Self-Determination: The Fierce Urgency of Now

An Invitational State of the Science Summit

Summit Speakers (Alphabetical)

Keynote Speaker: Wambui Bahati: www.wambui-bahati.com
Judith A. Cook is Professor of Psychiatry at The University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), Department of Psychiatry. Her published research numbers over 150 books and articles, as well as 50 manuals, curricula, research protocols, needs assessments, and self-determination tools. She served as expert consultant on employment and income supports for the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, and authored the Commission Subcommittee’s Report on “Employment and Income Supports for People with Mental Illness.” She consults with federal agencies including the U.S. Department of Labor, the Government Accountability Office, the Social Security Administration, Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General, the Veteran's Administration, the National Institute of Mental Health, the U.S. Department of Education, and the White House. She has served as a consultant and committee member for the Institute of Medicine on projects regarding mental health care quality, disability, and PTSD among veterans.
Sita Diehl the Executive Director of NAMI Tennessee, the state affiliate of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. She has been a supporter of consumer and family empowerment in Canada, Oregon and Wisconsin and Tennessee, and is best known as the editor of the BRIDGES curriculum, a peer-run program of mental health care consumers. She is a co-author of Back from Wherever I've Been, a collection of recovery stories from people in the BRIDGES program. Sita has seen the power of peer education and support in her own life and has seen many lives transformed and infused with hope through education and support. Ms. Diehl came to Tennessee in 1989 with a Masters degree in community psychology from Antioch University and earned her MSSW at the University of Tennessee. She trained consumer staff of drop-in centers in peer counseling and was a contributing author to the 1998 Journey of Hope curriculum. She has conducted research on public managed behavioral health care and consumer-operated services, a multi-year study of mental health services in Tennessee county jails and has developed curricula to cross-train mental health and criminal justice personnel.
Dan Fisher received his A.B. from Princeton University, his Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin, and his M.D. from George Washington University. He is a board-certified psychiatrist who completed his residency at Harvard Medical School. He is presently an Executive Director of the National Empowerment Center in Lawrence, MA, a practicing psychiatrist at Riverside Outpatient Clinic, Wakefield, MA, and a national voice for consumers. Dr. Fisher helped organize The National Coalition of Consumer/Survivor Organizations, consisting of 30 state-wide organizations and three National Technical Assistance (TA) Centers (www.ncmhcso.org). In addition to his leadership at the National Empowerment Center, he carries out workshops on Finding Our Voice to organize at the local and state level. Dr. Fisher is a person who has recovered from schizophrenia. He was hospitalized several times prior to becoming a psychiatrist, and is one of the few psychiatrists in the country who publicly discusses his recovery from mental illness. Dr. Fisher is recognized nationally as a role model for others who are struggling to recover, and his life dispels the myth that people do not recover from mental illness. Further, his work in the field has been recognized in many ways, such as his selection as a member of the White House Commission on Mental Health.
Carol Bailey Floyd has been working in the mental health field for many years. She is best known for her work and connection to services, particularly the Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP). In addition to her contributions as a WRAP program presenter, facilitator, and trainer of facilitators, she serves as Director of Programs for Mental Health Recovery and WRAP in collaboration with Mary Ellen Copeland, as well as Project Coordinator for the UIC National Research and Training Center’s randomized controlled study of WRAP in the State of Ohio. In that capacity, she was charged with numerous responsibilities, including oversight of local study recruitment and program implementation across six cities, help training and supervision approximately eighteen WRAP facilitators, conducting session make-up calls, completing fidelity checks to ensure high-fidelity to the WRAP model, serving as a back-up facilitator, and providing peer support for other WRAP study group leaders. Ms. Bailey Floyd considers WRAP ultimately about self-determination, based on the key WRAP concepts of hope, personal responsibility, education, self-advocacy, and support. She has witnessed, on numerous occasions, people who have become better able to coordinate their lives with WRAP and making positive choices as a more natural response to living. She also considers herself one of those people, and has been empowered by her own self-determination
Risa S. Fox, M.S., L.C.S.W., is a Public Health Advisor at the Center for Mental Health Services (CMHS), Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). She is situated within the CMHS Community Support Program Branch (CSP). She is the GPO on an Interagency Agreement with the U.S. Department of Education, National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) for two currently funded adult Rehabilitation, Research and Training Centers (RRTCs) at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Boston University. She is also the Program Director and government Project Officer (GPO) for the Consumer & Consumer Supporter National Technical Assistance Centers on Consumer/Peer-Run Programs. She represents SAMHSA/CMHS on the Interagency Committee for Disability Research, and on the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s work group for the National Healthcare Disparities Report. Ms. Fox serves as GPO on a contract with Westat that assists the CSP Branch in developing programs to transfer knowledge about evidence-based and promising practices to targeted audiences. These audiences include policymakers, service providers, advocacy groups, researchers, the media, consumers, and family members. She previously held positions at the National Institute of Mental Health working with the Community Mental Health Centers Program and has been with the Federal Government for 29 years. Her research and publications focus on community mental health centers, and psychiatric rehabilitation for persons with a serious mental illness. She is a licensed psychiatric social worker with an MS degree from Columbia University.
