IFMH Graduate Certificate

Courses: CLP 6477 and CLP 6462

Dr. McHale is Executive Director of the USF St. Petersburg Infant-Family Mental Health Center at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital, directs the USFSP Family Study Center, and is a Professor of Psychology at USF St. Petersburg. He trained as a family therapist in both Palo Alto and Philadelphia, and served for many years as Director of Clinical Training at Clark University in Worcester, MA. He is the nation’s leading expert on coparenting in diverse family systems, and his studies of coparenting and child development have been supported since 1996 by the National Institute of Mental Health, and the National Institute of Child Health and Development. He has authored more than 200 conference research reports and published over 70 articles, books, and other manuscripts on the topic of coparenting, and his 2007 book, "Charting the Bumpy Road of Coparenthood," received Zero to Three’s Irving B. Harris Book Award. In 2004, Dr. McHale delivered the World Association for Infant Mental Health’s 'Decade of Behavior" lecture, introducing the concept of coparenting in diverse family systems. Together with Dr. Susan Allen, Dr. McHale created the Infant-Family Mental Health certificate program at USFSP, and he has taught in the program since its inception.

Courses: PSY 6931 Special Topics: Assessment of Infant-Family Mental Health and
                 PSY 6931 Special Topics/Coparenting and Systems Change for Infant-Family                               Mental Health

Dr. Pinto is a licensed clinical child psychologist with a specialization in infant mental health. She is a Lake Maggiore Shores resident and directs the Lake Maggiore Shores Neighborhood Readiness Initiative, a neighbor-led, place-based approach to community-scale infant-family mental health. Previously she established and directed an infant/early childhood mental health clinic at a community mental health agency in Los Angeles County, California and served as a DC:0-3R national trainer for Zero to Three. She directed neighborhood and community data initiatives at a non-profit community engagement organization in Sarasota, Florida and was co-founder of a neighborkid-oriented community change organization established with fellow residents in the Central-Cocoanut neighborhood. She also designed and facilitated a variety of community-based efforts related to early childhood and community change at the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County. She was an Assistant Research Professor at the USF Florida Mental Health Institute in Tampa, Florida and Clinical Training Director at community mental health agencies in Oakland and Santa Monica, California. She contributes to Family Study Center efforts in relation to community collaborations and systems change initiatives.

Course: CLP 6477 Infant Family Mental Health

Dr. Hogan is the 2015-2016 President of the Florida Association of Infant Mental Health. After leading the FSU Harris IMH Training institute from 2003-2013, she has continued to provide training and consultation on early childhood development and infant mental health foundations throughout Florida. Trained as an applied developmental psychologist, her early research and experience focused on social-emotional development in vulnerable infants and young children. More recently she has focused on IMH training and workforce development for multidisciplinary audiences, with an emphasis on child development and applications of IMH and developmental principles.

Relevant publications:

Quay, H.C., Hogan, A.E., & Donohue, K. (2009). Competencies for infant mental health therapists: A survey of expert opinion. Infant Mental Health Journal, 30, 180-201.

Hogan, A.E., Dillon, C.O., Fernandes, S., Spieker, S., & Zeanah, P. (2012). Creating and sustaining an interdisciplinary infant-early childhood mental health workforce. Zero To Three Bulletin, 33, 35-42.

Hogan, A.E., & Quay, H.C. (2014). Bringing a developmental perspective to early childhood and family interventionists: Where to begin. In J. Benson (Ed.), Advances in child development and behavior, vol 46.London: Elsevier.

Certificate Program Coordinator
ebonymiller@usf.edu

Ebony has 20 years of experience in Child welfare, Managed care and the medical/ pediatric hospital setting. In addition to role as the IFMH Certificate Program Coordinator, her current position at the USFSP Family Study Center has allowed her to continue the very important work of supporting collaborative efforts with the community and juvenile court system to achieve swifter permanency outcomes for infants and toddlers in foster care.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Working with Post-Divorce Family Systems

Debra Carter is a Clinical and Forensic Psychologist, Parent Coordinator, and Florida Supreme Court Certified Family Law Mediator. She is Co-Founder and Chief Clinical Director of the National Cooperative Parenting Center (NCPC) offering services to Mental Health and Legal Communities and to families and children struggling with divorce- related issues. Dr. Carter provided leadership in development of standardized Parental Responsibility Guidelines emphasizing needs of children in divorce, adopted and endorsed by the court. She is author of "Parenting Coordination: A Practical Guide for Family Law Professionals," and several articles on empirically-based parenting plans, parenting coordination and family law matters.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Working with Post-Divorce Family Systems

Debra Carter is a Clinical and Forensic Psychologist, Parent Coordinator, and Florida Supreme Court Certified Family Law Mediator. She is Co-Founder and Chief Clinical Director of the National Cooperative Parenting Center (NCPC) offering services to Mental Health and Legal Communities and to families and children struggling with divorce- related issues. Dr. Carter provided leadership in development of standardized Parental Responsibility Guidelines emphasizing needs of children in divorce, adopted and endorsed by the court. She is author of "Parenting Coordination: A Practical Guide for Family Law Professionals," and several articles on empirically-based parenting plans, parenting coordination and family law matters.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Group Interventions for Committed Couples with Young Children

