AASR Live

Please join us for “From Trauma to Resilience Beyond Surviving in Classrooms: An Interview with Dr. Annette Oswald” for an interview on her new book.

Dr. Annette Oswald is an educator, professor, and advocate for transformative approaches to early childhood education, with expertise in childhood development, educational neuroscience, social-emotional learning, and trauma-responsive practice. She serves as a faculty member and department chair in the Early Childhood Education and Development program at Monterey Peninsula College, in California, where she prepares future educators to understand child development through a whole-child, relationship-centered, and brain-informed lens. Her academic preparation includes a Bachelor of Science in Exceptional Student Education from Florida International University, a Master of Science in Education. from the University of Miami, and a doctorate in Education from Nova Southeastern University.

As the Founder and Executive Director of From The Root Transformative Education, Dr. Oswald brings together education, neuroscience, and relationship-based practice to help educators, administrators, parents and caregivers better understand the connections between children's developing brains, behavior, learning, and relationships. Her work emphasizes moving beyond traditional approaches to disciplinary school policies toward practices that recognize the biological, relational, developmental, and environmental influences on children's learning and behavior. Her work challenges us to look beyond the behavior we see on the surface and consider what may be happening "from the root."

Through From The Root Transformative Education, she provides professional development and learning and educational resources designed to support educators and communities in creating responsive environments where children can experience connection, belonging, regulation, learning, and growth.

Her professional interests include educational neuroscience, early brain development, trauma-responsive education, resilience, attachment, and family partnerships. Through both her teaching and community work, Dr. Oswald seeks to bridge research and practice, translating emerging knowledge about the developing brain into meaningful strategies educators and families can use in real-world settings. Her work reflects a commitment to transforming educational practice through relationships, reflection, neuroscience, and a deeper understanding of the whole child.

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Please join us for “The Unspoken Emotional Labor of Advocacy” with Santanna Ficken.

Santanna Ficken - They/Them

Santanna is an AuDHDer with a PDA profile whose perspective is deeply shaped by both lived experience and years spent serving children, families, and school teams as a Mental Health Practitioner. Through Minnesota Neurodivergent Education Advocacy and Therapy Services (MnNEAT), they hold multiple roles as a board member, speaker, consultant, and direct caregiver advocate in special education, with their role continuing to evolve into educational consulting and systems-level advocacy.

A central focus of their personal work comes from what they’ve experienced over and over again in systems that call themselves trauma-informed, while autistic trauma itself often goes unrecognized. They help bridge gaps in understanding autistic trauma through a disability justice lens and to reduce the harm autistic people frequently experience in spaces meant to support them. 

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Please join us for “Transformative Mindfulness in Education: A Discussion with Dr. Rhiannon Kim.”

Rhiannon Kim, Ed.D., CGS-RBA, M.S., CCC-SLP, E-RYT 200, RYT 500, is an educator, facilitator, and consultant working with schools and other organizations who are seeking to integrate socially just and trauma-informed practices and ways of being into their work. Prior to her current work, she served in public education as a para educator, 1:1 interventionist, and a school-based Speech-Language-Pathologist. She is the author of Transformative Mindfulness in Education: Caring for Ourselves While Kindling Change.

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Please join us for "Stop the Shock: A Panel Discussion about the Judge Rotenberg Center” with members of the Stop the Shock Coalition.

Elisa Hunt

Driven by the loss of a loved one to institutional abuse, Elisa Hunt is an advocate and coalition leader specializing in institutional care accountability and disability rights. As the lead organizer of the Stop the Shock Coalition, she coordinates grassroots and national efforts to end the use of electric skin shock devices at the Judge Rotenberg Center. Elisa has volunteered for national survivor movements Unsilenced and Breaking Code Silence to reform the Troubled Teen Industry, helping pass the Stop Institutional Child Abuse Act (SICAA). Today, she focuses on regional campaigns to secure lasting protections for vulnerable individuals.

