARCH EXPERTS
ADVOCACY/NONPROFIT EXPERTS
FEDERAL/STATE EXPERTS

Administration on Children and Families, HHS
Data and Statistics
Find statistics, publications and other data on all ACF programs including child care, child support, child welfare (including neglect/abuse and foster care), Head Start, refugees and welfare.

American Bar Association
Commission on Immigration
The ABA established the commission in 2002 to direct its efforts ensuring fair treatment and full due process rights for immigrants and refugees in the United States. The commission works extensively on legal issues affecting immigrant families and children. The ABA’s Center on Children and the Law also is a good resource.

The Annie E. Casey Foundation
Kids Count Data Center
"Data Snapshot on Foster Care and Placement (pdf)," 2011

The nonprofit foundation's Kids Count Data Center is an outgrowth of the child well-being report released by the foundation each summer. It contains national, state- and city-level data for over 100 measures of child well-being, including health.

Casey Family Programs
CSSP Alliance for Racial Equality
Nearly 60 percent of U.S. children in foster care are of color, though evidence shows parents of color are no more likely than white parents to abuse or neglect their children. This paper summarizes current research findings, exploring recent patterns involving child maltreatment and disproportionality, the role race plays at various decision-making stages in child welfare, the extent of racially disparate treatment in child welfare, and how other social systems contribute to disproportionality in child welfare.

Center for Law and Social Policy
"Parental Incarceration: How to Avoid a 'Death Sentence' for Families (pdf)," 2007
This paper highlights a number of promising services and supports for incarcerated parents and recommends what attorneys representing or working with incarcerated parents and their children can do to minimize harm to children. The report is by Tiffany Conway and Rutledge Q. Hutson, first published by the Clearinghouse Review Journal of Poverty Law and Policy in Summer 2007.

"Is Kinship Care Good for Kids (pdf)?" 2007
More than 2.5 million children are being raised by grandparents and other relatives because their parents are unable—for a variety of reasons—to care for them. A number of states have utilized subsidized guardianship programs as a way of supporting these “kinship families.” Some wonder whether kinship care is a good thing—and how we know this. This fact sheet addresses these often unasked but crucial questions.

Chapin Hall Center for Children, University of Chicago Link
"... Adult Functioning of Former Foster Youth," 2010
The longitudinal study follows youth aging out of foster care and transitioning to adulthoood in Illinois, Iowa and Wisconsin. It suggests these youth face significant challenges, including educational deficits, mental health problems, economic insecurity, victimization and early child-bearing. They're also much more likely to have been involved with the criminal justice system.

“An Employment Training and Job Placement Program for Foster Youth Making the Transition to Adulthood,” 2010
The report examines the need for employment-related services and supports among youth in foster care and describes how one community-based employment training and job placement program in Chicago is trying to address those needs.

Child Welfare League of America
"International Adoption: Trends and Issues (pdf)," 2007
The two-page brief notes that, between 1989 and 2005, 234,358 children were adopted in the U.S. from other countries. In 2005 alone, 22,710 foreign-born children were adopted by Americans, while 51,278 were adopted from the public welfare system.

Children's Bureau, HHS
Child Welfare Information Gateway
Provides links to data and information on topics from prevention to permanency, including child welfare, child abuse and neglect and adoption.

Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics
A collaboration of federal agencies and departments, the forum fosters coordination in collecting and reporting federal statistics on education, family and social environment, economic circumstances, health and health care, behavior, physical environment and safety. It releases the "America's Children" report each July. For federal statistics on a range of issues, see www.fedstats.gov

National Conference of State Legislatures
“Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoptions Act: 2010 Introduced Legislation,” 2010
In 2008, the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Act was signed into law. The law is designed to connect and support relative caregivers, improve the lives of children in foster care, support tribal foster care and adoptions, and improve incentives for adoption. Twenty states have enacted nearly 40 bills related to the provisions of the Fostering Connections Act. NCSL tracks the introduction of these bills as they enter the 2010 legislative sessions.

"Promoting Court Capacity to Improve Outcomes for Abused and Neglected Children," 2007
In the child welfare system, courts play a pivotal role in ensuring children's safety, permanency and well-being. Strong commitment of state judicial leaders, a rich body of court experience, growing consensus about the need for court reform, and new federal funding provide state legislatures with conditions that are conducive to reform.

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services/SAMHSA
National Center on Substance Abuse and Child Welfare
NCSACW staff are experts on cross-system issues involving child welfare, substance abuse, dependency courts and tribal and family judicial systems. They collect and disseminate analysis and research to help child welfare and other professionals improve their services and policies.

ACADEMIC/RESEARCH EXPERTS

Lisa Amaya-Jackson Ph.D., Associate Director
National Center for Child Traumatic Stress, Duke University Medical School
Box 3613
Durham, NC 27710
919.682.1552, Ext. 253; laj@acpub.duke.edu
Amaya-Jackson also is an assistant professor of child and adolescent psychiatry at the medical school. Her research involves psychological trauma and exposure to violence – particularly risk factors, protective factors and treatment effects. She's interested in psychopharmacology and psychotherapy for children and adolescents with post-traumatic stress disorder and related problems. The traumatic stress center, a joint program of Duke and UCLA, coordinates the National Child Traumatic Stress Network.

Eloise Anderson, Director
Program for the American Family, The Claremont Institute
2716 13th Street
Sacramento, CA 95818
916.446.7924; eloisea@msn.com
Anderson was previously director of social services for Wisconsin and California. While directing California's welfare system, the nation's largest, Anderson led the way in crafting California's new welfare reform program, CalWORKs. As part of The Claremont Institute's contribution to the debate on California's Proposition 22, Anderson co-authored the booklet "Will Any Two Parents Do? The Essential Roles of Mothers and Fathers in the Raising of Children." She has written and presented papers on faith-based social services, marriage policy, child welfare, TANF and various issues in welfare reform. Anderson has a bachelor's degree in sociology.

Richard Barth Ph.D., Dean
School of Social Work, University of Maryland, Baltimore
525 W. Redwood St.
Baltimore, MD 21201
410.706.7794; rbarth@ssw.umaryland.edu
Barth's research interests include child abuse and neglect, foster care dynamics, adoption policy, shared family care, program evaluation and linkages between child welfare and juvenile justice services. He's the co-author of several books, including "Evidence for Child Welfare Policy Reform" (2005) and is co-principal investigator of the National Study of Child and Adolescent Well-Being. He has received numerous awards and was a senior Fulbright specialist in Australia in 2006.

