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Celebrate the Children’s founder, Monica G. Osgood, is an experienced behavioral consultant and therapist who specializes in using developmental approaches to support children with autism and other differences in relating and communicating. She is also the Founder and Director of the Developmental Center for Children and Families (Limitless), a Board Member and founding member of the Profectum Foundation, and a Board Member and founding member of Celebrate the Individual (CTI). Monica has worked in homes, therapy centers, and private and public school settings for over 20 years. Some of her experience has included assessment and the development of intervention programs, curriculum and IEP development, and parent and professional training.

In 1998, Monica created the first public school program with the Developmental Individual Relationship-based (DIR model) approach as the core philosophy. ​In 2000, she was the first educator to join the senior faculty of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning(ICDL) to provide interdisciplinary training in the DIR model. During her time with ICDL, Monica served as faculty for all of their yearly training institutes, spoke at many of their conferences and had the opportunity to work closely and collaborate with Drs. Greenspan and Wieder to further develop the DIR model in school settings. ​In 2004, she collaborated with Lauren Blaszak to open a state-approved, DIR model school for children ages 3-21 in Denville, New Jersey, now serving over 70 school districts and 150 families.

Additional accomplishments include, many speaking engagements at conferences and participation in television, radio and newspaper interviews across the USA, Wales, Ireland and Amsterdam. Monica has appeared on Welsh Channel 4 and BBC1 documentaries, sharing the DIR model approach with British parents and professionals. Monica and the Celebrate the Children school were featured in a TIME Magazine cover story in May of 2006. ​She serves on the Advisory Board for 3LPlace and the National Advisory Council for The Centers for Exceptional Children​.  Monica also serves on the Economic Development Advisory Council and the Sustainable Economic Development Plan Steering Committee for her local Town Council. Finally, she collaborated with twice Grammy nominated children’s artists Dan Myers and Brady Rymer on an album and music video celebrating diversity in children with all abilities released April 2011.

Amy Keveanos has worked in and out of district high school special ed for 16 years. She received her bachelor’s degree in English and Education from Monmouth University in 2002, then received her Teacher of Students with Disabilities (TOSD) from the College of St. Elizabeth graduate school. She is currently pursuing a Masters Degree in educational leadership at Montclair State University. She has worked at Celebrate the Children for 6 years and loves working with the DIR model and seeing how much progress students make with a relationship based approach.

Barbara Kalmanson has 40 years experience working with infants, children and their families, as well as with schools and agencies serving children environmentally and developmentally at risk . She is a founder of the Oak Hill School in San Anselmo, California, a developmental, relationship-based school for children and adolescents with autism spectrum and related neurodevelopmental disorders. Dr. Kalmanson has extensive experience as a clinical psychologist, a special educator, and an infant mental health specialist, including work with the Infant-Parent Program at the University of California in San Francisco; The San Francisco Psychoanalytic Institute, Child Development Program; California Pacific Medical Center, Child Development Center and in private practice in San Francisco and Marin County. She provides interdisciplinary consultation to schools and agencies nationwide and internationally. Dr. Kalmanson is the recipient of a FAR fund grant for the Kids Attuned website, promoting the importance of healthy relationships in infancy and early childhood. She teaches infant mental health at the Stella Maris Institute, the neuropsychiatric institute of the University of Pisa medical school. Dr. Kalmanson was the founding Academic Dean of the ICDL Graduate School, and senior faculty and for the Interdisciplinary Council on Learning & Developmental Disorders (ICDL). She’s served on multiple boards of directors including the Mayor’s Advisory Board on Maternal, Child and Adolescent Health in San Francisco, California. She received her doctorate in psychology and special education from the University of California, Berkeley. Dr. Kalmanson is a recipient of the Zero to Three: the National Center for Infants, Toddlers and Families Harris Fellowship, The Frederic Burk Foundation for Education Fellowship and a National Institute of Mental Health Training grant. Her publications and presentations focus on early identification and treatment of autistic spectrum disorders, relationship-based intervention and the importance of family-provider relationships. Recent publications include: Infant Parent Psychotherapy for Early Indicators of Autism Spectrum Disorders:How We Know How to be with Others, In Bonovitz and Harlem (eds.), Therapeutic Action in Child Psychotherapy, (in press) Echoes in the Nursery: Insights for the Treatment of Early Signs of Autism in a Baby Sibling, Journal of Infant, Child, and Adolescent Psychotherapy, vol. 8, no.1,2009, and Autism Assessment and Intervention: the developmental individual difference, relationship-based DIR® model / Floortime model, with Serena Wieder and Stanley Greenspan, Zero to Three, March 2008.