Philip A. Cowan is Professor of Psychology, Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, where he served as Director of the Clinical Psychology Program and the Institute of Human Development. In addition to authoring numerous scientific articles, he is the author of Piaget with Feeling (Holt, Rinehart, & Winston, 1978), co-author with Carolyn Pape Cowan of When partners become parents: The big life change for couples (Erlbaum, 2000), and co-editor of four books and monographs, including Family Transitions (Erlbaum, 1990) and The family context of parenting in the child’s adaptation to school (Erlbaum, 2005). Phil was a founding member of the Council on Contemporary Families, and in 1999, received the Distinguished Contribution to Family Systems Research award from the American Family Therapy Academy.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Working with Extended and Kinship Families

Joseph Crumbley is a family therapist, trainer and consultant to numerous institutions and organizations that serve infants, toddlers and young children, including Spaulding for Children, Casey Family Programs, Casey Family Services, Brookdale Foundation, the Child Welfare League of America and the Department of Health and Human Services. Internationally, Dr. Crumbley has worked with the New Zealand Ministry of Children and Family Services, the Ministry of Children and Youth in Ontario Canada, the British Association for Adoption and Fostering, and the International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect in Durban, South Africa. His clinical experience includes kinship care, foster care, adoption, chemical dependency, couples therapy, physical and sexual abuse, and transracial adoptions.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Working with the Modern United States Military Family

Dr. DeVoe is Associate Professor at the Boston University School of Social Work (BUSSW) and Principal Investigator on a federally-funded investigation of Strong Families Strong Forces, a family based reintegration program designed for military parents returning from Iraq and/or Afghanistan who have children ages birth to five. More broadly, her scholarship focuses on the impact of violence on young children and families and on the development and evaluation of interventions designed to mitigate such effects. Dr. Devoe’s clinical interests include work with very young children and their families where there has been trauma, domestic violence, or sexual abuse.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Working with Families of Children with Developmental Delays and Disabilities

V. Mark Durand, professor of psychology at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg, is an internationally-recognized expert in autism spectrum disorders. He has received over $4 million in research federal funding and has over 100 publications on functional communication, educational programming, and behavior therapy. Dr. Durand developed a unique treatment for severe behavior problems now used worldwide. Most recently he developed an innovative approach to help families work with their challenging children (Optimistic Parenting).

Elisabeth Fivaz-Depeursinge, Ph.D, PD has retired from teaching as a professor of clinical ethology at the University of Lausanne School of Medicine. She was president of the University Center for Family Studies and head of its research department. Trained in developmental psychology at the University of Geneva, she served as clinical assistant professor of psychiatry at the university of Virginia, USA and as invited professor in Israel and in Italy. Dr Fivaz-Depeursinge was a practicing child analyst and family therapist before she moved into the area of clinical research. Central to her approach was the Lausanne Trilogue Play situation (LTP), which was designed to observe the typical development of triangular and multi-person communication in families, as well as to identify maladaptive trajectories as early as infancy. Created with A. Corboz-Warnery, the LTP is currently used in research on the family in more than 10 countries, in dozens of research and clinical settings. This paradigm was the subject of a book, co-authored with A. Corboz-Warnéry: "The Primary Triangle. A Developmental Systems Approach of Fathers, Mothers and Infants" (New York, Basic Books, 1999), which has now been translated into a number of languages.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Cultural Considerations in Working with Families of Infants and Toddlers

Chandra Ghosh Ippen is Associate Research Director of the Child Trauma Research Program at the University of California, San Francisco and the Early Trauma Treatment Network, a member of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN). She is past co-chair of the Cultural Competence Consortium of the NCTSN, and is committed to examining how culture and context affect perception and mental health systems. She has conducted treatment outcome research on the effectiveness of psychosocial intervention programs with Spanish-speaking children and parents, and authored "The sociocultural context of infant mental health: Towards contextually congruent intervention," for the 3rd edition of the Handbook of Infant Mental Health.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6477, Topic: Infant biological and brain development – pregnancy to age 3

Peter Gorski is Chief Health and Child Development Officer of the Children’s Trust, Miami-Dade County, FL and former director of Research and Innovation at the Children’s Board of Hillsborough County, professor of Public Health, Pediatrics and Psychiatry at the University of South Florida, and Director of the Lawton and Rhea Chiles Center for Healthy Mothers and Babies at USF. He also served as director of Professional Education at the Brazelton Institute of Boston Children’s Hospital, and served on the National Commission on the Prevention of Black Infant Mortality at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies in Washington, D.C. Dr. Gorski has published 50 peer-reviewed articles on infant and early childhood relationships and early brain development, social determinants of health, and community health. He has devoted his career to training health professionals and community advocates to support optimal processes of child and family development.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6477, Topic: Coparenting and work with children in child care settings