Michelle Bazie, Deputy Director of Communications
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
820 1st St. NE, Suite 510
Washington, DC 20002
202.408.1080; bazie@cbpp.org
CBPP conducts research and analysis to inform debates on fiscal policy and to help ensure that the needs of low-income families and individuals are considered. It supports increasing access to supports such as Medicaid, children’s health insurance, food stamps and housing assistance. Senior researcher Arloc Sherman studies the causes and consequences of family and child poverty, trends in income inequality, policies that improve child well-being, and welfare reform. The center publishes state-by-state data on fiscal policies.

Jill Duerr Berrick Ph.D., Co-Director
Center for Child and Youth Policy
University of California Berkeley School of Social Welfare
120 Haviland Hall
Berkeley, CA 94720-4700
510.643.7016; dberrick@berkeley.edu
Berrick researches child welfare services, including developmentally-sensitive services for very young children and children's experiences in out-of-home care. She has examined neighborhood-based foster care and ways to restructure child welfare systems. She emphasizes enlisting the voices of children and families to share their experiences.

Douglas Besharov, Program Director and Professor
Welfare Reform Academy
School of Public Affairs, University of Maryland
4131Van Munching Hall
(AEI) 17th St. NW, Suite 1100, Washington, DC 20036
College Park, MD 20742
301.405.6341; besharov@umd.edu
Besharov is a professor in UMD's School of Public Policy and a senior scholar at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, D.C. He's also a lawyer. Besharov runs UMD's Welfare Academy, which helps state and local officials, private social service providers and others reshape programs in keeping with the 1996 welfare reform law. It has provided training in program design, implementation and evaluation for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, Medicaid, food stamps, job training, child care and more. Besharov served as founding director of the U.S. National Center on Child Abuse from 1975 to 1979. He's the author of "Recognizing Child Abuse: A Guide for the Concerned" and 14 other books, including "The Vulnerable Social Worker: Liability for Serving Children and Families."

Bruce Boyer, Director
Civitas ChildLaw Clinic, Loyola University
25 E. Pearson St.
Chicago, IL 60611
312.915.7927; bboyer@luc.edu

Boyer directs the clinic, a pediatric law office in which Loyola students learn skills to represent children and advocate for clients. Boyer focuses primarily on child maltreatment issues and has represented clients in a wide range of proceedings, including child welfare, juvenile delinquency, special education and disability hearings. Boyer has litigated, taught, consulted and written extensively in the area of child abuse and neglect. He has been appointed to the new Illinois Supreme Court Commission on Professionalism.

Mark Courtney Ph.D., Executive Director
Partners for Our Children, University of Washington

4516 University Way
Seattle, WA 98105-6299
206.221.3144; mark.courtney@partnersforourchildren.org
In 2007, Courtney became founding executive director of the child welfare research and development center. He also joined the university's School of Social Work as the Ballmer Chair in Child Well-Being. Previously, he had been at the University of Chicago, directing its Chapin Hall Center for Children from 2001 to 2006. He has conducted extensive research on individual, family and societal contributors to the well-being of children placed in out-of-home care. Courtney is widely acknowledged as an expert on the child welfare system. His studies of youth aging out of foster care have been used extensively by legislators, agency administrators and courts around the country.

Kenneth A. Dodge Ph.D., Director
Center for Child and Family Policy, Duke University
Box 90545
302 Towerview Drive
Durham, NC 27708-0545
919.613.9303; dodge@duke.edu
Dodge, the William McDougall Professor of Public Policy Studies, directs the center, which aims to solve problems facing children by bringing together policy makers, practitioners and scholars from many disciplines. It's addressing issues of early childhood adversity, education policy reform and youth violence and problem behaviors. Dodge was a principal investigator on the Fast Track project, a federally funded longitudinal study of youth from age 8 to young adulthood to identify early risk factors for adolescent disorders, particularly involvement in violence and antisocial behavior. His other interests include education policy, child maltreatment and the science of child and adolescent development.

Bernardine Dohrn, Director
Children & Family Justice Center, Law Legal Clinic, Northwestern University
375 E. Chicago Ave.
Chicago, IL 60611
312.503.0396; cfjc@law.northwestern.edu

Dohrn is the center's founding director and a clinical associate professor of law. She teaches, lectures and writes about children's law and justice as well as the international human rights. Dohrn was a member of the Expert Work Group for the Adoption 2002 Project of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Domestic Violence Child Abuse Working Group of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, and the steering committee of the Illinois Family Violence Coordinating Committee. In the late 1960s, Dohrn was a member of the radical Weathermen group, which plotted against the U.S. government.

Greg Duncan Ph.D., Professor of Education
Department of Education, University of California, Irvine
Berkeley Place 2062
Irvine, CA 92697-5500
949.824.7831; gduncan@uci.edu

Duncan is an expert on family and neighborhood poverty and child development. He formerly worked at the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University. Dunca's research focuses on the effects of poverty on families and neighborhoods, and the intergenerational consequences of welfare use. He has investigated the concentration of persistent poverty among certain population subgroups, in particular African-Americans. Duncan and colleagues also have examined the life consequences for adolescents in families that receive at least partial income from welfare. He has written extensively about income distribution, child poverty and welfare dependence and is the co-author or co-editor of several books. A former principal investigator of the Michigan Panel Study of Income Dynamics, Duncan was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2001. He was elected president of the Population Association of America for 2008 and president of the Society for Research in Child Development for 2009-2011.

John Eckenrode Ph.D., Director
National Data Archive on Child Abuse and Neglect
Cornell University
G21 Martha Van Rensselaer Hall
Ithaca, NY 14853
607.255.0467; jje1@cornell.edu

NDACAN facilitates the secondary analysis of data relevant to the study of child abuse and neglect by providing access to data, recent research and other resources. Eckenrode has researched the characteristics of official child maltreatment reports and the academic effects of child abuse and neglect.

Jeffrey L. Edleson Ph.D., Director
Minnesota Center Against Violence & Abuse
University of Minnesota
105 Peters Hall, 1404 Gortner Ave.
St. Paul, MN 55108
612.624.8795; jedleson@umn.edu

Edleson is a professor in the University of Minnesota School of Social Work, where he directs the Minnesota Center Against Violence and Abuse. He has published extensively on domestic violence, group work and program evaluation. Edleson has conducted intervention research at the Domestic Abuse Project in Minneapolis for more than 16 years. He has provided technical assistance to domestic violence programs and research projects across North America as well as in Germany, Australia, Israel, Cyprus, Korea and Singapore. He was a member of the National Research Council's Panel on Research on Violence Against Women and is a consultant to the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

John Fluke, Director of Research
Walter R. McDonald & Associates

7311 Greenhaven Ave., Suite 273
Sacramento, CA 95831
720.870.0408; jfluke@wrma.com

WRMA is under federal contract to develop and implement the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System (NCANDS), to provide technical assistance to the states to help them meet reporting requirements and to develop annual reports on child abuse and neglect.