Celebrate the Children’s founder, Monica G. Osgood, is an experienced behavioral consultant and therapist who specializes in using developmental approaches to support children with autism and other differences in relating and communicating. She is also the Founder and Director of the Developmental Center for Children and Families (Limitless), a Board Member and founding member of the Profectum Foundation, and a Board Member and founding member of Celebrate the Individual (CTI). Monica has worked in homes, therapy centers, and private and public school settings for over 20 years. Some of her experience has included assessment and the development of intervention programs, curriculum and IEP development, and parent and professional training.

In 1998, Monica created the first public school program with the Developmental Individual Relationship-based (DIR model) approach as the core philosophy. ​In 2000, she was the first educator to join the senior faculty of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning(ICDL) to provide interdisciplinary training in the DIR model. During her time with ICDL, Monica served as faculty for all of their yearly training institutes, spoke at many of their conferences and had the opportunity to work closely and collaborate with Drs. Greenspan and Wieder to further develop the DIR model in school settings. ​In 2004, she collaborated with Lauren Blaszak to open a state-approved, DIR model school for children ages 3-21 in Denville, New Jersey, now serving over 70 school districts and 150 families.

Additional accomplishments include, many speaking engagements at conferences and participation in television, radio and newspaper interviews across the USA, Wales, Ireland and Amsterdam. Monica has appeared on Welsh Channel 4 and BBC1 documentaries, sharing the DIR model approach with British parents and professionals. Monica and the Celebrate the Children school were featured in a TIME Magazine cover story in May of 2006. ​She serves on the Advisory Board for 3LPlace and the National Advisory Council for The Centers for Exceptional Children​.  Monica also serves on the Economic Development Advisory Council and the Sustainable Economic Development Plan Steering Committee for her local Town Council. Finally, she collaborated with twice Grammy nominated children’s artists Dan Myers and Brady Rymer on an album and music video celebrating diversity in children with all abilities released April 2011.

Mona M. Delahooke, PhD is a clinical psychologist specializing in the development of infants, young children, and their families. She has received training as an infant mental health specialist, and works widely with multi-disciplinary teams supporting children with developmental or emotional delays. She is a faculty member of the Early Intervention Training Institute (EITI) of the Los Angeles Child Guidance Clinic. She is a senior faculty member and mental health working group Co-Chair of the Profectum Foundation. She also provides training to personnel in the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health and agencies across the country. Dr. Delahooke has a blog for parents and professionals, the Visible Parent, at www.thevisibleparent.com and at Facebook at /www.facebook.com/thevisibleparent and twitter at /twitter.com/monadelahooke

Professional Affiliations

Member: American Psychological Association

Member: California Psychological Association

Senior Faculty Member: Profectum Foundation

Faculty Member: Los Angeles Child Guidance Clinic Early Intervention Training Institute

Recent Trainings

November 2014:  Neurodevelopmental Techniques for Early Intervention, Hyannis and Taunton, MA

March 13-15, 2015: Co-Chair Profectum Third International Conference, Pasadena, CA

April 18, 2015: Parent Program at Harbor Regional Center, Torrance, CA.

April 27-28, 2015: Relationships Matter: About Building Connections, Project ABC Forum, Los Angeles, CA

November 5, 2015: Early Intervention: Neurodevelopmental Techniques for Challenging Behaviors, Parsippany, NJ

November 6, 2015: Early Intervention: Brain Based Techniques for Challenging Behaviors, Hasbrouck Heights, NJ

Rosemary White has been an occupational therapist since 1972 and brings a wealth of clinical experience to every workshop she teaches throughout the United States and internationally in Canada, Europe, South Africa, Uganda and Australia. Rosemary is a true clinician’s clinician! Rosemary received her neurodevelopmental therapy training in London with the Bobaths, her sensory integrative therapy training in Los Angeles with Dr. A Jean Ayres and her training in the DIRFloortime® model with Stanley Greenspan and Serena Wieder, Ph.D. and the Faculty of ICDL. She currently owns and operates Pediatric Physical and Occupational Therapy Services in Seattle, Washington. Rosemary has her certificate in the DIR® model and has been senior faculty on the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disabilities (ICDL) chaired by Stanley Greenspan, M.D. and Serena Wieder, Ph.D., since 2002. Rosemary is on the clinical faculty at the University of Washington in the School of Nursing Infant Mental Health Certificate Program. Rosemary is also faculty in the ICDL Graduate School in the Ph.D. in infant and early childhood mental health and developmental disorders. This is an on-line Ph.D. program providing education to professionals throughout the world. Rosemary is also Profectum Foundation Faculty.

