Ms. Ayada Bonilla

Ayada Bonilla is the School-Based Behavioral Health Educational Specialist in the Hawai‘i State Department of Education Office of Student Support Services. Ayada Bonilla has been committed to this program for over 20 years.

Currently, Ms. Bonilla is focused on developing an infrastructure that values evidence-based practice and data-based decision-making. Receiving a 12.5 million dollar over 5 years USDOE grant, she has secured partnership with PracticeWise, LLC to offer modular cognitive behavioral therapy training and data-based decision tool resources to all department staff. Launching a new service record system, integrating research-informed practice elements and treatment target language, has enabled system evaluation to improve services statewide and alignment with other state system of care agencies.

Ms. Bonilla has been described as a kind, generous, and revolutionary force, as she works to improve access and quality of mental health care for children and adolescents.

Dr. Regine Galanti

Regine Galanti is the founder of Long Island Behavioral Psychology, where she focuses on providing evidence-based treatment to children and teens. Dr. Galanti has centered her career on dissemination to the public.

Dr. Galanti goes beyond her clinical duties to educate the public about evidence-based therapies. She uses her social media presence, media interviews, and community presentations to disseminate CBT based principles. In her capacity as an author, she focuses on simplifying complex CBT for children, teens, and parents. In her unwavering commitment, she breaks barriers between academia and practice.

Dr. Galanti has been described as a person who focuses on providing evidence-based treatment information to the community beyond her individual reach, so that others can access key CBT principles, helping organize information to make dissemination simple.

Ms. Elizabeth Koschmann

Elizabeth Koschmann is the Founder and CEO of TRAILS. She launched TRAILS at the University of Michigan as a small pilot program in 2013, initially serving only two schools. Since then, TRAILS has evolved into a fast-growing organization that is transforming school mental health programming statewide in Michigan and beyond.

Along the way, Dr. Koschmann has spearheaded several research initiatives, and co-led a five-year clinical trial funded by the National Institutes of Health, which evaluated TRAILS in 100 Michigan schools. In the last two years alone, TRAILS has secured public funding, and trained 8,000 school professionals, providing nearly 200,000 more students access to mental health services. In Michigan, 46% of schools using TRAILS are Title I designated schools.

Dr. Koschmann enjoys collaborating with partners at the state and national level, always working in pursuit of a world in which all young people have access to the effective, equitable, and inclusive mental health care services they need.

Dr. Vanessa Ramirez

Vanessa Ramirez is Chief Program Officer at Kristi House Child Advocacy Center with 20 years of research and clinical experience working with high-risk children and families with complex psychiatric and social needs. Dr. Ramirez oversees a staff of 25 therapists and family advocates working in four locations, including program planning and implementation of multiple evidence-based therapies.

As project investigator for Kristi House’s federal SAMHSA grant, she led its C-START program focused on building capacity at the CAC and community-wide to deliver evidence-based treatments (EBTs) for childhood trauma. She specializes in marginalized and underserved populations, including Unaccompanied Children.

Dr. Ramirez has served as a consultant and author on numerous projects related to Unaccompanied Minors. She collaborated in adapting Psychological First Aid for Unaccompanied Children, which provides guidance on trauma-informed approaches to providers working in emergency settings for UC. She was a member of the 2020 National Child Traumatic Stress Network Policy Task Force, which focused on issues affecting UC and consulted in developing a policy brief titled “Children, Youth, and Families Who Experience Migration-Related Trauma and Family Separation.”

She is currently part of the Curriculum Development Project on Trauma-Informed Care for the Office of Refugee Resettlement.

Dr. Lucene Wisniewski

Lucene Wisniewski is the Chief Clinical Officer, Center for Evidence Based Treatment (CEBTOhio) and Adjunct Assistant Professor at Case Western Reserve University. She is a clinician, trainer, and researcher whose interests center around using empirically founded treatments to inform clinical practice. In addition to training, lectures, and scholarly work, her center has been at the forefront of training clinicians in real world settings.

Dr. Wisniewski and CEBT stand apart in their willingness and ability to take on some of the most challenging cases. CEBT welcomes patients with complex issues who have often been turned away by other practitioners.