Kate Gaston is Vice President for Affiliate Services and Relations with Mental Health America (MHA), and directs MHA's National Consumer Supporter Technical Assistance Center, working extensively with consumer led and run organizations around the country. Current projects include a peer specialist workforce development initiative in the 4 corners region on Navajo Land, and an awareness education project on Mandan lands in North Dakota that uses video and cross cultural health programming. Prior to coming to Mental Health America in 2006, Ms. Gaston's roles in the mental health field included experiences as executive director for multiple mental health associations, private consultant on juvenile justice and human services systems, grant consultant for university research teams, regional manager for a home-based services corporation, regional planner for a children and youth commission, assistant director for an offender aid program, senior staff for emergency services, and coordinator for Virginia's comprehensive services act for children, youth and families. Her professional history and personal experiences with friends, family and peers as consumers drive her passion to make a difference in the lives of others, and to create opportunities for inclusion and leadership.
Dori S. Hutchinson, Sc.D. is Director of the Services Division of the Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation, and Adjunct Professor of Rehabilitation Counseling at the Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences at Boston University. Dr. Hutchinson was the 2000 recipient of the International Association of Psychosocial Rehabilitation Services Association’s Early Career Research Award for her contributions to understanding health issues for people in mental health recovery. She served as chair of the research committee of the U.S. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association from 2002-2004 and is currently an active member. Dr. Hutchinson has developed and implemented recovery oriented service initiatives that assist people who have a mental illness to assume their rightful roles as students, employees, residents and members of their communities Dr. Hutchinson provides training nationally to organizations and providers who wish to deliver recovery-oriented services, hire people in recovery as colleagues, and conduct relevant program evaluations. Over the last 20 years she has taken a leadership role in the development of health service initiatives in community rehabilitation settings, inpatient settings and educational settings that provide health promotion knowledge and skills to empower people with psychiatric disabilities to recover their functional health and wellness.
Stephen Kiosk grew up in a rural town on the Illinois-Wisconsin border. Raised in a family that dealt with unacknowledged mental illness and addiction ending in the tragic death of his father, Mr. Kiosk began his own mental health and wellness path after college to address severe depression, anxiety, an eating disorder and a personality disorder. He later entered the seminary and was a member of a religious order for several years that began his service to and support of diverse individuals and communities across the country. To further his own growth and recovery, Mr. Kiosk studied substance abuse counseling, guided imagery and hypnotherapy, mind-body medicine, the effects of and approaches to trauma, solution-focused therapy, cross-cultural healing methods and traditions, and effective learning and behavior-change strategies, based on individual and cultural strengths and belief systems. His past work efforts have included roles and duties at the Whitman-Walker Clinic’s Elizabeth Taylor Medical Center, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and more recently, Miriam’s House, a residence and program for homeless women and children in DC living with HIV/AIDS, mental illness, addictions and other life challenges. Mr. Kiosk holds an M.Div. is a licensed professional counselor, and clinical hypnotherapist; currently he is on an Ed.D.
Jim McNulty is the Vice President of Peer Support for the Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA). He is the Project Director for the Peers Helping Peers Center, a National Consumer Technical Assistance Center. The Center is funded by a grant from the Center for Mental Health Services, Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. McNulty has served as the Director of the Office of Consumer Affairs for the Division of Behavioral Health in the state of Rhode Island, and Magellan Health Services’ Director of Consumer & Recovery Services. He is Past President of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI National). He served a 4 year term on the National Advisory Mental Health Council for the NIMH, currently serves on the SAMHSA/CMHS National Advisory Council, and is chair of the SAMHSA/CMHS Council’s Subcommitee on Consumer/Survivor issues. He is serving as a member of the board of directors of the American Association of Human Research Protection Programs, an accrediting body for research organizations. He is a member of the American Psychiatric Association’s Task Force for the 5th edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. He continues to serve as the President of the MDDA of Rhode Island (an affiliate of DBSA), a support and advocacy group for people who share the lived experience mental disorders. He also serves on the board of directors of the Mental Health Consumers of Rhode Island.