Dr. Hutman is a clinical and developmental psychologist and assistant professor in Psychiatry at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. He specializes in autism, social-emotional development, and social cognitive development. He received bachelor and master’s degrees in Modern Thought & Literature from Stanford University. He received his doctorate in psychology from UCLA. Dr. Hutman is an investigator for the longitudinal study of infant siblings of children with autism, part of the NIH-funded Autism Center of Excellence (ACE) at UCLA. This research integrates behavioral, eye-tracking, electrophysiological, neuroimaging, and genetic methodologies to characterize autism during infancy and, thereby, to improve efforts to screen infants for autism. He is the recipient of a prestigious career development award from the National Institute of Mental Health. Dr. Hutman’s research has also been supported by the Friends of the Semel Institute; the Mattel Children’s Foundation; the FPR/UCLA Center for Culture, Brain & Development; the UCLA Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities Research Center; the UCLA Clinical & Translational Science Institute; and the UCLA Center for Autism Research & Treatment.

Consulting Clinical Psychologist, New York Center for Child Development (NYCCD); Clinical Co- Director, New York City Early Childhood Mental Health Training and Technical Assistance Center (TTAC)

Gilbert M. Foley, EdD, IMH-E® serves as Consulting Clinical Psychologist at the New York Center for Child Development (NYCCD) in New York City and Clinical Co- Director of the New York City Early Childhood Mental Health Training and Technical Assistance Center (TTAC). He is Endorsed as an Infant Mental Health/ Clinical Mentor, Level IV and is a founding board member of the New York and Pennsylvania State Associations of Infant Mental Health. He is a senior faculty member of the DIR® Profectum Academy and core faculty member of the Psychodynamic Institute for Clinical Social work (Chicago). Dr Foley is a retired Associate Professor (tenured) of the School-Clinical Child Psychology Doctoral Program at Yeshiva University’s Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology and Director Emeritus of the Graduate Program in Infant Mental Health and Developmental Practice at Adelphi University. He served as Visiting Fellow at the Yale Child Study Center and was Director of Psychology in the Department of Pediatrics at the Medical College of Pennsylvania. Dr. Foley is the co-author of four books and has written over 50 scholarly articles and chapters. Linking Sensory Integration and Mental Health: Nurturing Self-Regulation in Infants and Young Children has just been published by National Zero to Three. Dr. Foley lectures widely nationally and internationally.

Dr. Serena Wieder is the Clinical Director and a founding member of the Profectum Foundation, dedicated to advancing the development and mental health of children, of all ages, including adolescents and adults with neurodivergent development and emotional challenges through interdisciplinary training and educational programs. She also co-founded the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disorders and was a Board Member of Zero to Three for 23 years. Dr. Wieder serves on various advisory boards to various programs serving infant mental health and other special needs.  Dr. Wieder also founded DIR-Israel, a training program that offers DIR Certificates, and provides consultation and training to many international and national programs.

As a clinical psychologist, Dr. Wieder has pioneered important approaches to diagnosing and treating infants and toddlers with infant mental health and developmental disorders.  She co-created the DIR Model with Stanley Greenspan, edited two diagnostic manuals for infants and young children. Further, she created models for interdisciplinary post-graduate case based training and pioneered parent-mediated intervention for parents of neurodivergent children.

Dr. Wieder has co-chaired and organized national and international conferences integrating development, neuroscience and intervention approaches for over 20 years. Dr. Wieder also developed approaches to integrate visual-spatial knowledge to advance emotional and cognitive development.  Her research interests concern follow up studies of children on the autism spectrum who received DIR model interventions and the evaluation of training and educational programs. In addition, she serves as adjunct faculty at various universities including Bank Street , UCS Davis IMH Fellowship Program, and Adelphi.

Amongst her many publications Dr. Wieder co-authored Engaging Autism, The Child With Special Needs and Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health with Stanley Greenspan, M.D. They also co-edited Infants in Multi-Risk Families as well as the ICDL Diagnostic Manual for Infants and Young Children (DMIC)/ She edited the original Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders of Infancy and Early Childhood (DC 0-3) for Zero-Three. . Her chapters on the DIR Model appear in major textbooks on Autism Spectrum Disorders. Dr. Wieder also co- authored Visual Spatial Portals to Thinking, Feeling, and Movement with Harry Wachs, O.D. She has published numerous journal and book chapters and presents at multiple conferences nationally and internationally.

At this time, Dr. Serena Wieder also has a private practice in NYC for diagnosis, treatment and consultation regarding complex developmental and mental health challenges.