Jennifer Msumba

Jennifer Msumba is an accomplished songwriter, musician and award-winning filmmaker. Jennifer's art brings both smiles and tears to audiences when unpacking difficult emotions or topics, like growing up with autism and OCD, and being institutionalized at the Judge Rotenberg Center where she received skin shocks as behavioral control. But you can leave it to Jen to find a shine of hope in every situation. Here are some details on Jennifer's Documentary: https://watch.eventive.org/heartlandfilmfestival/play/6a8caa0d26f98166f0238d0e. It becomes available on Oct 8th!

Jacob Levy

Jacob Levy is a young autistic self-advocate based in Massachusetts near the JRC. After hearing about the center at age 14, he became involved with efforts to shut down the JRC and joined the new Stop The Shock Coalition. He is passionate about helping to protect other young people from abusive treatment like what’s perpetuated at the JRC.”

Nancy Weiss, MSW

Nancy Weiss, MSW, is the Director Emeritus and co-founder of the National Leadership Consortium on Developmental Disabilities and co-founder of the Alliance for Citizen-Directed Support. She was a professor as well as the Director of Disability Initiatives at the University of Delaware. Prior to this, she was the Executive Director of TASH, an international advocacy association committed to full inclusion for people with disabilities and the Director of the Department for Community Services at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore. She also served as the Executive Director of Community Systems, Inc., an agency providing progressive supports for adults with developmental disabilities across Delaware. Ms. Weiss is a contributing author, with Jan Nisbet, of the book, ‘Pain and Shock in America: Politics, Advocacy and the Controversial Treatment of People with Disabilities’ (Brandeis University Press, 2021), the first book to be published on the history of the Judge Rotenberg Center, a controversial facility that uses electric shock and other painful and dehumanizing methods to control the behavior of children and adults with disabilities. Ms. Weiss has spearheaded advocacy efforts nationally to eliminate the use of pain, coercion, and restraint as methods of behavior control for over 30 years. The consistent theme of her work has been the promotion of disability supports that assure that people are treated humanely and guaranteed the full range of rights and opportunities available to all citizens.   (Contact Nancy Weiss at [email protected])

Colbe Mazzarella 

Colbe Mazzarella is an East Boston resident taking part in the Stop the Shock panel. She retired as a lawyer and volunteered for Citizens Commission on Human Rights, a watchdog for mental health abuse. Through CCHR she got involved with the coalition.

She learned how to free human beings from involuntary and illegal commitment into mental hospitals and became the president of CCHR New England, a watchdog against mental health abuse.

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Please join us for “Challenges and Progress: A Panel Discussion with our New Zealand Friends” with Jase Williams, Lynda Knight, Frian Wadia, and Kathryn Berkett.

Jase Williams is a TEDx Speaker who has 25 years of experience working as an educator and is the former Principal of Henry Hill School who won the prestigious Prime Minister’s Education Excellence Award - Wellbeing - the top education award in New Zealand. Jase is a certified trainer in the Neurosequential Model in Education (NME), and he is one of the leading voices in Relational Neuroscience & Trauma-Informed Practice in Education and has shared his knowledge through an equity-focused, compassionate, and indigenous lens with thousands of educators.

Lynda Knight (M.Ed.) is the principal of Glenview School in Cannons Creek, Porirua and a leader in trauma-informed education in New Zealand. She trained with Dr Bruce Perry in the Neurosequential Model in Education (NME), gaining her initial certification in 2020 and completing her Advanced Trainer Certificate in 2022. She was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2023.

Under her leadership, Glenview School has transformed its culture and practice through trauma-aware and neuroscience-informed approaches, significantly improving student wellbeing, engagement and behaviour. Glenview has maintained a proud record of no stand downs, suspensions, exclusions, seclusions nor restraints for several years. Lynda also shares her work more widely through professional development, speaking engagements and presentations, including in Australia, Fiji and the UK.

