Appendix D

Biographical Sketches of Committee Members

Vivian L. Gadsden, Ed.D. (Chair) is William T. Carter professor of child development and professor of education at the University of Pennsylvania. She is also on the faculties of Africana Studies and of Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies; serves as director of the National Center on Fathers and Families; and served as associate director of the National Center on Adult Literacy. Her research and scholarly interests focus on children and families across the life course, particularly those at the greatest risk for academic and social vulnerability by virtue of race, gender, ethnicity, poverty, and immigrant status. In addition to serving on the Board of the Foundation for Child Development, she has served or serves on various foundation and congressionally mandated review committees. She has held leadership roles in the American Educational Research Association, of which she is a fellow, and the Society for Research in Child Development. She received her Ed.D. in educational psychology and policy from the University of Michigan.

Clare Anderson, M.S.W., is a policy fellow at Chapin Hall, University of Chicago. Her work focuses on using research, policy, and fiscal levers to improve outcomes for vulnerable children and families. She works with state child welfare systems to implement evidence-based screening, assessment, and interventions and better integrate the goals of children’s safety, permanency, and well-being. Prior to joining Chapin Hall, she was deputy commissioner at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration on Children, Youth, and Families (ACYF), responsible for federal programs addressing child abuse and neglect, runaway and homeless

youth, domestic and intimate partner violence, and teen pregnancy prevention. Prior to joining ACYF, she spent a decade at the Center for the Study of Social Policy, helping states and local jurisdictions change policies and practices to improve outcomes for vulnerable children and families. She holds an M.S.W. from the University of Alabama.

Oscar A. Barbarin, III, Ph.D., is Wilson H. Elkins professor and chair of the African American Studies Department (with a joint faculty appointment in the Department of Psychology) at the University of Maryland, College Park. He is former Lila L. and Douglas J. Hertz endowed chair, Department of Psychology, Tulane University. He has served on the faculties of the Universities of Maryland, Michigan, and North Carolina. His research has focused on the social and familial determinants of ethnic and gender achievement gaps beginning in early childhood. He has developed a universal mental health screening system for children from prekindergarten to age 8. He was principal investigator for a national study focused on the socioemotional and academic development of boys of color. His work on children of African descent includes a 20-year longitudinal study of the effects of poverty and violence on child development in South Africa. He served as editor of the American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 2009-2014, and on the Governing Council of the Society for Research in Child Development, 2007-2013. He earned a Ph.D. in clinical psychology at Rutgers University in 1975.

Richard P. Barth, M.S.W., Ph.D., is dean, School of Social Work, at the University of Maryland. He previously served as Frank A. Daniels distinguished professor, School of Social Work, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and as Hutto Patterson professor, School of Social Welfare, University of California, Berkeley. He was the 1986 winner of the Frank Breul Prize for Excellence in Child Welfare Scholarship from the University of Chicago; a Fulbright Scholar in 1990 and 2006; the 1998 recipient of the Presidential Award for Excellence in Research from the National Association of Social Workers; the 2005 winner of the Flynn Prize for Research; and the 2007 winner of the Peter Forsythe Award for Child Welfare Leadership from the American Public Human Services Association. He is a fellow of the American Psychological Association, and was a founding board member and president of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare. He served on the Board of the Society for Social Work Research, 2002-2006, and has also served on the boards of numerous child-serving agencies. His A.B., M.S.W., and Ph.D. degrees are from Brown University and the University of California, Berkeley.

William R. Beardslee, M.D., directs the Baer Prevention Initiatives at Boston Children’s Hospital and is senior research scientist at the Judge Baker Chil-

dren’s Center; chairman emeritus, Department of Psychiatry, Boston Children’s Hospital; and Distinguished Gardner-Monks professor of child psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. His long-standing research interest has centered on the development of children at risk because of parental adversities such as mental illness or poverty. He and his colleagues adapted the principles of his work on public health interventions for families facing depression in a teacher training and empowerment program for use in Head Start and Early Head Start called Family Connections. He directed the Boston site of a multisite study on the prevention of depression in adolescents that demonstrated prevention of episodes of major depression in high-risk youth fully 60 months after intervention delivery. He has received numerous awards, including the Blanche F. Ittleson Award of the American Psychiatric Association for outstanding published research contributing to the mental health of children, the Catcher in the Rye Award for Advocacy of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, the Human Rights Award from the Department of Mental Health of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the Judge Baker Children’s Center World of Children Award. He received an honorary doctor of science degree from Emory University.