Michele is an occupational therapist, specializing in working with children with autism and sensory processing disorder. She currently works with children and families at her private practice – Great Kids Place – in Rockaway, New Jersey. She has been using and learning the DIR® model for over ten years in her work at Celebrate the Children school. She is a fellow of Dr. Lucy Jane Miller, OTR and faculty of both Profectum and Sensory Processing Disorder Foundation. Michele is DIR® model and SIPT certified with advanced training in visual spatial capacities. She started her therapy career providing consultation to public school districts on infusing sensory integration, visual spatial, and DIR® model goals throughout daily activities and curriculum. She co-developed a unique handwriting program – Connect Experience Write® – that highlights the importance of affective engagement in learning as well as sensory integration using music and movement to teach letter formation and pre-writing skills. Michele is passionate about working with families and other therapists and she continues to do so as a clinician and educator.

Dr. Levitt has held chair and institute directorships at the University of Southern California, Vanderbilt University and the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Levitt has been a MERIT awardee from the National Institute of Mental Health and served as a member of the National Advisory Mental Health Council for the National Institute of Mental Health. He is an elected member of the Dana Alliance for Brain Initiatives, an Elected Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), Chairman of the Neuroscience Division of the AAAS, and an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies. Dr. Levitt is a Senior Fellow at the Center for the Developing Child at Harvard University, and serves as Scientific Director of the National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, a policy council that brings the best research from child development and neuroscience to assist state and federal policy makers and private sector business leaders in making wise decisions regarding program investment. He has spoken on this topic in over 30 states. Dr. Levitt’s research focuses on the development of circuitry that controls learning, emotional and social behavior. His research focuses on genetic and environment factors that influence circuit formation and the underlying influence of individual differences (heterogeneity) in complex behaviors. Studies also identify factors that increase risk for neurodevelopmental and neuropsychiatric disorders. His clinical research studies address disorder heterogeneity by studying children with neurodevelopmental disorders who also have co-occurring medical conditions, such as gastrointestinal disorders. This research has a goal of developing better diagnostic criteria and personalized treatments. He has published over 260 scientific papers.

Celebrate the Children’s founder, Monica G. Osgood, is an experienced behavioral consultant and therapist who specializes in using developmental approaches to support children with autism and other differences in relating and communicating. She is also the Founder and Director of the Developmental Center for Children and Families (Limitless), a Board Member and founding member of the Profectum Foundation, and a Board Member and founding member of Celebrate the Individual (CTI). Monica has worked in homes, therapy centers, and private and public school settings for over 20 years. Some of her experience has included assessment and the development of intervention programs, curriculum and IEP development, and parent and professional training.

In 1998, Monica created the first public school program with the Developmental Individual Relationship-based (DIR model) approach as the core philosophy. ​In 2000, she was the first educator to join the senior faculty of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning(ICDL) to provide interdisciplinary training in the DIR model. During her time with ICDL, Monica served as faculty for all of their yearly training institutes, spoke at many of their conferences and had the opportunity to work closely and collaborate with Drs. Greenspan and Wieder to further develop the DIR model in school settings. ​In 2004, she collaborated with Lauren Blaszak to open a state-approved, DIR model school for children ages 3-21 in Denville, New Jersey, now serving over 70 school districts and 150 families.

Additional accomplishments include, many speaking engagements at conferences and participation in television, radio and newspaper interviews across the USA, Wales, Ireland and Amsterdam. Monica has appeared on Welsh Channel 4 and BBC1 documentaries, sharing the DIR model approach with British parents and professionals. Monica and the Celebrate the Children school were featured in a TIME Magazine cover story in May of 2006. ​She serves on the Advisory Board for 3LPlace and the National Advisory Council for The Centers for Exceptional Children​.  Monica also serves on the Economic Development Advisory Council and the Sustainable Economic Development Plan Steering Committee for her local Town Council. Finally, she collaborated with twice Grammy nominated children’s artists Dan Myers and Brady Rymer on an album and music video celebrating diversity in children with all abilities released April 2011.

Ricki Robinson, MD, MPH. is co-director of Descanso Medical Center for Development and Learning in La Canada, California and a clinical professor of pediatrics at the Keck School Medicine of USC. She has been in private pediatric practice for nearly forty years, specializing in children with autism and developmental delays for over twenty-five years.

Dr. Robinson received her MD degree in 1973 from the University of Southern California. She trained in pediatrics at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, having served as Chief Pediatric Resident for CHLA in 1976. She is board certified in pediatrics. In 1988 she received her MPH from the University at Berkeley School of Public Health.