Richard J. Gelles Ph.D., Dean & Co-Director
Field Center for Children's Policy, Practice and Research
School of Social Work, University of Pennsylvania
3701 Locust Walk, Caster Building
Philadelphia, PA 19104
215.898.5541; gelles@sp2.upenn.edu

Dean Gelles is an expert on family violence, child abuse and neglect, and family preservation. He advised legislators in drafting the federal Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, aimed at moving children out of foster care more quickly and, if necessary, terminating parents' custodial rights. Gelles directs the research center, which brings together scholars and professionals in law, medicine and social work to generate policies and practices for enhancing children’s welfare and protecting their rights. He also co-directs the Field Center for Children's Policy Practice and Research.

Martin Guggenheim, Professor of Clinical Law
School of Law,New York University
161 Avenue of the Americas, Fourth Floor
New York, NY 10013
212.998.6460; martin.guggenheim@nyu.edu

An expert in children's rights and family law, Guggenheim has been an active litigator in the area of children and the law and has argued leading cases on juvenile delinquency and termination of parental rights in the Supreme Court of the United States. He has published more than 40 book chapters and articles in leading law reviews in the United States. His research has focused on adolescent abortion, First Amendment rights in schools, the role of counsel for children in court proceedings, empirical research in child welfare practice, juvenile justice and family law. He is the author of five books on children and parents. His most recent book is "What’s Wrong with Children’s Rights" (Harvard University Press, 2005).

Susan Kellam, Senior Communications Adviser
Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20036
202.797.6310; skellam@brookings.edu

Kellam promotes Brookings, a think tank supporting a wide scope of research. Its Center on Children and Families examines policies affecting the well-being of U.S. children and their parents, especially children in less advantaged families. Directed by Ron Haskins and Isabel Sawhill, it co-publishes the twice-yearly journal Future of Children.

Janice Cooper, Interim Director
National Center for Children in Poverty
Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University
215 W 125th St., Third Floor
New York, NY 10027
646.284.9600; knitzer@nccp.org

A psychologist, Knitzer has spent her career in policy research and analysis of issues affecting children and families, including mental health, child welfare and education policy. She is dedicated to the study of how public policies can improve outcomes of low-income children and better support families, particularly those who are most vulnerable. She wrote a landmark 1982 report on children’s mental health, "Unclaimed Children: The Failure of Public Responsibility to Children and Adolescents in Need of Mental Health Services." Knitzer serves on the New York State Permanent Judicial Commission on Justice for Children and the board of Family Support America. Among her many awards, she received the first Nicolas Hobbs Award for Distinguished Service in the Cause of Child Advocacy from the American Psychological Association.

Nancy Landale Ph.D., Director
Population Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University
713 Oswald Tower
University Park, PA 16802-6207
814.863.7276; landale@pop.psu.edu

Besides directing the institute, Landale is a professor of sociology and demography. Her research focuses on family patterns and health outcomes of U.S. racial and ethnic minorities, especially Hispanic populations. She's a nationally recognized scholar in family demography, father involvement, immigration, race and ethnicity, and morbidity and mortality. She has written extensively about issues such as family structure and marriage, racial self-identification, infant health and poverty.

Alicia Lieberman Ph.D., Director
Child Trauma Research Project, University of California San Francisco
401 Parnassus Ave.
San Francisco, CA 94143-0984
415.206.5377; alicia.lieberman@ucsf.edu

Lieberman is vice chair for academic affairs at the UCSF Department of Psychiatry and director of San Francisco General Hospital's child trauma research project. She holds an endowed chair in infant mental health and studies toddler development, attachment disorders, interventions with high-risk families and the effects of early trauma. Lieberman directs the Early Trauma Treatment Network, a collaborative of the UCSF/SFGH Child Trauma Research Project, Boston Medical Center, Louisiana State University Medical Center and Tulane University. Lieberman also is president of the board of directors of Zero to Three: National Center for Infants, Toddlers and Families.

Duncan Lindsey, Professor of Social Welfare
School of Public Affairs, UCLA
5234 Public Policy Building
Los Angeles, CA 90095
310.206.2973; dlindsey@ucla.edu

Lindsey studies decision-making in foster care, child abuse fatalities, child support and welfare reform. He is editor-in-chief of Children and Youth Services Review, a child welfare research journal.

Kent Markus, Associate Professor & Director
National Center for Adoption Law & Policy
Capital University Law School, Capital University
303 E. Broad St.
Columbus, OH 43215
614.236.6500;kmarkus@law.capital.edu

Markus is on leave from the law school, serving as chief legal counsel to Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland. Markus is founding director of the center, which is dedicated to child welfare and adoption systemic reform. He teaches in an extensive array of law fields, including adoption, criminal and administrative. Before coming to Capital in 1998, Markus was the U.S. Justice Department's deputy chief of staff and Attorney General Janet Reno's highest-ranking adviser. During his five years at Justice, Markus oversaw national implementation of the Brady Law and the 1994 Crime Act. He served as founding director of the Office of Community-Oriented Policing Services (COPS) and as the department's point person on crime policy, particularly juvenile crime and gun violence. Earlier, Markus was the Democratic National Committee's chief of staff.

Jenice Robinson, Director of Communications
Center for Law and Social Policy
1015 15th St. NW, Suite 400
Washington, DC 20005
202.906.8027; jrobinson@clasp.org

The national nonprofit conducts research and policy analysis to improve low-income people’s economic security, educational and workforce prospects. Specifically, it aims to: increase adults’ access to quality education, training and transitional jobs; create universal opportunities for early childhood education; improve access to supports such as child care, food stamps, Medicaid and cash assistance; help young people avoid risky behavior; and help more kids grow up with two involved parents.

Ruth McRoy, Associate Dean for Research, Ruby Lee Piester Center
Center for Social Work Research, University of Texas at Austin
1 University Station D3500
Austin, TX 78712
512.471.0551; r.mcroy@mail.utexas.edu

McRoy's areas of focus include: Open adoptions, outcomes for birthmothers, adoptive parents and adopted children, trans-racial adoptions, family preservation, special needs adoptions, post adoption services, female sexual abuse perpetrators, racial identity issues, adolescent pregnancy, effectiveness of residential treatment services.

William Meezan, Dean
College of Social Work, Ohio State University
305 A Stillman Hall
1947 College Road
Columbus, OH 43210
614.292.5300; meezan.1@osu.edu

His research interests include: child welfare policies and services; child abuse and neglect; foster care and adoption; family support and family preservation; and evaluation research. Meezan co-wrote "Gay Marriage, Same-Sex Parenting and America's Children," an article for a 2005 issue of the journal Future of Children.

