Offering expertise to support systems of care in LA County.

Gabriela Alejos, LCSW is a lead facilitator for the Early Childhood Fellowship. Ms. Alejos is also a Clinical Social Worker with the PCIT Clinic and, a Trainer and Curriculum Developer for the Prevention Center of Excellence at UCLA, and a facilitator for SEEDS (Strategies for Enhancing Early Developmental Success) Programs. Much of her current and past clinical work has been with young children and their families. Ms. Alejos is passionate about dyadic work and is always impressed by how powerful and healing relationships truly are. She is a Level 2 Reflective Parenting facilitator, is certified in Parent-Child Interaction Therapy and PC-CARE and has completed Implementation-Level Child-Parent Psychotherapy Training. Ms. Alejos earned her Master’s in Social Work from the University of Southern California with a concentration of Children, Youth and Families.

Ana Amador is the Assistant Director of the Education and Training at the UCLA-UCSF ACEs Aware Family Resilience Network (UCAAN). A dedicated mental health professional, she provides bilingual, evidence-based outpatient services with a present-centered and person-centered approach, ensuring care is tailored to each individual’s unique experiences.

With extensive experience in community mental health, Ana has worked closely with outside agencies to support vulnerable children and families, particularly those involved in the child welfare system. Her ability to foster cross-system collaboration and mobilize resources ensures that families receive comprehensive, trauma-informed care.

Ana is a passionate advocate for healing and resilience, firmly believing in the potential for individuals and communities to thrive. She specializes in trauma-informed interventions, helping individuals process and recover from adversity while building skills for lasting well-being. In addition to her clinical work, Ana serves as Project Director for the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence, where she leads training initiatives for the Los Angeles County workforce. Her efforts equip professionals with the tools needed to integrate trauma and resilience-informed practices into their work, ultimately strengthening the broader system of care.

A champion of culturally responsive and collaborative approaches, Ana is committed to fostering collective healing. Her leadership, compassion, and dedication to creating meaningful change make her a valued contributor to the field of mental health and a driving force in advancing well-being at both the individual and systemic levels.

Agustina Bertone, PhD, serves as the Associate Director of the Early Childhood Fellowship. She is a Spanish-bilingual licensed clinical psychologist with specialties in perinatal psychology and infant/early childhood mental health. Dr. Bertone has worked in a number of settings, including hospitals, schools, academic centers, and community mental health clinics. She is passionate about the implementation of culturally-responsive practices for supporting parents with young children in schools and therapeutic settings. She completed her doctorate in Counseling, Clinical, and School Psychology at the University of California Santa Barbara and a Postdoctoral Fellowship in Early Childhood and Integrated Care at UCLA

Dr. Natalie Arbid worked as a clinician and supervisor at Harbor UCLA Medical Center where she offered trauma informed, evidence-based care to clients and taught this approach to students. Dr. Arbid also worked on the system level dissemination and implementation of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) and Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) to clinicians in county clinics. She is passionate about making trauma informed, evidence-based practices more accessible for underserved populations in LA county.

Dr. Arbid is a training manager at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence overseeing the implementation of trauma and resilience informed training programs to Los Angeles County employees working in Short-Term Residential Therapeutic Programs (STRTP). STRTPs are intended to serve children/youth/nonminor dependents who need a level of care and supervision that cannot be met in a family-like setting and who are not in need of inpatient services, such as a psychiatric hospital or Community Treatment Facility.

Claudia Avalos-Garcia is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist specializing in providing evidenced-based outpatient mental health services in both English and Spanish to high school and college students, young adults launching into adulthood (Transitional Aged Youth-TAY), and adults established in life. Her theoretical approach is eclectic: focusing on Cognitive Behavioral and Cognitive Processing Therapies, Narrative, Solution-Focused, and Post-Modern modalities. Claudia has over a decade of experience working in community-based mental health services including employment support, case management, and therapy in a variety of settings, such as outpatient, field-based, in-home, and school-based services servicing communities in need. Claudia is very passionate about destigmatizing mental health in all communities and works to empower and motivate individuals to strengthen their confidence in self-discovery. Claudia serves as Clinical Trainer at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence where she provides professional development to professionals in health care, mental health, and various other settings. She does this through evidence-based trainings designed to improve community mental health and wellbeing from a trauma and resilience informed lens, understanding the impact of toxic stress, recognizing and strengthening protective factors, and resiliency.