Kimberly Boller, Ph.D., is a senior fellow at Mathematica Policy Research. She studies the effects of early childhood care and education, parenting programs, and policy on children and parents. Her expertise includes measurement of program fidelity, implementation, and quality; child outcomes from infancy through early elementary school; and parent well-being and self-sufficiency. Her current research in the United States focuses on Early Head Start, the cost of quality early childhood services, and informal child care. As director of testing and learning for the Early Learning Lab, she supports research-informed innovation and improvement of programs for children and families. She has conducted research on early childhood and parenting programs and systems in more than 10 countries. A recent project in Tanzania included an evaluability assessment of a preprimary teacher training intervention designed to improve grade 2 outcomes. She recently guest co-edited a special issue of Early Childhood Research Quarterly on early childhood care and education quality rating and improvement systems. She received her Ph.D. in developmental and cognitive psychology from Rutgers University.

Natasha J. Cabrera, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Human Development and Quantitative Methodology, College of Education, University of Maryland, College Park. Previously, she had several years of experience as an executive branch fellow and expert in child development with the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). Her research focuses on father involvement and children’s social develop-

ment, ethnic and cultural variations in fathering and mothering behaviors, family processes in a social and cultural context, and the mechanisms that link early experiences to children’s school readiness. In her previous position with NICHD, she developed a major initiative called Developing a Daddy Survey, which coordinated measures of father involvement across major studies in the field and provided a set of measures for others to use. She is associate editor of Child Development and Early Childhood Research Quarterly and recipient of the National Council on Family Relations award for best research article regarding men in families. She is a 2015-2016 visiting scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Denver, Colorado, in educational and developmental psychology.

Eric Dearing, Ph.D., is a professor in the Department of Counseling, Developmental, and Educational Psychology at Boston College’s Lynch School of Education. He is also a senior researcher at the Norwegian Center for Child Behavioral Development, University of Oslo. His work is focused on the consequences of children’s lives outside of school for their performance in school. He has a special interest in the power of families, early education and care, and neighborhood supports to bolster achievement and well-being for children growing up poor. He is currently principal investigator for a study investigating the importance of parents’ engagement in their children’s early math learning for children’s long-term achievement. He holds a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of New Hampshire.

Greg J. Duncan, Ph.D., is distinguished professor of education at the University of California, Irvine. Previously, he was a professor at the University of Michigan and director of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. His recent work has focused on understanding the relative importance of early academic skills, cognitive and emotional self-regulation, and health in promoting children’s eventual success in school and the labor market. He has also investigated how families, peers, neighborhoods, and public policy affect the life chances of children and adolescents. He has served as president of the Population Association of America and of the Society for Research in Child Development. He received the 2013 Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize of the Jacobs Foundation, given for scientific work of high social relevance to the personality development of children and young people. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences and holds a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Michigan.

Norma Finkelstein, Ph.D., M.S.W., is founder and executive director of the Institute for Health and Recovery, a Massachusetts statewide services, policy, program development, training, and research organization. Previously, she was founder and executive director of the Women’s Alcoholism

Program/CASPAR, Inc., a comprehensive prevention, education, and treatment program for chemically dependent women and their families. Her work has focused on substance use prevention and treatment, with specific emphasis on women, children, and families; pregnancy; co-occurring disorders, including integrated care for women with substance use disorders, mental illness, and histories of violence; trauma-informed services; services for youth and young adults; tobacco education and cessation; and family-centered care. She has received numerous awards, including, most recently, the National Center on Substance Abuse and Child Welfare’s National Collaborative Leadership Award, the National Organization on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome’s Erin Frey Advocacy Award, and the Women’s Service Network’s and National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors’ Women’s Services Champion Award. She received her M.S.W. from the University of Michigan and her Ph.D. from Brandeis University.

Elena Fuentes-Afflick, M.D., M.P.H., is chief of pediatrics at San Francisco General and professor and vice chair of pediatrics and vice dean for academic affairs at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Her research has focused on the broad themes of acculturation and immigrant health, with specific emphasis on perinatal and neonatal health disparities. She has served as chair of the UCSF Academic Senate and served on national committees of the Society for Pediatric Research, the National Institutes of Health, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. She served as president of the Society for Pediatric Research, 2008-2009, and has served or is serving as a member of numerous advisory councils and committees. In 2010, she was elected to the National Academy of Medicine. She obtained her undergraduate education and medical degree at the University of Michigan. She completed her residency training at UCSF, where she served as chief resident, followed by a research fellowship at the Phillip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies. She also completed an M.P.H. at the University of California, Berkeley.

Iheoma U. Iruka, Ph.D., is director of research and evaluation, Buffett Early Childhood Institute, University of Nebraska. Her research focuses on determining how early experiences impact poor and ethnic minority young children’s health, learning, and development and the role of the family and education environments and systems in this process. She is engaged in projects and initiatives focused on how evidence-informed policies, systems, and practices in early education can support the optimal development and experiences of low-income and ethnic minority children, such as through quality rating and improvement systems, home visiting programs, and high-quality preschool programming. In addition to being a former scientist and associate director at the Frank Porter Graham Child

Development Institute, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, she serves on several national committees and boards. She holds a Ph.D. in applied developmental psychology from the University of Miami, Florida.