Tom Nerney is the author of the original “Principles of Self-Determination” (www.Self-Determination.com) and directed the first demonstration on self-determination beginning in 1993. Tom has authored many papers including “The Poverty of Human Services,” commissioned papers by SAMHSA and other organizations on rethinking quality based on universal human aspirations rather than the consumer industry “satisfaction” standard. He directs the national Center on Self-Determination which provides training and technical assistance on self-determination across all disabilities and aging. Many of his papers appear on the Center’s website. He is a former Kennedy Foundation Fellow in Public Policy and a Mary Switzer Distinguished Fellow, U.S. Department of Education, National Institute for Disability Research and Rehabilitation.
Sue Pickett is an Associate Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry, and Director of Research at the University of Illinois at Chicago Center on Mental Health Services Research and Policy. She received her Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Chicago and completed a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) post-doctoral fellowship in mental health service systems research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She is a nationally renowned expert on familial coping with mental illness, with a specific focus on family education and support programs. Her numerous publications in this area include family education and support group participation benefits, ethnic minority family care giving experiences, and care giving gratifications. Dr. Pickett’s research also includes studies of peer-led recovery education programs, including a federally-funded study of NAMI Greater Chicago’s Pathways in Living consumer-led recovery interventions, and an ongoing evaluation of Recovery International peer-led groups. Dr. Pickett also is the Co-Investigator of the UIC NRTC BRIDGES study.
Russell Pierce is a native of Omaha, Nebraska. He is a past Member and Chair of the Nebraska Mental Planning and Evaluation Council in addition to having served as Vice-Chair of the State’s Protection and Advocacy System, NAS, for seven years. In addition, Mr. Pierce has served as a consultant to SAMHSA, including positions with CMHS as a Project Officer in the Block Grant Division, later joining the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP), where he served as a Project Officer working with the Drug Free Communities Support Program to assist communities with drug-prevention strategies. In this role he also worked with the White Office House of National Drug Control Policy and the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America. From 2006 to 2008, he served as a member of the Beeman Mental Health Commission in concert with the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors. Currently, Mr. Pierce is regional coordinator of recovery and inclusion services at Pathway Homes, Inc., where he is responsible for leading the Northern Virginia Region in the transformation of its mental health system to include broader consumer and family participation in the design and implementation of recovery principles and values, and to align this vision with resources to match innovative approaches to empowerment and self-determination for service recipients.
David Pilon, Ph.D., C.P.R.P., received his doctorate in Social Psychology from Harvard University in 1981. He is a licensed psychologist and is currently serving as the Executive Vice President for Mental Health America of Los Angeles. In 1989, he was the lead writer for the grant writing team that produced the successful bid to design and implement the Village Integrated Service Agency in Long Beach, California. He has consulted in the design and transformation of mental health programs and systems throughout the United States, New Zealand and Japan. Dr. Pilon has presented numerous workshops on ethical issues in psychosocial rehabilitation as well as on the development of outcome measures for social rehabilitation programs. From 1999 through 2007, he served as the lead evaluator coordinating the collection and analysis of data documenting the effectiveness of the Integrated Services for the Homeless (AB34) program serving nearly 5000 people who are mentally ill and had been incarcerated and/or homeless. He is the co-creator of the Milestones of Recovery Scale and has served on the Performance Measurement Advisory Committee (PMAC) for the California State Department of Mental Health. He is a past president for the California Association of Social Rehabilitation Agencies. In 2004 he received USPRA’s Armin Loeb Award for outstanding research in the field of psychiatric rehabilitation.
Stephen Pocklington is the executive director of the Copeland Center for Wellness and Recovery. Before becoming the director of the Copeland Center, Stephen was the deputy director of a public multi-county, multi-service human services agency that provided mental health, substance abuse, and developmental disability services. As deputy director, Stephen led his agency’s transformation into being a leader in recovery education and a premier provider of recovery-oriented services in North Carolina. Stephen worked within the mental health system for over 21 years in a variety of capacities. As a person with lived experience with both mental health and substance challenges, Stephen has also been a leader in advocacy in North Carolina, bringing WRAP to his state and helping to establish peer support and self-advocacy groups in his community and around the state. Stephen was a co-developer of North Carolina's first peer support crisis alternative program and continues to support various initiatives within the state. Stephen is a recipient of both state and national leadership awards. He has a BA in English and Philosophy, and is a thesis shy of a Master's degree in Existential Phenomenology. Stephen is married to the woman of his dreams; he has three wonderful daughters, two gifted stepsons, and two amazing grandsons who are his favorite wellness tools.