Alyssa Ayon is a passionate and eager advocate, educator, and lifelong learner dedicated to fostering community resilience through education and support. As a first-generation college student born and raised in Los Angeles, Alyssa aims to show up authentically, embodying her lived experiences across her work. She earned her Master’s in Social Work from California State University, Northridge and a Bachelor of Arts in Sociology from California State University, Fullerton. Her expertise focuses on gender-based violence prevention, education, and advocacy in university and community settings. Alyssa is a mental health facilitator and curriculum developer with the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence, where she creates and delivers trainings to promote trauma and resilience-informed care throughout LA County. Her work includes program evaluation, workforce development, and curriculum development designed to improve community health and wellbeing. Alyssa also serves as a mental health clinician providing culturally-attuned, empowerment-based, and trauma-informed therapy to support survivors of violence, college students, and young adults.

Helen Chen earned their Master of Social Work degree from UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs in 2018. Helen’s past experience includes working with individuals experiencing homelessness, severe and persistent mental illness, substance use addiction, chronic health problems, the LGBTQ community, transitional aged youth (TAY) population, older adults, and immigrant populations. Helen is an avid member of the A Slice of New York family in the Bay Area as they’ve been slinging pizza pies since 2011. Helen wouldn’t consider themselves an expert in any one particular subject. However, if there was any sort of “choose your own” educational research project to be done, they would do it and have done it on the LGBTQ community, worker wellness, and/or the intersection of having multiple marginalized identities. In addition to designing attractive PowerPoints, Helen hopes to continue to be part of systemic change at UCLA through being themselves and creating more accessible mental health learning and training materials for the larger Los Angeles County community, from the ivory tower to across the land. Helen is a Curriculum Developer at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence and a social worker by trade.

Miguel Drayton is an eLearning Specialist on the COE team. He’s lived a few previous lives: screenwriter, filmmaker, educator, administrator. Other indulgences include social science research, non-profit leadership, and videogame narrative design. He’s hooked on stories and passionate about employing narrative to ignite engagement in digital learning platforms. His obsession with interactive storytelling led him to UCLA Health in 2019, where, among other things, he scripted live-action and virtual learning scenarios at the UCLA Simulation Center. He also coordinated and ran high fidelity clinical simulations and designed instructional innovations with Extended Reality (Virtual/Augmented/Mixed Reality) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) integration. He managed the design, development, and deployment of the “TeamCARE–Finding Your Voice” eLearning curriculum to train UCLA Health Medical Chaperones to combat sexual harassment and abuse in healthcare facilities. This was the first time UCLA Health deployed an eLearning curriculum that integrated Unity game engine virtual simulations and natural language processing AI.

Miguel’s research interests lie at the intersection of virtual learning environments, gamification, and narrative storytelling. His endgame is to push the boundaries of gamified eLearning and create innovative experiential learning solutions for digital platforms. He holds a BA in Communication from Stanford University, an MFA from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, and an MS in Instructional Design and Technology from CSUF’s MSIDT Program.  When he isn’t working, he’s doting on his teenaged daughter, wife, too-many kick scooters, and Brompton folding bike. He’s sometimes sighted chasing sunsets on the Ballona Creek bike path.

Casey Estorque received a BA in Psychology from the University of Texas and an EdM & MA from Teachers College, Columbia University. She is deeply committed to delivering culturally responsive and trauma-informed education that supports community wellbeing. In particular, Casey is passionate about leveraging education to elevate social justice and support the mental health of youth in marginalized populations.