Frian Wadia is a parent of young adults with learning support needs and disabilities, an Early Intervention Teacher specializing in supporting autistic children and the adults supporting them, a training facilitator, community leader, and advocate for inclusion for disabled, neurodivergent, disadvantaged, and trauma-affected children. She is passionate about inclusion and equity through a disability rights, social justice, neuroscience, and trauma-informed lens and is the founder of NATINA, ie. Neuroscience and Trauma-Informed Network Aotearoa. Frian believes in empowering parents, families, and the professionals supporting children using a holistic, relational neuroscience, trauma-informed lens so all children have the opportunity to experience inclusion, a sense of belonging, and wellbeing across their environments within the home and community.

Kathryn Berkett has been learning and training about behaviour for over thirty years. She has a Masters of Educational Psychology, is currently doing her second Masters of Applied Neuroscience through King's College London, and is certified as a Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics practitioner. She is an author of "What's Going on in There? The neuroscience of the adolescent brain", has a podcast series with Pio Terei called "I've Got Questions' and has a TEDx talk entitled "Neuroscience of Device Zombies".

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Please join us for “Positive Behavior Supports Are Compliance-Based” with Jillian Enright.

Jillian Enright is the founder of Neurodiversity Manitoba and has been working as a neurodiversity specialist and advocate since 2017. Being Autistic and ADHD, and the parent of a neurodivergent child, Jillian brings a unique combination of personal, professional, and academic experience to her work

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Please join us for “A Body of Evidence: An Interview with S. M. Korhonen on her New Book.”

S. M. Korhonen writes about family life, disability, and public systems. With a background in engineering and complex systems work, Korhonen brings an evidence-driven lens to lived experience, tracing how assumptions harden into practice and how institutions struggle to see what does not fit their expectations.

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Please join us for “Ease the Pain in the Classroom: Creating Safety and Regulation for Every Student” with Dr. Bethany Bilodeau.

Dr. Bethany Bilodeau, an expert in human behavior with a Doctorate of Arts in Leadership, has a remarkable career that began teaching high school biology in Guam. She has designed innovative programs to help students achieve academic success and holds numerous certifications in behavioral therapies. She has been recognized with multiple awards, including the 2024 Business of the Year in education and Business Excellence for Social Equity.

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Please join us for “The Informed Parent: Navigating Autism Services and Advocacy, an Interview with Anne Borden King.”

Anne Borden King is a Toronto-based podcaster, writer and human rights advocate. Her work has appeared in the New York Times, Healthy Debate and the Thinking Person's Guide to Autism, among other publications. She is the host of Noncompliant, a popular podcast about neurodiversity. Her Substack is entitled The Children Do Not Consent.

A co-founder of Autistics for Autistics, the Canadian autistic self-advocacy organization, Anne has presented before the United Nations and the Canadian Senate, among others, about autism policy. She is the founder of The Autistic Health Access Project, which educates medical students and clinicians about making health care accessible for autistic patients. Her upcoming book, The Children Do Not Consent: The search for autism’s “cure”—and the kids who pay the cost, will be published in 2025.

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Please join us for “When 'That Kid' Becomes the Teacher,” a presentation with Lindsay Rice. 

Lindsay Rice is an elementary educator, presenter, and advocate based in Columbus, Ohio, dedicated to advancing equitable education for neurodivergent learners. With over a decade of experience presenting for organizations such as the National Education Association (NEA), Ohio Education Association (OEA), NSTA, and ATE, she brings both professional expertise and lived experience to her work.

Lindsay specializes in helping educators understand how the brain works, with a focus on reducing cognitive load, challenging neurotypical bias, and creating classrooms where all students can thrive. Her work highlights the intersection of neurodivergence, identity, and access, encouraging educators to recognize both the brilliance and the barriers neurodivergent students experience.

As a teacher, parent of neurodivergent children, and leader within the Leaders for Just Schools program, Lindsay is committed to building inclusive systems, amplifying diverse voices, and equipping educators with practical, neuroscience-informed strategies that support every learner.

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