Ronald Mincy Ph.D., Maurice V. Russell Professor of Social Policy and Social Work Practice
School of Social Work, Columbia University
1255 Amsterdam Ave.
New York, NY 10027
212.851.2406; rm905@columbia.edu

Mincy teaches and directs the School of Social Work's Center for Research on Fathers, Children and Family Well-being. He studies the effects of welfare, child support, family support, housing, and employment and training policies and practices on family formation and father involvement. Before joining Columbia's faculty in 2001, Mincy was a Ford Foundation senior program officer, working on such issues as improving U.S. social welfare policies for low-income fathers, especially child support, and workforce development policies. He also served on the Clinton Administration's Welfare Reform Task Force. Mincy is a co-principal investigator of the Fragile Families and Child Well-being Survey, and he has been involved in numerous other research grants. He is a member of the MacArthur Network on the Family and the Economy and serves on advisory boards for many organizations, including the African American Healthy Marriage Initiative and the University of Michigan's National Poverty Center.

Barbara Needell Ph.D., Principal Investigator
Child Welfare Research Center
University of California at Berkeley
120 Haviland Hall
Berkeley, CA 94720
510.642.1893; bneedell@berkeley.edu

Needell's interests include administrative data and child welfare services; foster care reform (Family to Family Initiative); the overrepresentation of black children in the child welfare system; and infants in foster care.

Yolanda Padilla Ph.D., Professor of Social Work and Women's Studies
Population Research Center, University of Texas at Austin
School of Social Work
1 University Station D3500
Austin, TX 78712-0358
512.471.6266; ypadilla@mail.utexas.edu

Padilla’s research focuses on racial and ethnic disparities in health and well-being in the United States, particularly among Mexican Americans. She looks at poverty, immigration, family structure, early childhood health and development, and social welfare policy. Padilla also does research on gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender populations. The Society for Social Work and Research gave her an outstanding research award for a study on factors influencing Mexican immigrants' earnings potential.

Bruce Perry M.D., Senior Fellow
Child Trauma Academy
5161 San Felipe, Suite 320
Houston, TX 77056
713.446.1491; childtrauma@childtraumaacademy.orgchildtrauma@childtraumaacademy.org

Perry, a physician, was the founding director of the ChildTrauma Academy, a training and research institute working to improve the lives of high-risk children. He remains the medical director for provincial programs in children's mental health for the Alberta (Canada) Mental Health Board. Perry's research examines the long-term cognitive, behavioral, emotional, social and physiological effects of childhood trauma in children, adolescents and adults.

Arthur Reynolds Ph.D., Professor
Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota
51 E. River Road
202 Child Development
Minneapolis, MN 55455-0345
612.625.4321; ajr@umn.edu

Reynolds studies the effects of early childhood intervention on youngsters' development from school entry to early adulthood. He also investigates the family and school influences on children's educational success. Reynolds directs the Chicago Longitudinal Study, one of the largest and most extensive studies of the effects of early childhood intervention. Reynolds' project team also is documenting the determinants of child maltreatment, delinquency and crime, educational attainment and economic well-being.

Rubén Rumbaut Ph.D., Professor
School of Social Sciences, University of California, Irvine
3151 Social Science Plaza
Mail Code: 5100
Irvine, CA 92697
949.824.2495; rrumbaut@uci.edu

Rumbaut has co-directed the landmark Children of Immigrants Longitudinal Study since 1991. He also directs, in collaboration with a team of UCI and UCLA colleagues, a large-scale study of immigration and intergenerational mobility in metropolitan Los Angeles and does comparative research on transitions to adulthood. Rumbaut's research has focused on immigrants and assimilation, language and bilingualism, ethnic identity, intergenerational relations in immigrant families, educational achievement and aspirations, social mobility, crime and incarceration, and health and mental health. He co-wrote “Immigrant America: A Portrait” (University of California Press, 2006) and “Multiple Origins, Uncertain Destinies: Hispanics and the American Future” (National Academies Press, 2006).

Narayan Sastry Ph.D., Research Associate Professor
Population Studies Center, Institute for Social Research
University of Michigan
426 Thompson St., Box 1248
Ann Arbor, MI 48106-1248
734.936.0462; nsastry@umich.edu

At the center, Sastry focuses on child health, international child poverty, ethnic disparities, health insurance coverage of immigrants, and the effects of neighborhood and family on children’s well-being. He's also a senior social scientist for the RAND Corp., where he co-directs the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey, a longitudinal study. Sastry is the principal investigator for several other National Institutes of Health grants to analyze children’s health and development. He's examining the effects of Hurricane Katrina on family resettlement patterns and the future population of New Orleans.

Arloc Sherman, Senior Researcher
Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
820 First St., NE, Suite 510
Washington, DC 20002
202.408.1080; sherman@cbpp.org

Sherman researches trends in income inequality, employment of single mothers, the causes and consequences of family and child poverty, and welfare reform and policies that reduce poverty.

Carol Spigner, Professor
School of Social Policy and Practice, University of Pennsylvania
3701 Locust Walk
Philadelphia, PA 19104
215.898.2507; spignerdsw@aol.com

Spigner oversaw federal child welfare programs as the Children's Bureau associate commissioner from 1994 to 1999. At Penn, she teaches and co-directs the Field Center for Children's Policy, Practice and Research, a multi-disciplinary voice for children in the child welfare system. Her current research focuses on documenting parents' experiences in the child welfare system. She also has studied the reform of state child welfare systems through foundation and litigation efforts, cultural competency, permanency planning and relative care.

Matthew Stagner, Executive Director
Chapin Hall Center for Children, University of Chicago
1313 E. 60th St.
Chicago, IL 60637
773.753.5900; mstagner@chapinhall.org

Stagner is a nationally recognized authority on policies affecting children and families. His research includes work on youth risk behaviors, children aging out of foster care, and programs that support social services. Before joining Chapin Hall in 2006, Stagner directed the Center on Labor, Human Services and Population at the Urban Institute in Washington, D.C. Earlier, Stagner directed the Division of Children and Youth Policy in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He has directed research for the National Research Council and the Center for the Study of Social Policy.