Samuel L. Odom, Ph.D., is director of the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and principal investigator, National Professional Development Center on Autism Spectrum Disorders and Center on Secondary Education for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). His current research is addressing treatment efficacy for children and youth with ASD, early intervention for toddlers with disabilities and their families, and professional development for teachers of children and youth with ASD. In 2013, he received the Arnold Lucius Gesell Prize for career achievement in research on social inclusion and child development from the Theordor Hellbrugge Foundation, Munich, Germany. He holds a Ph.D. in special education from the University of Washington.

Barbara Rogoff, Ph.D., is distinguished professor of psychology, University of California, Santa Cruz. She received the 2013 Award for Distinguished Lifetime Contributions to Cultural and Contextual Factors in Child Development from the Society for Research in Child Development. She is a fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, the American Anthropological Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Educational Research Association. Her research focuses on cultural aspects of learning, with special emphasis on collaboration and observation and indigenous-heritage, Mexican, Guatemalan, and other communities of the Americas. She has held the University of California Presidential Chair and has been a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, a Kellogg fellow, a Spencer fellow, and an Osher fellow of the Exploratorium. She holds a Ph.D. in developmental psychology from Harvard University.

Mark A. Schuster, M.D., Ph.D., is William Berenberg professor of pediatrics, Harvard Medical School, and chief of general pediatrics and vice chair for health policy, Department of Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital. He conducts research on child, adolescent, and family issues and has studied the role of parents in influencing and addressing their children’s health. He has conducted research on health disparities, family leave for parents with chronically ill children, adolescent sexual health, obesity prevention, children with HIV-infected parents, parental reports of family experience of health care, and other aspects of quality of health care. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine and a recipient of the Society for Pediatric Research’s Richardson Award for lifetime achievement in peri-

natal and pediatric health care research, and was president of the Academic Pediatric Association (2014-2015). He received his B.A. from Yale University, his M.D. and M.P.P. from Harvard University, and his Ph.D. in public policy analysis from the Pardee RAND Graduate School.

Selcuk R. Sirin, Ph.D., is associate professor of applied psychology, New York University (NYU). His research focuses primarily on the lives of immigrant and minority children and their families and ways to increase professionals’ ability to better serve them. He conducted a major meta-analytical review of research on socioeconomic status and co-produced the Racial and Ethical Sensitivity Test and accompanying training program for school professionals. He also served as research coordinator for the Partnership for Teacher Excellence project at NYU in collaboration with New York City School of Education. His most recent research focused on immigrant youth in general and Muslim American children and adolescents in particular. He is the recipient of a Teaching Excellence Award from Boston College; a Young Scholar Award from the Foundation for Child Development for his project on immigrant children; and a Review of Research Award from the American Educational Research Association, given in recognition of an outstanding article published in education. He holds a Ph.D. in applied developmental and educational psychology (minor in methodology) from Boston College.

Kasisomayajula “Vish” Viswanath, Ph.D., is professor of health communication, Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, Harvard School of Public Health and McGraw-Patterson Center for Population Sciences, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He is also faculty director of the Health Communication Core of the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center (DF/HCC) and leader of the DF/HCC’s Cancer Risk and Disparities Program. He is founding director of DF/HCC’s Enhancing Communications for Health Outcomes Laboratory. His work focuses on the use of translational communication science to influence public health policy and practice. His primary research emphasis is on documenting the relationship among communication inequalities, poverty and health disparities, and knowledge translation to address health disparities. He is a member of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ National Vaccine Advisory Committee and chairs its Working Group on Vaccine Acceptance, and is a member of the Board of Scientific Counselors, Office of Public Health Preparedness, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He holds a Ph.D. in mass communications from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.

Michael S. Wald, J.D., M.A., is Jackson Eli Reynolds professor of law, emeritus, at Stanford University. His teaching and research focus on public

policy concerning children and families. In addition to his teaching and research, he has extensive experience in designing and implementing public policy related to parents and children, including holding a number of government positions at the federal, state, and local levels related to social services for children and families, and he has helped author legislation related to child welfare at the federal and state levels. He has served as director of the San Francisco Human Services Agency, deputy general counsel of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (1993-1995), and member of the U.S. Advisory Board on Child Abuse and Neglect. He is currently a member of the San Francisco Our Children Our Families Council, which develops child and family policy for San Francisco, and has been a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on the Welfare of Children; the Board of Directors, Chapin Hall Children’s Center, University of Chicago; and the Carnegie Foundation’s Commission on Children 0-3. He received his B.A. from Cornell University, his M.A. in political science from Yale University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and his LL.B from Yale Law School.