She has been actively involved in the field of autism since 1990, developing multidisciplinary educational and medical programs for children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) and devoting endless hours in education, legislation and research efforts on a national level. Dr. Robinson has been at the forefront of leading grassroots autism organizations. She was a founding board member of Cure Autism Now (now Autism Speaks) and the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disorders (ICDL), and most recently Profectum Foundation. She was a member of the Autism Speaks Scientific Review Panel for over eight years. Dr. Robinson organized and chaired the first nationally recognized task force to define the standard of care for clinical trials in autism. The results of this outstanding effort were published in CNS Spectrums (January 2004, Vol. 9, #1). Most recently she was appointed as Medical Director of Profectum Foundation, an organization devoted to providing multi-disciplinary education and training for parents, families and professionals working with individuals with ASD across the lifespan.

A nationally sought-after expert, she has appeared on the Today Show, The Talk, Larry King Live and Good Morning America Health in support of the needs of children and families with autism spectrum disorders. She is an internationally recognized speaker addressing the needs of children with autism and other developmental delays to parent, professional and lay audiences worldwide for the past two decades. She is also the author of the acclaimed book Autism Solutions – How to Create a Healthy and Meaningful Life for Your Child. 

Elizabeth Torres is a Computational Neuroscientist who has developed theoretical models of sensory-motor integration and motor control since the late 90's. Her models have been translated to clinical applications across neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative disorders, as well as applied to other neurological disorders. She holds a multi-disciplinary tenure-track Assistant Professorship at Rutgers University. Her appointment is shared among the Psychology, Department, the Computer Science Department and the Rutgers Center for Cognitive Science. She also holds and adjunct faculty position in Neurology (Movement Disorders) at the Medical School of Indiana University in Indianapolis. Her lab has created new dynamic behavioral biomarkers of Autism, sub-typed Autism severity and identified autistic female traits to help increase early detection reliability. More recently these findings are being used to implement new concepts for earlier intervention and extended to include neural correlates with novel metrics to objectively track change in the developing child. She has published her work in important peer-reviewed journals including the Journal of Neuroscience, the Journal of Neurophysiology, and Experimental Brain Research and disseminated her findings in the open access platforms of Biomed Central, Plos One and Frontiers. Her edited research topic in Frontiers in Neuroscience has attracted worldwide interest and gained the attention of Nature Reviews Neuroscience this September 2013.

Karen McDowell is an educator with over 25 years experience working with the adolescent and young adult population. She is an assistant faculty member of Profectum Foundation and strives to implement a comprehensive developmental curriculum into both her classroom environment and therapy work. As a lead teacher and Young Adult Program Coordinator at Celebrate the Children school for 13 years, she has contributed to innovative curriculum and strategies with the unique needs of individuals in mind while promoting opportunities for growth and development in both group and individual settings. Karen facilitates a weekly young adult group for several years with intensive focus on social and emotional strengths and challenges. Areas of interest and study include executive functioning, visual spatial processing, emotional regulation, and problem solving and she has provided workshops around the country on these developmental areas. Karen strives to provide programs that entice thinking, collaborative problem solving, effective communication, and positive coping strategies to support success, independence, meaningful and fulfilling experiences, and happiness within the demands of the 21st century.

Lauren Blaszak is one of the Co-Founders and Executive Directors of Celebrate the Children school. Lauren has extensive experience working with students with Autism Spectrum Disorder and other developmental disorders for over 14 years. Prior to starting the school in 2004 in collaboration with Monica Osgood, Lauren worked as a behavioral consultant to public school districts in New Jersey and New York. In addition, her experience includes parent support and training, social skills training, supervision of home programs, supervisor of instructional teams and supporting public schools in learning about and integrating DIR® into the mainstream. She also works collaboratively with other organizations and professionals in terms of education and research of Autism and related disorders. Her accomplishments include speaking engagements at national and local conferences, as well as participation in television, radio, and newspaper interviews and publications.Lauren Blaszak is one of the Co-Founders and Executive Directors of Celebrate the Children school. Lauren has extensive experience working with students with Autism Spectrum Disorder and other developmental disorders for over 18 20 years. Lauren worked as a behavioral consultant to public school districts in New Jersey and New York. In addition, her experience includes parent support and training, social skills training, supervision of home programs, supervisor of instructional teams and supporting public schools in learning about and integrating DIR® into the mainstream. She also works collaboratively with other organizations and professionals in terms of education and research of Autism and related disorders. Her accomplishments include speaking engagements at national and local conferences, as well as participation in television, radio, and newspaper interviews and publications.