Mark Testa Ph.D., Director
Children and Family Research Center, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
150 N. Wacker, Suite 2120
Chicago, IL 60606
217.649.9728; mtesta@illinois.edu

Testa is an associate professor of social work, a child welfare researcher and former research director for the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. For 30 years, he has provided leadership on research and public engagement to improve the lives of children and families involved in the income assistance and child protection systems. Testa is the architect of several major child welfare innovations in Illinois, including the Home of Relative Reform in 1995 and the federal Subsidized Guardianship Demonstration in 1997. He is leading the evaluations of replications of the Illinois subsidized guardianship demonstration project in the states of Wisconsin and Tennessee.

Michael Wald, Jackson Eli Reynolds Professor of Law, Emeritus
School of Law, Stanford University
Crown Quad 215
Stanford, CA 94305
650.723.0322; mwald@stanford.edu

Wald has had a distinguished career as an academic researcher and teacher. A leading national authority on legal policy toward children, he drafted the American Bar Association’s Standards Related to Child Abuse and Neglect, as well as major federal and state legislation regarding child welfare. Wald served as deputy general counsel for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services during the Clinton Administration, executive director of the San Francisco Department of Human Services, and senior adviser to the president of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.

Elaine Wethington, Associate Professor, Human Development and Sociology
Institute for the Social Sciences, Cornell University
G52 Martha Van Rensselaer Hall
Ithaca, NY 14853
607.255.2918; ew20@cornell.edu

Wethington, co-director of the Cornell Institute for Translational Research on Aging, is a medical sociologist, specializing in the sociology of mental health and illness. Her research interests are in the areas of stress and the protective mechanisms of social support. Three current interests frame her work: 1) longitudinal studies of the impacts of life events, chronic difficulties, and their accumulation on changes in mental and physical health: 2) adaptation to work and family demands during midlife; 3) social isolation, social integration and health among older people.

Paul Wise M.D., Professor of Child Health and Society
Center for Health Policy, Center for Primary Care and Outcomes Research
Stanford University
117 Encina Commons
Stanford, CA 94305-6019
650.725.5645; pwise@stanford.edu

Wise’s areas of study focus on the health of children, women and families, particularly children's health policy; disparities in health outcomes by race, ethnicity and socioeconomic status; and the impact of medical technologies on disparities in health outcomes. Before coming to Stanford in July 2004, he was a professor of pediatrics at Boston University and vice chief of Social Medicine and Health Inequalities at Brigham and Women's Hospital. Earlier, he directed emergency and primary care services at the Children's Hospital of Boston, and he led the Harvard Institute for Reproductive and Child Health. He also has served as a special expert at the National Institutes of Health and as special assistant to the Surgeon General.

Fred H. Wulczyn, Research Fellow
Chapin Hall Center for Children
University of Chicago
5 Sheffield Drive
Clifton Park, NY 12065
773.256.5212; csaper@chapinhall.org

Wulczyn directs Chapin Hall's Multi-state Foster Care Data Archive, a longitudinal file containing the placement records of nearly 1.25 million foster children from 12 states. He's an expert on service agency administrative data analysis, studying child welfare outcomes and program development, and how states can connect fiscal data to program performance and outcomes. Wulczyn designed the Child Assistance Program, a major social experiment that won the Innovations in Government award from Harvard University and the Ford Foundation. He also developed the nation’s first proposal to change the federal law limiting states' ability to design innovative child welfare programs, which then led to the development of the Title IV-E waiver programs now used by 25 states to undertake system reform in child welfare programs. He continues to develop alternative approaches to financing child welfare programs.

Ying-Ying Yuan Ph.D., Senior Vice President
Walter R. McDonald and Associates Inc.
12300 Twinbrook Pkwy., Suite 310
Rockville, MD 20852
301.881.2590, Ext 310; info@wrma.com

Yuan and WRMA have led the team responsible for implementing the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System, including providing extensive technical assistance and data analysis to all states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. WRMA also developed and implemented the federal government's Statewide Automated Child Welfare Information System.

Julie Magno Zito Ph.D., Associate Professor of Pharmacy and Research
University of Maryland School of Pharmacy
Lombard Building Room 252
Baltimore, MD
410.706.0524; jzito@rx.umaryland.edu

Zito is the lead author of several published studies on the use of psychotropic drugs on children. In a 2003 report, she and colleagues reported that the number of children receiving psychotropic drug treatment had tripled from 1987 to 1996, to 6 percent of U.S. children. In a 2000 report, they estimated that 150,000 preschoolers (10 percent of them 2-year-olds) were on psychotropic drugs in 1995, up from 100,000 in 1991. She has also looked at the use of such drugs in child welfare systems and Medicaid.

ADVOCACY/NONPROFIT EXPERTS

Sue Badeau, Member
Govenor's Cabinet and Commission on Children and Families
1835 Market St., Suite 420
Philadelphia, PA 19103
215.568.0620, Ext. 18; sbadeau@philadelphiachildren.org

Badeau leads the commission, which aims to improve the health, safety, well-being and development of Philadelphia children and to make supportive policy a city priority. Badeau is a long-time child welfare professional, working in positions from direct casework to administration at the local, state and national levels. Before joining the commission in 2006, she was deputy director of the national, nonpartisan Pew Commission on Children in Foster Care. Badeau worked on the federal Chafee Foster Care Independence Act as a U.S. Senate Public Policy Fellow in 1999. She and her husband have been foster parents to more than 50 children and have adopted 20 children from foster care, raising them with their two biological children.

Marilyn Barr, Executive Director
National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome
2955 Harrison Blvd., #102
Ogden, UT 84403
801.627.3399; mail@dontshake.org

In 1999, Barr founded NCSBS, the only global organization dedicated solely to preventing this form of child abuse. The nonprofit organization focuses its efforts in two areas: professional training for those who work with SBS cases, and education for parents and those who work to prevent child abuse. Earlier, she served as executive director in the Utah office of Prevent Child Abuse America, a national nonprofit advocacy organization.

Laura Beavers, Research Associate
Kids Count, The Annie E. Casey Foundation
701 St. Paul St.
Baltimore, MD 21202
410.223.2975; lbeavers@aecf.org

The annual Kids Count Data Book is a national and state-by-state project of the Casey Foundation to track the status of children in the United States. Data from the 2008 “Right Start for America’s Newborns” report are available. State- and city-level data on birth outcomes are available on the online database, Kids Count Data Center, which allows users to generate custom graphs, maps, ranked lists, and state-by-state profiles; or download the entire data set. The 2007 Kids Count Data Book, to be released on June 26, 2007, looks at the goal of permanence or ensuring that every child and young person served by the child welfare system achieves a lifelong family connection.
Alternative Kids Count contact: William O'Hare, senior fellow, The Annie E. Casey Foundation; WOhare@aecf.org; 410.547.6600, ext. 2049

Cornelius Bird, Senior Consultant
Child Welfare Policy and Practice Group
3212 Northbrook Drive
Atlanta, GA 30341
678.427.5600; myrenebird@aol.com

Bird is a senior consultant with the Child Welfare Policy and Practice Group and has worked in the human services field for 25 years. In his work with state child welfare systems, he designs processes to ensure that families are involved in all aspects of their children’s case management and that agency services are culturally competent. Bird previously worked on system-wide reform efforts in several states and has served as project director for Western Washington University’s Children and Family Services Training Academy. He helped develop the Foster Parent Staff Development Institutes in Georgia and was a group facilitator at the Domestic Violence Resource Center’s Men Anger Control Program in Hillsboro, Ore. He was a subject matter expert for the publication Guidelines for Facilitating Child and Family Team Meetings with Family with a History of Domestic Violence, by the Family Violence Prevention Fund in San Francisco.