Dr. Wisniewski has also developed a national reputation for working with patients in the Orthodox Jewish community, an underserved population that historically shy away from secular treatment. Her team conducted a comprehensive literature review and consulted with Orthodox Jewish colleagues to ensure that the EBTs offered would be culturally sensitive.

Jonathan E. Alpert, M.D., Ph.D.

Jonathan E. Alpert is Chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and Professor of Psychiatry, Neuroscience and Pediatrics at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Medical Center. He is also Chair of the Council on Research at the American Psychiatric Association. His interests include pharmacological and psychotherapy treatments of mood disorders, ethical issues in research design, advancing mental health education and training, addressing research and training gaps in areas such as perinatal mental health and the mental health impacts of climate change, and promoting mental health equity in research and clinical care. Dr. Alpert is recognized as a Champion for three decades of work on the identification of novel therapeutic targets and treatments for depression; for his specific interest in and passion for hiring and supporting CBT trained clinicians; and for his role as a psychiatrist leading the APA research council, where he has assured evidence-based psychological approaches are considered in APA recommendations.

Yesenia Ceballos, M.A., APCC, PPS

Serving 20+ years in education as a teacher and school counselor in diverse school settings, she is currently the wellness counselor for Sierra High School (SHS) in San Bernardino, CA. Yesenia’s personal story inspired her to be a change agent for historically underserved youth. Through her efforts in coordinating services with community-based organizations, students receive evidence-based therapies such as CBT and DBT and an accompanying health and wellness class. SHS students treated for depression, anxiety, PTSD, borderline personality disorder, self-harm behaviors and chronic suicidal ideation on the school campus had increased rates of achievement and decreased absenteeism. Thanks to her efforts, the San Bernardino City Unified School district is using the Sierra High School Wellness Center as a model to replicate throughout schools in the district.

Theodore K. Kyle, RPh, MBA

Since founding ConscienHealth in 2009, Ted Kyle has advocated for access and utilization of evidence-based behavioral therapy for obesity. Through his work, he reaches experts, policymakers, and patient advocates. Kyle has raised awareness for the role of prevailing bias about obesity and people who are living with it. This bias fuels a social norm that creates resistance to behavioral therapies. Because of his advocacy, popular media figures, such as Bill Maher, have criticized Kyle falsely, suggesting that he is an advocate for fat acceptance. Despite such criticism, Kyle risks his reputation due to his commitment to effect change.

Dr. Meg Harrell

Dr. Margaret “Meg” Harrell is the Chief Program Officer at the Bob Woodruff Foundation. She formerly served the Obama Administration as the Executive Director of Force Resiliency, within the Office of the Secretary of Defense, where she was responsible for sexual assault prevention and response; suicide prevention; diversity, inclusion, and equal opportunity; personnel safety; and for Department of Defense collaboration with the Department of Veterans’ Affairs. Dr. Harrell spent 25 years at the RAND Corporation and her research portfolio includes approximately 70 publications pertaining to military manpower and personnel, military families’ quality of life, and veterans’ issues. Concurrent with her time at RAND, Dr. Harrell served as a presidential appointee to the National Commission on the Structure of the Air Force, 2013-2014. From July 2011 to August 2012, Dr. Harrell served as a Senior Fellow and founding Director of the Military, Veterans, and Society Program at the Center for a New American Security. She is a prior voting member of the Army Science Board, and has also briefed international audiences, testified before Congress, spoken extensively at conferences, and guest lectured at the United States Military Academy. She holds a B.A. with Distinction from the University of Virginia, a M.S. in Systems Analysis and Management from the George Washington University, and a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology from the University of Virginia, where her dissertation focused on the role expectations for Army spouses.

Leah Peskin

Leah Peskin established the Gavin Farrell Foundation in 2017 after the profound loss in the death of a much-beloved son and brother who suffered from PTSD. The Foundation’s mission is to ensure everyone with PTSD has access to effective treatments. GFF has trained 231 clinicians in Cognitive Processing Therapy, including 42 bilingual clinicians and 9 clinicians who serve the deaf community. Leah has also been working on improving access in Israel through sponsoring PE Consultants Training with Dr. Foa and partnering with the Ministry of Health to broker an integrated CPT training program within the public mental health clinics with Drs. Patricia Resick and Danny Derby.

Courtney Wells, Ph.D.