Chantal’s passion for empowering others and her personal interest in autism has led her to become an autism consultant, an award-winning author, speaker, and leader in the field of autism, adolescence and transition to adulthood. She has been involved with autism spectrum disorders for over 25 years as both a parent and a professional on both sides of the Atlantic. A tireless advocate for those on the autism spectrum, Chantal founded Autism College in order to provide consultation services, practical information and training online about autism. In 2009, Chantal was appointed by the California Senate Select Committee on Autism & Related Disorders to lead the South Counties Autism Regional Taskforce as Co-Chair; and in the past served on the Taskforce on Transitional Services & Supports reporting to the California Legislative Blue Ribbon Commission on Autism. Chantal received her BA in Social Ecology from the University of California at Irvine (UCI). Her first practical experience with autism was at Fairview State Hospital, teaching self-help and community living skills to severely developmentally disabled and autistic adolescents in preparation for their de-institutionalization. Then, as a case manager for Orange County Regional Center for the Developmentally Disabled, Chantal provided information and resources to families. Little did Chantal know that years later, these work experiences would prove invaluable when her son (now a young adult) was born and eventually diagnosed with autism in Paris, France, where the only treatment on offer was psychoanalysis. Chantal’s struggle to find appropriate treatment for her son led them to move to England, where they became one of the first families in the UK to run a Lovaas-type (based on applied behavior analysis) home program. Having been a service provider in California, and then a parent raising her child and dealing with the ’systems’ in France, United Kingdom and the United States, gives Chantal a unique and well-rounded perspective few people in this field have. A former researcher on BBC documentaries and a line producer on a TV Series in Paris, Chantal blogs on Huffingtonpost.com, and PsychologyToday.com. Chantal has been interviewed on a wide variety of media, including NPR, PBS, The Chicago Tribune, Newsweek and Fox News. Jeremy, Chantal’s son, was highlighted in the Newsweek cover story “Growing up with Autism” and featured in the MTV documentary True Life series, in “I Have Autism” which was the recipient of a 2008 Voice Award. His commencement speech from Torrey Pines High School was covered by the media. Jeremy is a painter, writer, advocate and autism consultant.

Lauren Blaszak is one of the Co-Founders and Executive Directors of Celebrate the Children school. Lauren has extensive experience working with students with Autism Spectrum Disorder and other developmental disorders for over 14 years. Prior to starting the school in 2004 in collaboration with Monica Osgood, Lauren worked as a behavioral consultant to public school districts in New Jersey and New York. In addition, her experience includes parent support and training, social skills training, supervision of home programs, supervisor of instructional teams and supporting public schools in learning about and integrating DIR® into the mainstream. She also works collaboratively with other organizations and professionals in terms of education and research of Autism and related disorders. Her accomplishments include speaking engagements at national and local conferences, as well as participation in television, radio, and newspaper interviews and publications.Lauren Blaszak is one of the Co-Founders and Executive Directors of Celebrate the Children school. Lauren has extensive experience working with students with Autism Spectrum Disorder and other developmental disorders for over 18 20 years. Lauren worked as a behavioral consultant to public school districts in New Jersey and New York. In addition, her experience includes parent support and training, social skills training, supervision of home programs, supervisor of instructional teams and supporting public schools in learning about and integrating DIR® into the mainstream. She also works collaboratively with other organizations and professionals in terms of education and research of Autism and related disorders. Her accomplishments include speaking engagements at national and local conferences, as well as participation in television, radio, and newspaper interviews and publications.

Dr. Serena Wieder is the Clinical Director and a founding member of the Profectum Foundation, dedicated to advancing the development and mental health of children, of all ages, including adolescents and adults with neurodivergent development and emotional challenges through interdisciplinary training and educational programs. She also co-founded the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disorders and was a Board Member of Zero to Three for 23 years. Dr. Wieder serves on various advisory boards to various programs serving infant mental health and other special needs.  Dr. Wieder also founded DIR-Israel, a training program that offers DIR Certificates, and provides consultation and training to many international and national programs.

As a clinical psychologist, Dr. Wieder has pioneered important approaches to diagnosing and treating infants and toddlers with infant mental health and developmental disorders.  She co-created the DIR Model with Stanley Greenspan, edited two diagnostic manuals for infants and young children. Further, she created models for interdisciplinary post-graduate case based training and pioneered parent-mediated intervention for parents of neurodivergent children.

Dr. Wieder has co-chaired and organized national and international conferences integrating development, neuroscience and intervention approaches for over 20 years. Dr. Wieder also developed approaches to integrate visual-spatial knowledge to advance emotional and cognitive development.  Her research interests concern follow up studies of children on the autism spectrum who received DIR model interventions and the evaluation of training and educational programs. In addition, she serves as adjunct faculty at various universities including Bank Street , UCS Davis IMH Fellowship Program, and Adelphi.