David Carrier, Outreach Director
Child Trends
4301 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 350
Washington, DC 20008
202.572.6138; dcarrier@childtrends.org

The nonprofit, nonpartisan research center studies children at every stage of development. It is a key source of information on a wide range of topics, including early childhood development, foster care and adoption, education, teen sex and pregnancy, and marriage and family. The Child Trends DataBank is a one-stop source for the latest national trends and research on more than 100 key indicators of child and youth well-being. Its recent reports include “Child Care Use by Low-Income Families: Variations Across States.” The nonprofit, nonpartisan organization provides research guidance to improve policies, programs and practices affecting children and their families. Its major research areas include: early childhood and youth development; child welfare; education; health; teen sex and pregnancy; fatherhood and parenting; and marriage and family. It studies children and youth at every stage of development and in every important subgroup (e.g., by race/ethnicity, family income, immigrant status). Its online DataBank provides the latest statistics on more than 100 indicators of well-being.

Terry Cross, Executive Director
National Indian Child Welfare Association
5100 SW Macadam Ave., Suite 300
Portland, OR 97201
503.222.4044, Ext. 112; tlcross@nicwa.org

Cross, an enrolled member of the Seneca Nation of Indians, is the association's developer and founder. He has at least 32 years of experience in child welfare, including a decade working directly with children and families. He also served on the faculty of Oregon's Portland State University School of Social Work. He has developed curricula for parents and for tribal child welfare staff. He also has written about culturally competent social services.

Carol Emig, President
Child Trends
4301 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 350
Washington, DC 20008
202.572.6003; cemig@childtrends.org

Emig has run Child Trends since late 2006. The nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization provides guidance to improve policies, programs and decisions affecting children and their families. Its major research areas include: early childhood development; child welfare; education; youth development and the transition to adulthood; health; teen sex and pregnancy; fatherhood and parenting; and marriage and family. It studies children and youth at every stage of development and in every important subgroup (by race/ethnicity, family income, parents’ marital status, immigrant status, etc.). Child Trends’ online DataBank provides the latest statistics on more than 100 key indicators of child and youth well-being.

Patrick Fagan, Senior Fellow
Family Research Council
801 G St.
Washington, DC 20001
202.393.2100; mcd@frc.org

A former deputy assistant secretary for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Fagan joined FRC in fall 2007 as a senior fellow and director of the Center for Marriage and Religion. The center supports the study of marital stability and religion, and how the two affect happiness, physical and mental health, income and savings, educational attainment and family stability as well as negative outcomes. Earlier, Fagan spent 13 years as a fellow at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., examining the relationships among family, community and social problems. He worked for HHS during the administration of President George H.W. Bush. Before his public policy career, Fagan was a child, family and marital therapist. Contact FRC's media office at 202.637.4615.

Robert C. Fellmeth, Executive Director
Children's Advocacy Institute, University of San Diego School of Law
5998 Alcala Park
San Diego, CA 92110
619.260.4806; cpil@acusd.edu

The institute is an academic center and statewide law firm that advocates for children in the courts, legislature and agencies. Fellmeth joined the USD faculty in 1977, founding its Center for Public Interest Law in 1980 and the institute in 1989. Fellmeth holds the Price Chair in Public Interest Law, teaches about children's rights and consumer law, directs a dependency court clinic representing abused children, and writes the annual California children's budget. Earlier, he was an attorney with the Center for the Study of Responsive Law in Washington, D.C., a deputy district attorney for San Diego County and an assistant U.S. attorney based there. He’s active on the boards of several foundations and associations, including Voices for America’s Children and the National Association of Counsel for Children. He has written at least 14 books, including “Child Rights and Remedies.”

Marvin Ferneau, President
National Foster Parent Association
403 W Madison, Box 221
Montezuma, IA 50171
641.623.3166; mferneau@nfpa.us

NFPA is a nonprofit volunteer organization that strives to support foster parents and to be a strong voice on behalf of all children. It serves foster families and the children and youth in their care through a network of affiliates in U.S. states and territories. Its headquarters are in Gig Harbor, Wash.

Sarah Greenblatt, Director
Casey Center for Effective Child Welfare Practice
Casey Family Services
127 Church St.
New Haven, CT 06510
203.401.6917; sgreenblatt@caseyfamilyservices.org

Greenblatt oversees the center, which offers technical assistance to those involved in family services. It aims to ensure positive outcomes for vulnerable children and families; coordinate and provide quality technical assistance; and develop knowledge and learning opportunities that support practice, program and policy improvements in the wider child welfare field.

Ron Haskins, Senior Fellow, Economic Studies
Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20036
202.797.6057; rhaskins@brookings.edu

Haskins is a senior fellow at Brookings and senior consultant at the Annie E. Casey Foundation. He co-directs Brookings’ Center on Children and Families, which disseminates research to Congress, advocates and the public. He served President George W. Bush in 2002 as a senior adviser on welfare policy. Before joining Brookings and AECF in 2000, Haskins spent 14 years working for the House Ways and Means human resources subcommittee. He edited several editions of its Green Book, a compendium that analyzes federal social programs and domestic policy issues including health care, poverty and unemployment. Haskins wrote “Work Over Welfare: The Inside Story of the 1996 Welfare Reform Law” (Brookings, 2006). He has co-edited several books, including “Welfare Reform and Beyond: The Future of the Safety Net” (Brookings, 2002).

Martha Henry, Director
Center for Adoption Research, University of Massachusetts Medical School
196 Maple Ave.
Shrewsbury, MA 01545
508.856.8510; martha.henry@umassmed.edu

The center works to improve foster care and adoption policy and practice by conducting research and policy analysis – and by developing education and training programs. It translates findings to reach policy makers and practitioners whose work affects children and families involved in foster care and adoption. Many of the center's staff members have personal connections to foster care and adoption. The center develops practical responses to the challenges of adoption and foster care, and addresses a broad range of regional, national and international adoption issues.