Jane M. Porter received her bachelor’s from the University of Florida. Currently, she is Director of Government Relations & Public Affairs for the United States Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association (USPRA). She has more than 13 years of experience working on Capitol Hill in diverse offices within the U.S. House of Representatives, including those of specific legislators as well as the Surveys and Investigations Staff of the Committee on Appropriations. Ms. Porter has extensive knowledge of and direct experience with legislative and appropriations processes, strategies to enhance the effectiveness of communication with elected and public officials, the operations of congressional committees, and the interface between congress and community agencies and/or private organizations. In her role at USPRA, she was fundamental in development and execution of USPRA’s first “Capitol Hill Day,” thus facilitating exposure of core issues in psychiatric rehabilitation and recovery to legislators through face-to-face meetings with organizational leaders and advocates. In addition to her work to promote advancement of policies and programs for people in recovery from psychiatric disabilities, Ms. Porter is a long-time advocate within the disability community at-large, having been recognized for her efforts nationally with an Advocacy Award from the Lupus Foundation of America.
Joy Prater has always been interested in mental health. Her oldest son struggled in school and she gained valuable experience in helping him to make sense of the outward behavior of his peers. After that, she started to struggle and sought peer support at Harmony House Peer Support Center. Joy became employed at Harmony House, where her past experience helped her to aid others. Soon she rose to the position of Director and fought many hard battles for her peers and associates. Her experiences in the peer center introduced Joy to the Bridges program which has proven its value to her. She was trained to be a BRIDGES teacher, a BRIDGES Teacher Trainer, and a BRIDGES Train the Trainer. She is now an employee of Tennessee Mental Health Consumers' Association and a Certified Peer Specialist, and she loves her job.
Lisa A. Razzano is a tenured Associate Professor of Psychiatry at UIC and Director of Training and Education Programs for the Center on Mental Health Services Research and Policy. Dr. Razzano is a nationally recognized expert on mental health services research and psychiatric rehabilitation, and is Principal Investigator or Evaluation Director for several federally funded studies of mental health service and treatment programs. She has particular expertise in vocational rehabilitation and employment, treatment adherence, transforming academic programs and curricula, and special topics, including community re-entry, formerly detained individuals, and the mental health aspects of HIV/AIDS. She is the author of numerous peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, technical reports, and training materials. In 2003, Dr. Razzano was one of 15 national scholars invited to a Rehabilitation Services Administration study group regarding employment. In 2005 she received the Armin Loeb Research Award for exemplary scholarship and contributions to the field from the United States Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association (USPRA); in March 2007, the John M. Davis Research Award from the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) of Greater Chicago; and in March 2009 she was selected as Mentor of the Year by the UIC Chancellor’s Committee on the Status of Women. She is co-PI of the NRTC’s Transforming Medical Education project.
Maria Restropo-Toro is Senior Training Associate at the Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation at Boston University. She has been working at the Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation since 1990 in several multicultural projects and divisions throughout the years. She is the founder of the Latino Initiatives at the Center. She has been responsible for adapting various rehabilitation practices so that they are culturally competent and will meet the needs of the Latino communities around the country. As a Senior Training Associate she trains practitioners, administrators, and consumers in both multicultural competence and in the field of psychiatric rehabilitation both nationally and internationally, in both English and Spanish. She strongly believes that Culture and/or Ethnicity play an important role in health and recovery, and in the need to actively help consumers and their families from various cultural backgrounds to gain equal access to health and rehabilitation services.
Joseph Rogers is founder and executive director of the National Mental Health Consumers’ Self-Help Clearinghouse (a consumer-run national technical assistance center funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Center for Mental Health Services) and chief advocacy officer of the Mental Health Association of Southeastern Pennsylvania. Rogers, a national consultant on the development of the certified peer specialist (CPS) profession, has trained CPS and helped develop CPS curriculums, including that of MHASP’s Institute for Recovery and Community Integration (one of two CPS training agencies in Pennsylvania). In 2006, he convened a national group of experts to create a new trade association to promote the emerging CPS profession. The association has since blended with the National Association of Peer Specialists, whose 2008 national conference in Philadelphia Rogers helped organize. Rogers’ vision and leadership resulted in the expansion of the Mental Health Association of Southeastern Pennsylvania from a small regional advocacy agency in 1984 to a large, multi-faceted organization serving local, regional, statewide and national constituencies. A national leader of the consumer movement, Rogers has received numerous awards, including a prestigious Heinz Award for the Human Condition in 2005, which includes a $250,000 unrestricted cash prize.