Dr. Courtney Wells (they/them) is owner and psychologist at Pivot Psychological Services, a Chicago-based practice specializing in evidence-based trauma treatments. Outside of the therapy office, they lecture at the University of Chicago and volunteer as an associate board member for Resilience (formerly Rape Victims Advocates). Dr. Wells is also a TEDx speaker. In their recent talk, they use Acceptance and Commitment Therapy principles to loosen our grip on the gender binary. Over the years, Dr. Wells has worked with Veteran Affairs and was the creator and director of the largest trauma-focused partial hospitalization and intensive outpatient program in Chicago.

Dr. Chad Wetterneck

Dr. Wetterneck is a licensed psychologist and Clinical Director of Trauma Recovery Services at Rogers Behavioral Health. At Rogers, he developed the adult trauma recovery programs at the residential, partial hospital, and intensive outpatient levels of care, and helped incorporate a cognitive behavioral therapy-based approach into Rogers’ addiction and mental health recovery programs. Dr. Wetterneck also grew a program that now trains dozens of students and counselors in evidence-based treatments for PTSD, OCD, and depression each year. He was also highlighted for his work to build bridges with practitioners who disagree with EBPs.

Wounded Warrior Project, led by CEO Lt. Gen (Ret.) Michael Linnington, and Program Manager Lt. Col. (Ret.) Michael Richardson

Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) has funded the Warrior Care Network at 4 academic medical centers: Emory University, Massachusetts General Hospital, Rush University, and UCLA to provide evidence‐based care to post-9/11 veterans. Each of the programs offers a 2‐ or 3‐week intensive outpatient program and 3 of the 4 programs offer outpatient therapy. They all offer either prolonged imaginal exposure therapy or cognitive processing therapy or both. They have made evidence‐based therapy more available and are creating many new jobs for evidence-based therapists.

Maria Contreras, Training Coordinator, Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health

Maria Contreras, M.A., has been a public servant with Los Angeles County for almost 20 years and in her current role with the Department of Mental Health for the past 7 years. As the primary Training Coordinator organizing and hosting CBT trainings, Ms. Contreras’ work has resulted in approximately 2,000 clinicians trained in providing quality mental health treatment across Los Angeles County.  She acts as the administrative ambassador for the practice, problem solving countless logical challenges such as waning leadership support, technology adoption, procurement, and scheduling. Ms. Contreras lives in the San Gabriel Valley with her husband and two sons.

Beth Cooney, Mercy Family Center

Beth Cooney, LCSW-BACS, has had a remarkable impact on trauma-exposed youth in New Orleans area schools through her passion and dedication to improve access to evidence-based psychological treatment.  Over the last 15 years, her work has been centered around providing treatment, training, and clinical supervision to improve mental health care in schools. Through her collaboration with sites in the National Child Traumatic Stress Network, she has created and developed innovative programming in schools with a focus on multiple evidence-based grief and trauma interventions and secondary traumatic stress.

Laura Danna, Mercy Family Center

Laura Danna, LCSW, has served as Director of Project Fleur-de-lis and Clinician at Mercy Family Center in New Orleans, LA. She is a certified trainer in Cognitive Behavioral Intervention for Trauma in Schools (CBITS) and provides training/consultation both locally and nationally. She has worked closely with the developers of this model and other evidence-based interventions to ensure fidelity and to promote effective assessment and implementation in a variety of schools. She has been a tireless advocate for the use of evidence-based trauma treatments to improve the quality of mental health services in schools for almost 15 years.

Christopher McMahon, CEO and Co-Founder of Passages Hospice; Co-Founder and Chairman of Longbranch Healthcare

Christopher McMahon struggled with addiction for a decade before finding recovery more than 21 years ago. In that time, he has founded two healthcare organizations that employ over 250 people who all work in service to provide evidence-based care to clients. Passages Hospice was founded in 2009 and Longbranch Healthcare, a network of substance-use disorder programs, was founded in 2017. Both companies were born out of a belief that our region deserved a higher standard of care than what was currently available. He has received numerous accolades for his efforts to innovate healthcare services in Louisiana.