Barbara Holtan, Project Director
AdoptUsKids
8015 Corporate Drive, Suite C
Baltimore, MD 21236
410.933.5700; bholtan@adoptuskids.org

AEA is a nonprofit organization. It operates AdoptUsKids, a project funded by the federal Children's Bureau. Begun in 2002, the project promotes adoptive and foster family recruitment and retention. It also provides training and technical assistance to states and tribes. Holtan is responsible for the National Adoption Recruitment Campaign and the AdoptUsKids Web site. Earlier, Holtan specialized in placing foster children with special needs.

Joyce Johnson, Communications Director
Child Welfare League of America
2345 Crystal Drive, Suite 250
Arlington, VA 22202
804.492.4519; jjohnson@cwla.org

Johnson serves as the press liaison for the CWLA. The association of nearly 800 public and private nonprofit agencies assists more than 3.5 million abused and neglected children and their families each year with a range of services. Its many programs include those on child protection, domestic violence and juvenile justice. It's based in Washington, D.C.

Karen Jorgenson, Executive Director
National Foster Parent Association

7512 Stanich Lane, #6
Gig Harbor, WA 98335
800.557.5238; kjorgenson@NFPAinc.org

Jorgenson leads the NFPA, which since 1972 has supported foster parents in achieving safety, permanence and well-being for the children and youth in their care. Its members – at least 1,600 – include both foster parents and the agencies through which they're involved. A former foster parent, Jorgenson adopted two children.

Stuart Kantor, Senior Public Affairs Associate
Urban Institute
2100 M St. NW
Washington, DC 20037
202.261.5283; skantor@urban.org

The nonpartisan research institute investigates, analyzes and seeks solutions to U.S. social and economic problems. It works on issues involving work and income, housing and communities, child welfare, and civic engagement and philanthropy. Urban has 10 policy centers, including those focusing on low-income working families, economic security, education, health policy, criminal justice and taxes.

Marsha Levick, Legal Director and Co-Founder
Juvenile Law Center
The Philadelphia Building, 4th Floor
1315 Walnut St.
Philadelphia, PA 19107
215.625.0551; mlevick@jlc.org

Levick, an advocate for juvenile and women's rights, co-founded the center. She has represented children in delinquency and dependency proceedings and litigated challenges to conditions of confinement in juvenile institutions. She has worked to develop standards for prosecuting juveniles in the adult criminal justice system, and she's developing strategies to address girls' special needs in the juvenile justice and child welfare systems.

Marcia Robinson Lowry, Director
Children's Rights Inc.
330 Seventh Ave., 4th floor
New York, NY 10001
212.683.2210; mlowry@childrensrights.org

Children’s Rights works to promote and protect the rights of abused and neglected children in failing foster care systems, using policy analysis, public education and the power of the courts. Lowry founded Children’s Rights in 1995. Formerly director of the Children's Rights Project of the New York Civil Liberties Union and the American Civil Liberties Union, Lowry pioneered the first body of law to protect children in foster care, bringing increased attention and public scrutiny to systems that were all but ignored.

Media contact: Allan Margolin, 212.683.2210; amargolin@childrensrights.org

Scott Matson, Research Associate
Center for Sex Offender Management
Center for Effective Public Policy
8403 Colesville Road, Suite 720
Silver Spring, MD 20910
301.589.9383; smatson@cepp.com

CSOM supports state and local jurisdictions in the effective management of adult and juvenile sex offenders under community supervision. It is sponsored by the U.S. Department of Justice, in collaboration with the National Institute of Corrections, State Justice Institute and the American Probation and Parole Association.

Patrick McCarthy, President and CEO
The Annie E. Casey Foundation
701 St. Paul St.
Baltimore, MD 21202
410.223.2852; media@aecf.org

Since 1948, AECF has worked to build better futures for disadvantaged children and their families in the United States. Its primary mission is to foster public policies, human service reforms and community supports that more effectively meet the needs of vulnerable children and families. Prior to becoming president and CEO, McCarthy was senior vice president and oversaw the foundation's work in income security; child welfare; general, reproductive and mental health; substance abuse; juvenile justice; education; and early childhood and youth development.

Allison Nadelhaft, Public Relations Manager
National Association of Social Workers
750 First St. NE, Suite 700
Washington, DC 20002
202.336.8228; anadelhaft@naswdc.org

NASW is the largest membership organization of professional social workers in the world, with 153,000 members. It works to enhance the professional growth and development of its members, to create and maintain professional standards and to advance sound social policies.

William O'Hare Ph.D., Senior Fellow
Kids Count, The Annie E. Casey Foundation
701 St. Paul St.
Baltimore, MD 21202
410.547.6600, Ext. 2049; WOhare@aecf.org

O’Hare is a senior fellow at Casey and a visiting senior fellow at the University of New Hampshire’s Carsey Institute. At Casey, he has worked on Kids Count, a national and state-by-state effort that tracks the status and well-being of U.S. children, since 1990. He directed the project from 1993 to 2006. At Carsey, he joins in policy research on youth and working families in small cities and rural communities. Earlier, the social demographer directed policy studies at the Population Reference Bureau in Washington, D.C., and population and policy research at the University of Louisville’s Urban Studies Institute. O’Hare has testified before Congress on issues related to measurements of poverty and race. He has served on an advisory committee to the U.S. Census Bureau and as president of the Southern Demographic Association.

Michael Piraino, Chief Executive Officer
National Court Appointed Special Advocate Association (CASA)
100 W. Harrison St.
Seattle, WA 98119
800.628.3233, Ext. 202; michael@nationalcasa.org

CASA promotes the best interests of abused and neglected children who are involved in the juvenile courts. Staff members work with state and local CASA and volunteer guardian ad litem programs to support quality volunteer advocacy to help assure each child a safe, permanent, nurturing home. Piraino has served as CEO since 1994. While practicing law, he represented children as a guardian ad litem and served as a consultant to international social service and child advocacy organizations in Europe and Southeast Asia. Earlier, he worked as a juvenile probation officer and was an associate research scientist for Columbia University's National Center for Children in Poverty.

Robert Schwartz, Executive Director
Juvenile Law Center
The Philadelphia Building
1315 Walnut St., 4th Floor
Philadelphia, PA 19107
215.625.0551; rschwartz@jlc.org

JLC provides legal representation and services to children under the care of child welfare or juvenile justice systems, residential treatment facilities and adult prisons. A co-founder of the center, Schwartz has brought class-action litigation over institutional conditions and probation functions. He was chair of the American Bar Association's Juvenile Justice Committee from 1992 to 1998 and was a member of the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Adolescent Development and Juvenile Justice.