Mark Salzer is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania and an investigator in the VISN 4 Mental Illness Research, Education, and Clinical Center at the Philadelphia VA Medical Center. He is the principal investigator and director of the UPENN Collaborative on Community Integration of individuals with psychiatric disabilities (www.upennrrtc.org) funded by the NIDRR. Dr. Salzer’s adopts a social capabilities/social model of disability orientation and conducts research that incorporates a normative understanding of factors that affect community participation of individuals with psychiatric disabilities, especially in the area of employment and financial independence. This is in contrast to efforts that are primarily influenced by “exceptional” or illness-focused frameworks that are dominant in current mental health and rehabilitation research, programs, and practices, and influence policies affecting individuals with psychiatric disabilities.
Sam Shore, MSSW, is the Project Director in Texas for Mental Health Transformation. Mr. Shore has a Bachelor’s Degree in psychology from Wichita State University in Wichita, KS and a Masters Degree in Social Work from the University of Texas at Austin. He has worked in the Texas public mental health system for the past 28 years in various roles at the community and state levels. Throughout his career in the public mental health system, Mr. Shore has managed a variety of system change initiatives and federal grants, including the Texas Self-Directed Care Program located in the Dallas area.
Peggy Swarbrick is a part time Assistant Clinical Professor Department of Psychiatric Rehabilitation, University of Medicine and Dentistry, School of Health Related Professions, and the Director of the Institute for Wellness and Recovery Initiatives, CSP-NJ (a large statewide agency run by persons living with mental illness in collaboration with professionals). Her early personal life challenges and experiences in the mental health system led to a career focused on promoting wellness and self-determination models as guiding models for the mental health system. Dr. Swarbrick worked many years an occupational therapist in a variety of settings developing and delivering services focused on wellness, self-sufficiency and self-determination. She has many publications and has lectured nationally and internationally on issues such as promoting wellness through addressing poverty, the role of employment on recovery and wellness, peer delivered models and self-sufficiency models. Dr Swarbrick helped developed the array of innovative asset-building models offered through Community Enterprises Corporation and CSPNJ. She also completed a post-doctoral fellowship in Advanced Training and Research, funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research in Department of Psychiatric Rehabilitation and Counseling Professions.
Can Truong is the Director of the Center for Education Empowerment, which promotes recovery and mental health advocacy in higher education settings. He holds a B.S. in Biology from the University of Chicago. In addition to his recovery consulting work, he is a certified NxLeveL Instructor, teaching entrepreneurial skills to support and strengthen small businesses and promote economic development. He is also a WRAP Master Trainer and co-author (with Leah Harris) of Training the Mind, Opening the Heart: Mindfulness Meditations as a Tool for Recovery. As one of the few Asian American mental health advocates in this country, he serves on numerous boards and committees including the National Coalition of Mental Health Consumer/Survivor Organizations, and the People in Recovery Committee of the United States Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association. In 2005, he represented the U.S. consumer movement at the World Federation Mental Health Congress in Cairo, Egypt.
Amy Watson is Assistant Professor, Jane Addams College of Social Work, University of Illinois at Chicago. She is the past project director of the Chicago Consortium for Stigma Research, an interdisciplinary group of researchers interested in mental illness stigma. Her research interests include examining how persons with mental illness are processed through and experience different components of the criminal justice system, with particular emphasis on policing interventions. Dr. Watson also is interested in mental illness stigma as a barrier to service access and recovery for adolescents and adults, including those involved in the criminal justice system. In 2008 she was received the John M. Davis Researcher of the Year Award from the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) of Greater Chicago.
Debbie Whittle, Director of the National Empowerment Center’s TAC, is a consultant, educator, counselor, artist, writer, motivational speaker, and change agent. She has transformed her own experience of suffering and is passionate about helping to birth a new paradigm in mental health care by moving away from pathology toward wholeness-based perspectives. Debbie devoted the past 16 years to the study of psychology, holism, metaphysics, process therapy, spirituality, and the healing process. She held positions in business management, volunteer management, training and development, community organizing, and mental health advocacy. She served as direct care staff in several DMH and DMR funded residential facilities, volunteered on a telephone counseling service, and had a private counseling practice. She was the team leader for a federal grant project to create a statewide network of people who use mental health services in Massachusetts, and established the first Massachusetts Leadership Academy to build advocacy and leadership skills. She has been developing and facilitating workshops since 1989 and has presented at Massachusetts Human Rights Conferences, nationally at statewide consumer conferences and at NARPA, NYAPRS and Alternatives Conferences. As Director of Training and Development, she coordinated a state-work-force training grant awarded to Relief Resources, an organization that provides relief staff to direct care facilities. She received her B.A. in Behavioral Science from Leslie College, Cambridge MA.

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Self-Determination: The Fierce Urgency of Now

An Invitational State of the Science Summit

Summit Speakers (Alphabetical)