Jennifer Hughes holds a Master of Education degree and is a certified Florida teacher. She has spent most of her career working with young children exposed to trauma and providing intervention, coaching and consultation services to teachers and their families. She has previous career experience as a Director of early intervention services for children under the age of five, an Executive Director of a non profit agency serving children in St. Petersburg, and is currently a Project Coordinator for the Family Study Center at USFSP.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topics: Working with Families where Parents Abuse Substances & Working with Families where Infants and Toddlers are in Non-Kin Foster Care

Lynne Katz is Director of the Linda Ray Intervention Center and Research Assistant Professor in the Departments of Psychology and Pediatrics at the University of Miami . Since 1993, she has coordinated comprehensive early intervention services for nearly 1000 families of children prenatally cocaine exposed. She directs the Miami Child Well Being Court translational research and training grant activities funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and has worked extensively with Juvenile Court to provide early intervention, assessment and Child-Parent Psychotherapy for young children who have been maltreated or exposed to violence. Dr. Katz is co-author of "Child- Centered Practice for the Courtroom & Community: A Guide to working effectively with young children and their families in the child welfare system."

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Working with Diverse Family Systems

Dr. Lewis holds a Ph.D. in Sociocultural Psychology and is an Associate Professor at Tulane University School of Social Work in New Orleans, Louisiana. She was a visiting professor at the Merrill-Palmer Skillman Institute at Wayne State University in Detroit, Michigan in 2015. Her program of research focuses on the rituals and routines of hair-combing interaction and parent-infant attachment. In 2009 she founded and Directs the Center for Natural Connections (CNC).  The Center’s mission is to conduct and disseminate research and training to promote the hair-combing task as an opportunity for parents to connect with their children, culture and community and dismantle the acceptance or rejection of children based on Colorism (valuing light skin color) or 'good' vs. 'nappy' hair type.  CNC programs translate research into culturally valid, strengths based, community-based interventions titled, Talk, Touch & Listen While Combing Hair©.  In 2011, she was commissioned to develop a training program addressing structural racism and racial disparities stemming from the legacies of the historical trauma of slavery for child welfare professionals. She has been a Zero to Three Fellow since 1994, currently serves on the National Zero to Three Advisory Board and works as a consultant with the National Quality Improvement Center, Safe Babies Court Teams.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6477, Topic: Trauma, abuse and violence in                                                   families
Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Working with Families where                                                     Domestic Violence has been at Issue

Lisa is the Assistant Director of the Family Study Center. She is an LCSW with an MSW from Marywood University in Scranton, PA. She has been working with children and families in the mental health field for over 25 years. Lisa’s experience includes expertise in therapeutic interventions with children and families, infant mental health, early childhood, trauma, domestic violence, children’s exposure to violence, parenting education and support, and clinical supervision and training as well as the evidence-based parent-child interventions of Parent-Child Interaction Therapy, Trauma Focused-Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. She is currently in training for Child-Parent Psychotherapy with the Child Trauma Institute. Lisa’s experience also includes; non-profit executive leadership, child and family program development, mental health program management, and community advocacy for children.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Family Consultations: Using the LTP

Diane Philipp is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto Medical School, and is on faculty at the Hincks-Dellcrest Centre (HDC) in Toronto, where she has headed an Infant and Preschool Treatment and Assessment team since 1998. Dr. Philipp trained for a year in Lausanne, Switzerland developing expertise in clinical usages of Fivaz-Depeursinge and Corboz-Warnery’s "Lausanne Trilogue Play" (LTP) paradigm, and has developed an innovative brief family therapy model developed from the LTP in her clinical work and research at the HDC.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6477, Topic: Cultural perspectives on development in the family

Gwendolyn Reese is a longtime Pinellas County community leader and advocate. She has been president since 2003 of InFinite Solutions of Tampa Bay, an organization that provides professional development services to individuals and organizations, including workshop development, grant writing assistance, human resources support and motivational speaking. Before that, she was a coordinator and consultant with PATRICIA – an acronym for Pinellas African Americans Targeting Reduction in Infant Mortality. She also coordinated the Midtown Health Council and the Black Infant Health Practice Initiative in St. Petersburg, FL.

Co-presenter, Course: CLP 6462, Topic: Effectively Engaging Fathers in Diverse Families

Neil Tift, founding director of the Fathers Resource Center in Minneapolis, MN, has served as director of training for three national fatherhood programs in Washington, DC and Mesa, AZ since 1998. For more than 20 years, he served as adjunct professor of Family Studies at Metropolitan State University in St. Paul, MN. Neil is a family mediator, parent educator and men’s therapist, and is presently Father Involvement Program Coordinator at the Child Crisis Center in Mesa. He is a father of three, grandfather of eleven, and foster father of many.