Amongst her many publications Dr. Wieder co-authored Engaging Autism, The Child With Special Needs and Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health with Stanley Greenspan, M.D. They also co-edited Infants in Multi-Risk Families as well as the ICDL Diagnostic Manual for Infants and Young Children (DMIC)/ She edited the original Diagnostic Classification of Mental Health and Developmental Disorders of Infancy and Early Childhood (DC 0-3) for Zero-Three. . Her chapters on the DIR Model appear in major textbooks on Autism Spectrum Disorders. Dr. Wieder also co- authored Visual Spatial Portals to Thinking, Feeling, and Movement with Harry Wachs, O.D. She has published numerous journal and book chapters and presents at multiple conferences nationally and internationally.

At this time, Dr. Serena Wieder also has a private practice in NYC for diagnosis, treatment and consultation regarding complex developmental and mental health challenges.

Mady Kaplan is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, with a specialization in children and families. She is a Certified Early Childhood Group Therapist, a graduate of the Profectum Advanced Clinical Training Program and a Certified Profectum Trainer. Mady conducts individual and group therapy for children and parents at Celebrate the Children school and in private practice. Throughout her career Mady has offered workshops at a variety of national conferences for educators, parents, social workers and other professionals. Mady is delighted to be presenting at the NY/NJ Profectum Conference on Relationships.

Tal Baz, MS, OTR/L is a registered and licensed occupational therapist who has practiced as a DIR Floortime® therapist, supervisor and consultant for more than fifteen years and works both nationally and internationally with families, clinicians, and various school systems. She has a clinical practice in Somerville, MA, and is teaching DIR Floortime® courses through the Profectum Foundation, nationally as well as internationally. Her special interests are in sensory-affective regulation, as it develops within the parent-child relational field. Tal has served on the DIR® faculty since 2001.

Rosemary White has been an occupational therapist since 1972 and brings a wealth of clinical experience to every workshop she teaches throughout the United States and internationally in Canada, Europe, South Africa, Uganda and Australia. Rosemary is a true clinician’s clinician! Rosemary received her neurodevelopmental therapy training in London with the Bobaths, her sensory integrative therapy training in Los Angeles with Dr. A Jean Ayres and her training in the DIRFloortime® model with Stanley Greenspan and Serena Wieder, Ph.D. and the Faculty of ICDL. She currently owns and operates Pediatric Physical and Occupational Therapy Services in Seattle, Washington. Rosemary has her certificate in the DIR® model and has been senior faculty on the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disabilities (ICDL) chaired by Stanley Greenspan, M.D. and Serena Wieder, Ph.D., since 2002. Rosemary is on the clinical faculty at the University of Washington in the School of Nursing Infant Mental Health Certificate Program. Rosemary is also faculty in the ICDL Graduate School in the Ph.D. in infant and early childhood mental health and developmental disorders. This is an on-line Ph.D. program providing education to professionals throughout the world. Rosemary is also Profectum Foundation Faculty.

Linda Cervenka is a licensed Speech Language Pathologist and works primarily with children and adolescents with autistic spectrum and related disorders utilizing DIR® and development language models. She has a private practice in Riverside, Illinois providing mentoring, teaching, case management/guidance and direct service.   Linda is also co-founder of Soaring Eagle Academy, an Illinois State Board of Education approved school serving students 5 through 21 years of age with autism and related disorders.  She serves as an Expert Clinician/Trainer at the Academy.   Linda received her Bachelor's Degree from Elmhurst College in Elmhurst, IL and her Master's Degree in Communicative Disorders from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has worked for over 35 years with children with special needs, in home based and clinic based therapeutic services and public and private schools providing consultation, training and support for children and families. Linda is a Senior Faculty member of Profectum and has presented nationally on the topic of developmental approaches to intervention for children.  Additionally, within the Academy and through private consultations, Linda helps parents/caregivers and school programs understand a developmental approach to dysregulation seeing the child’s actions as a stress response versus “behaviors” that are intentional and to avoid/escape learning.  The primary areas of support include training all stakeholders in the child’s developmental process including but not limited to the child’s language comprehension profile, recognizing and reading their subtle communicative intentions and understanding their individual sensory, affective and motor systems during a stress response. 

Celebrate the Children’s founder, Monica G. Osgood, is an experienced behavioral consultant and therapist who specializes in using developmental approaches to support children with autism and other differences in relating and communicating. She is also the Founder and Director of the Developmental Center for Children and Families (Limitless), a Board Member and founding member of the Profectum Foundation, and a Board Member and founding member of Celebrate the Individual (CTI). Monica has worked in homes, therapy centers, and private and public school settings for over 20 years. Some of her experience has included assessment and the development of intervention programs, curriculum and IEP development, and parent and professional training.