Lesley A. Slavin, Chief Psychologist at the Hawaii State Child and Adolescent Mental Health Division

Dr. Slavin, Ph.D., Chief Psychologist, Hawaii State Child and Adolescent Mental Health Division (CAMHD), retired in August from her leadership role at CAMHD where she worked for 18 years supervising the division’s psychologists, training providers, developing policy, and promoting evidence-based practice and measurement-based care. Dr. Slavin’s work emphasized fostering interagency cooperation, including working with Child Welfare to develop a new jointly funded Residential Crisis Stabilization Program, and working with two other state departments to establish a new predoctoral psychology internship consortium. Dr. Slavin’s interest in trauma has informed much of her work, including a successful effort to minimize the use of seclusion and restraint in the system, and developing a model of gender-responsive care for girl’s exposed to trauma.

Glenace Edwall, Ph.D., Psy.D., M.P.P., Director of Children’s Mental Health, Minnesota Department of Human Services (retired)

Dr. Edwall has worked tirelessly to evolve the division of Children’s Mental Health toward an expanded role in the healthcare system, through the introduction of evidence-based treatment and related quality initiatives. Dr. Edwall was instrumental in implementing an expansion of Medicaid benefits through new programing and championed a vision of available research-informed interventions for all children needing them.

T. Lindsey Burrell, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Pediatrics, Emory University School of Medicine, Clinician and Supervisor, Feeding Program at the Marcus Autism Center, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta

Dr. Burrell provides clinical treatment to children with Autism Spectrum Disorder, including supervision and mentorship of trainees. She trains and supervises practicum students and interns in evidence-based interventions and actively works to improve existing interventions. For example, she is working on enhancing a feeding treatment for children with developmental and other disabilities. Her work includes revising protocols and developing a phone-based app and website to make the treatment easier to disseminate and more palatable for parents. She is involved in numerous projects to promote innovation and increase the impact of family-based interventions.

Lanalle Darden, MS.Ed., LMSW, Children, Adolescents and Families (CAF) Services Director, Santee-Wateree Community Mental Health Center

Ms. Darden has spearheaded a number of evidence-based practice initiatives at the Santee-Wateree Community Mental Health Center. Ms. Darden has a demonstrated history of advocacy and support, as well as active engagement with prominent researchers. She has gone above and beyond agreed-upon research involvement to problem solve implementation challenges, participate in trainings, use evidence generated from research to inform her decision making around changes in her own clinic. Her influence on providers and supervisors is clear in the caliber of their work, and their capacity to both adopt and implement new evidence-based practices.

Patricia Nygaard, Ph.D., Immediate Past Quality & Performance Manger, Children’s Mental Health, Minnesota Department of Human Services

Dr. Nygaard has served the Minnesota Department of Human Services in various roles for more than 15 years. During this time she has promoted the implementation of multiple evidence-based services across diverse levels of care ranging from school-based settings to residential services. She has been a strong and enduring advocate of measurement-based care and the use of evidence to improve the quality of children’s mental health service.

Joshua A. Gordon, M.D., Ph.D., Director of NIMH

Dr. Gordon’s own neuroscience research focuses on neural analysis and directly translates to furthering our understanding of schizophrenia, depression, and anxiety disorders. He also oversees a research portfolio at NIMH that seeks to promote preventions, recovery, and cure of mental health disorders.

David Chambers, DPhil, Deputy Director for Implementation Science, Office of the Director in the Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS) at the National Cancer Institute (NCI)

Dr. Chambers has been an integral part of advancing the field of implementation science by fostering dissemination and implementation research within the NIH portfolio, funding opportunity announcements, training programs, research activities, dissemination platforms, and enhancement of partnerships and networks to integrate research, practice and policy. He has also published several seminal papers advancing the field of implementation science to enhance translation of research to practice.

Arthur Evans, Jr., Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer and Executive Vice President

Dr. Evans served as the commissioner of Philadelphia’s Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual Disability Service for 12 years. In this role, he served as a champion of implementation and dissemination of evidence-based psychotherapies throughout the city of Philadelphia and improved health outcomes and increased the efficiency of the Philadelphia system.

Rep. Joseph Kennedy, III, J.D. (D, MA)

Congressman Kennedy has a record of working towards bipartisan, comprehensive mental health reform. He has been an advocate for systemic reform of the mental health system, proposing the Fair Care for Kids Act to facilitate mental health treatment for children on Medicaid (signed into law in 2016), and introducing the Behavioral Health Coverage Transparency Act of 2015, to hold insurers accountable for providing adequate mental health benefits and increase transparency for consumers.