Carole Shauffer, Executive Director
Youth Law Center
417 Montgomery St., Suite 900
San Francisco, CA 94104
415.543.3379; cshauffer@ylc.org

The center – with offices in San Francisco and Washington, D.C. – works nationally to ensure humane treatment of children in adult jails, juvenile detention facilities, state institutions and child welfare systems. It pushes for improvement through training, technical assistance, negotiation or, as a last resort, litigation. Shauffer has extensive experience in child welfare and juvenile justice reform. She has written about special education in juvenile institutions, coordination of services to children, the rights of gay youth and the reasonable efforts requirement.

Linda Spears, Vice President
Child Welfare League of America
2345 Crystal Drive, Suite 250
Arlington, VA 22202
703.412.2400; lspears@cwla.org

Spears has worked on the front lines of child protection and in senior management of child welfare services for more than 25 years. Spears has served as associate vice president for programs, guiding CWLA's research, consultation, training and best practice activities in program areas including foster care, adoption and domestic violence.

Joe Theissen, Vice President for Policy and Government Affairs
Voices for America’s Children
1000 Vermont Ave. NW, Suite 700
Washington, DC 20005
202.289.0777; theissen@voices.org

Theissen leads federal lobbying efforts for Voices, a nonpartisan, national organization committed to speaking out for the well-being of children at the federal, state and local levels of government. It represents member organizations in nearly every state, as well as the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Before joining Voices in spring 2007, he was special assistant to the president for the Points of Light Foundation.

Contact Halle Czechowski, vice president for communication, at 202.380.1781 or czechowski@voices.org.

Suzanne Tiapula, Director
National Center for Prosecution of Child Abuse, National District Attorneys Association
99 Canal Center Plaza
Alexandria, VA 22314
703.549.9222

The nonprofit, federally funded center has resources that can assist in the investigation and prosecution of crimes against children.

Victor Vieth, Director
National Child Protection Training Center
Winona State University
Maxwell Hall, 2nd Floor
Winona, MN 55987-5838
507.457.2894; ictor.vieth@ncptc.org

Vieth is an expert on criminal and civil matters pertaining to abused children. He spearheads a program to improve forensic interviewing of child victims in the United States. The center, launched in 2003 to develop and disseminate model child protection curricula, was affiliated with the National District Attorneys Association until late 2007. It's now affiliated with the National Association to Prevent Sexual Abuse of Children, a nonprofit based in St. Paul, Minn.

Paul Vincent, Director
Child Welfare Policy and Practice Group
428 E. Jefferson St.
Montgomery, AL 36104
334.264.8300, Ext. 13; pv@childwelfaregroup.org

Vincent, a former director of Alabama's Division of Family and Children's Services, is a co-founder of the group. The private nonprofit, staffed by child welfare and mental health professionals, assists child welfare systems in designing and managing organizational changes that improve outcomes for children and their families. Vincent and his colleagues have consulted with at least a third of the nation's child welfare systems.

Richard Wexler, Executive Director
National Coalition for Child Protection Reform
53 Skyhill Road, Suite 202
Alexandria, VA 22314
703.212.2006; rwexler@nccpr.org

The coalition is dedicated to seeking comprehensive change in the child protective system. Its members believe that many children taken from their homes and placed in foster care don't need to be there; that these children could have been safely kept in their own homes. Wexler's interest in the child welfare system grew out of 19 years of work as a reporter for newspapers, public radio and public television.

FEDERAL/STATE EXPERTS

Wade Horn Ph.D., Director
U.S. / State Government Sector
Deloitte Consulting LLP
12010 Sunset Hills Road, Suite 500
Reston, VA 20190
703.885.6000

Horn is an adviser to health and human services clients of Deloitte Consulting’s state government practice. Before joining Deloitte in 2007, he'd been assistant secretary for ACF since 2001. While there, Horn worked to increase the effectiveness of Head Start and early childhood education programs, promote positive youth development and build partnerships with community and faith-based organizations in delivering social services to the poor. Additionally, Horn launched a mentoring program for children of incarcerated parents and a public awareness campaign to help rescue victims of human trafficking. Earlier, Horn was president of the National Fatherhood Initiative.

Contact Tourang Nazari in public relations at 703.885.6233 or tnazari@deloitte.com.

Orlando Prescott, Presiding Judge
Miami-Dade Juvenile Court
11th Judicial Circuit-State of Florida
3300 NW 27th Ave.
Miami, FL 33142
Prescott was appointed in July 2009 by new Miami-Dade Chief Judge Joel H. Brown.

John Mattingly, Commissioner
Administration for Children's Services
New York City
150 William St., 18th Floor
New York, NY 10038
212.341.0900; Nora.Rodriguez@dfa.state.ny.us

Mattingly was appointed ACS commissioner in 2004. The agency, established in 1996, oversees child protective, foster care, adoption, child care and Head Start services. Before joining ACS, Mattingly directed human services reforms for The Annie E. Casey Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to building better futures for disadvantaged children and families. There, he designed and for 12 years managed the Family to Family foster care initiative; he also led AECF’s child welfare policy team. From 1998 to 2001, Mattingly served on the New York City Special Child Welfare Advisory Panel, whose work helped end two child welfare class action lawsuits. Earlier, Mattingly spent more than six years as executive director of Lucas County (Ohio) Children Services, the public child welfare agency serving the Toledo area. He also was executive director of the Institute for Child Advocacy and the West Side Community House, both in Cleveland. Before that, he directed the Camp Hill Project, Pennsylvania’s statewide effort to remove juveniles from its adult correctional system.

Daniel Schneider Ph.D., Acting Assistant Secretary for Children and Families
Administration for Children and Families (ACF)
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
370 L'Enfant Plaza Promenade SW
Washington, DC 20201
202.690.5977 ; Daniel.Schneider@HHS.GOV

Schneider became acting assistant secretary in April 2007. ACF oversees programs that promote the social and economic well-being of America’s children, youth and families. Before joining ACF, Schneider served as the general counsel at the National Endowment for the Humanities. During his NEH appointment, he spent a year as deputy associate director of the White House Office of Presidential Personnel.

Kenneth Wolfe, ACF Acting Deputy Director
Administration on Children and Families
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
370 L'Enfant Promenade, SW
Washington, DC 20201
202.401.9215; kenneth.wolfe@acf.hhs.gov

ACF funds state, territory, local and tribal organizations to improve the economic and social well-being of families, children, individuals and communities. It oversees roughly 60 programs involving child welfare and child support, Head Start, child care, family violence, and fatherhood and marriage.

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