In 1998, Monica created the first public school program with the Developmental Individual Relationship-based (DIR model) approach as the core philosophy. ​In 2000, she was the first educator to join the senior faculty of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning(ICDL) to provide interdisciplinary training in the DIR model. During her time with ICDL, Monica served as faculty for all of their yearly training institutes, spoke at many of their conferences and had the opportunity to work closely and collaborate with Drs. Greenspan and Wieder to further develop the DIR model in school settings. ​In 2004, she collaborated with Lauren Blaszak to open a state-approved, DIR model school for children ages 3-21 in Denville, New Jersey, now serving over 70 school districts and 150 families.

Additional accomplishments include, many speaking engagements at conferences and participation in television, radio and newspaper interviews across the USA, Wales, Ireland and Amsterdam. Monica has appeared on Welsh Channel 4 and BBC1 documentaries, sharing the DIR model approach with British parents and professionals. Monica and the Celebrate the Children school were featured in a TIME Magazine cover story in May of 2006. ​She serves on the Advisory Board for 3LPlace and the National Advisory Council for The Centers for Exceptional Children​.  Monica also serves on the Economic Development Advisory Council and the Sustainable Economic Development Plan Steering Committee for her local Town Council. Finally, she collaborated with twice Grammy nominated children’s artists Dan Myers and Brady Rymer on an album and music video celebrating diversity in children with all abilities released April 2011.

Michele is a licensed speech and language pathologist, who works primarily with children diagnosed on the autistic spectrum. Michele is one of three founders of Soaring Eagle Academy, a school for children with special needs that utilizes developmental language intervention and the DIR® model. In addition, she has a private practice in the western suburbs of Chicago. Michele has a master’s degree in speech-language pathology from Northwestern University (1995).

Director for Medical Virtual Reality - Institute for Creative Technologies; Research Professor - USC Davis School of Gerontology and USC Keck School of Medicine Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences / Psychologist Skip Rizzo conducts research on the design, development and evaluation of virtual reality (VR) systems targeting the areas of clinical assessment, treatment/rehabilitation and resilience. This work spans the domains of psychological, cognitive and motor functioning in both healthy and clinical populations. Rizzo, whose work using virtual reality-based exposure therapy to treat PTSD received the American Psychological Association’s 2010 Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Treatment of Trauma, is the Director for Medical Virtual Reality at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies. In addition to his work using VR to deliver exposure therapy for the treatment of PTSD, he is developing applications for training emotional coping skills with the aim of preparing service members for the stresses of combat. His cognitive work has addressed the use of VR applications to test and train attention, memory, visuospatial abilities and executive function. In the motor domain, he has developed VR game systems to address physical rehabilitation post stroke and traumatic brain injury and for other CNS-related health conditions. He is currently designing VR scenarios to address social and vocational interaction in persons with autistic spectrum disorder and is working with a team that is creating artificially intelligent virtual patients that clinicians can use to practice skills required for challenging clinical interviews and diagnostic assessments. He is senior editor of the MIT Press journal, Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments. He also sits on a number of editorial boards for journals in the areas of healthcare and computer technology (The Computer Games Journal; Journal of Communication in Healthcare; Future Internet Journal; Journal of Computer Animation and Virtual Worlds;) and is one of the founders of the International Society of Virtual Rehabilitation.

Diane Selinger, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst in private practice, who works with children, adolescents and adults. She is a  faculty member of Profectum Academy and of the Chicago Center for Psychoanalysis (CCP).  For many years, she was the mental health consultant at Beth Osten and Associates, a multidisciplinary pediatric clinic. She continues to be a mental health consultant at Soaring Eagle Academy and to provide individual and group consultation. 

Dr. Marco is a child neurologist and neuroscientist at the University of California, San Francisco. She did her undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania and proceeded to UCSF for her medical school training, pediatrics and neurology residency as well as her cognitive and behavioral fellowship. She is the director of research for the UCSF Autism and Neurodevelopment Program (ANP) and she directs the cognitive and behavioral child neurology clinic and the Autism NeuroGenetics Clinic. Dr. Marco’s research laboratory applies her clinical expertise in cognition and behavior to understanding the neural mechanisms of neurodevelopmental disorders related to autism, agenesis of the corpus callosum, sensory processing disorder (SPD), ADHD, and brain injury. Her laboratory is focuses on how individuals with neurodevelopmental differences process basic sensory information from perception to action using cutting edge neuroimaging techniques. Her expanding treatment projects are targeting computer training as a tool for augmenting positive brain plasticity.