Sarah Hollingsworth Lisanby, M.D., Director, Division of Translational Research NIMH

Dr. Lisanby is one of the leading researchers in the area of neuromodulatory interventions for treating major depression. She has been an outstanding mentor to numerous investigators and as Director for the Division of Translational Research at NIMH, Dr. Lisanby has a major impact on the national research approach to mental illness.

Denise (Denny) Pintello, Ph.D., Chief of the Child and Adolescent Research Program, NIMH

Dr. Pintello previously oversaw the implementation of innovative scientific initiatives and special research dissemination projects, and currently supports implementation science research efforts within the NIMH portfolio. Prior to her time at NIH, she worked as a social worker and focused on child welfare, mental health, and substance abuse.

Jonathan Purtle, DrPH and MPH, Assistant Professor, Dornsife School of Public Health, Drexel University

Dr. Purtle is a leader in the field of dissemination research, and has developed strategies to effectively disseminate mental health evidence to state policymakers, as well as identifying ways to reduce health inequities in US cities.

Joel Sherrill, Chief of the Psychosocial Treatment Research Program at the NIMH, Director of the Division of Services and Intervention Research at NIMH

Dr. Sherrill works to advance psychological research by identifying research priorities within intervention and services research. He regularly attends ABCT and consistently advises clinical researchers and supports investigator-initiated projects with targeted initiatives directed at specific populations or clinical practice questions to advance research on enhancing mental health care.

Pia Escudero, Director of the Los Angeles Unified School District School Mental Health

Ms. Escudero oversees more than 300 professionals (psychiatric social workers, psychiatrists, and clinical psychologists) and provides local and national leadership to assist in the development, implementation, evaluation, and dissemination of trauma-informed and trauma-specific services for children and families in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) School Mental Health. Ms. Escudero has also participated in the development of the California Mental Health Services Act and represented LAUSD, students, and school stakeholders in several local and state workgroups. She has also served as a champion for evidence-based mental health treatments in routine care in the Los Angeles community.

Bruce Cuthbert, Ph.D., Directors, RDoC Unit, National Institute of Mental Health

Dr. Cuthbert previously served as the Chief of NIMH’s Adult Psychopathology and Prevention Research branch, as the Director of the Division of Adult Translational Research and Treatment Development, and the acting director of NIMH. He has also spearheaded the Research Domain Criteria project (RDoC) which has had a major impact on the national research agenda. The primary goal of RDoC is to gain a better understanding of mental disorders by providing a new classification system that incorporates many levels of information (from genomics to self-report).

Beverly Pringle, Ph.D., Chief of the Global Mental Health Research Program at the National Institute of Mental Health

Dr. Pringle oversees scientific leadership for the institute’s global research activities, monitors NIMH’s international grants and activities, and provides consultation to the global mental health research community. Her work has supported expansion of mental health services to the global community.

David I. Sommers, Ph.D., ABPP, Scientific Review Officer, National Institute of Mental Health

Dr. Sommers has been a tireless champion for interventions research as a Scientific Review Officer for NIMH for more than 18 years. He is deeply committed to facilitating the development, testing, and dissemination of evidence-based psychosocial interventions, thereby serving an instrumental role in improving mental health outcomes. Dr. Sommers is also a practicing clinical psychologist, delivering evidence-based care to those with mood and anxiety disorders.

Kim Griffin Esperon, LCSW, Field Coordinator, Los Angeles Unified School District’s School Mental Health Department

Ms. Griffin Esperon provides administrative oversight to the LA Unified School District’s 15 mental health clinics and wellness centers, playing a critical role in strategic and operational management of implementation quality of student mental health services. Her 20 years of collaboration, leadership, and service have led to successful and efficient implementation of evidence-based interventions, affecting tens of thousands of students’ lives in one of the largest school districts in the country.

Mark Chavez, Ph.D., Division of Translational Research, NIMH

For nearly two decades, Dr. Chavez has been committed to the training and career development of clinician-scientists at the graduate, postgraduate, and early-career levels at the National Institute of Mental Health. Through his diverse portfolio, he has played an integral role in the research funding, promotion, and success of many of the emerging leaders in psychology and psychiatry in the country. In addition, he conducts an intramural program of research on the etiology, core features, longitudinal course, and assessment of eating disorders.