Before joining the COE team as a curriculum developer, Casey developed and facilitated family and community programming for low-income families at a mental health nonprofit organization, counseled at-risk youth in Harlem, NY, created social-emotional interventions for school-based digital learning programs, and conducted research in a variety of labs. She is excited to expand trauma and resilience informed practices through her as role at UCLA’s Prevention Center of Excellence.

Dr. Sophie de Figueiredo oversees systems-level implementation of a variety of trauma and resilience informed training programs for employees of LA County across various sectors, including those from the Office of Education, Department of Mental Health, Home Visitation, and LA County Disaster Service Workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. de Figueiredo is also a practicing licensed bilingual/bicultural clinical psychologist who, prior to joining UCLA, supervised staff psychologists for many years in a DMH-contracted behavioral health clinic within the Division of Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine of Children’s Hospital Los Angeles primarily providing direct clinical services, including several evidence-based practices, to a range of culturally diverse, underserved teens, young adults and families. Her primary areas of clinical emphasis include youth exposed to complex trauma, pregnant/parenting teens, youth diagnosed with neurodevelopmental differences and/or chronic medical illnesses, and issues related to immigration and acculturation. She is especially passionate about supporting young women from BIPOC communities in navigating their unique challenges in order to enhance opportunities for achievement, health and wellbeing. Dr. de Figueiredo has extensive experience providing trauma-informed clinical supervision to interdisciplinary teams and front-line staff and psychology trainees and has developed and facilitated diversity seminars for post-doctoral psychology fellows to enhance clinical sensitivity and humility in provision of care. Her research focuses on risk and protective factors related to compassion fatigue and burnout among interdisciplinary groups of trauma providers. Dr. Sophie de Figueiredo is a Senior Clinical Training Manager at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence.

Dr. Susan Finley serves as a curriculum developer at UCLA’s Prevention Center of Excellence. She brings nearly two decades of experience working in higher education. As an associate professor, she teaches psychology and research methods at the graduate and undergraduate levels for colleges and universities in New York and Southern California. Dr. Finley has also worked as a career counselor and tele-mental health provider. She is actively involved in the community doing mental health advocacy work and has completed trainings at the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center. Her research interests include distance education, telehealth, mindfulness, and resilience. Her formal training is equity-centered and trauma-informed. Dr. Finley received her Doctorate in Organizational Leadership from Pepperdine University, an MS degree in Mental Health Counseling from Pace University, and a BA degree in Media Studies with a minor in Psychology from Fordham University in New York City, where she was a scholar athlete.

Dr. Daisy Gomez is a Los Angeles native who received an MS in Forensic Psychology and EdD in Counseling Psychology. Dr. Gomez specializes in restorative practices, working with high-risk populations and adults and families affected by trauma, gang-involvement, the criminal justice system, the foster care system, substance abuse, racial injustice, and those affected by incarceration. She has collaborated with community-based organizations, national organizations, and law enforcement agencies in creating and implementing reformative initiatives to increase education and access to mental health within underserved populations. Dr. Daisy Gomez is the lead trainer for the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence.

Christina Harrison is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and received their Master in Social Welfare degree from UCLA.  Social welfare posits that an individual’s well-being and growth is inextricably connected to the overall wellness of the communities and organizations they are a part of, and vice versa; this framework perfectly captures Christina’s approach to work, as well as life.  Having first-hand experiences about the challenges of operating in the “in between” spaces, Christina utilizes their lived and professional expertise to serve QTIBIPOC+ folx at all intersections of their identities, via second & third-wave behavioral therapies. 

Prior to joining the COE as a curriculum developer, Christina worked at a wide variety of settings, including community mental health clinics, schools, academic training centers, hospitals, in private practice, and done project design/implementation/evaluation for the Department of Mental Health; Christina has also worked in the tech industry, providing coaching & consultation in creating trauma-informed systems for companies working in digital safety.  Christina is a firm believer that change needs to simultaneously occur at a systems-level in order to sustain individual healing and growth; as such, Christina furthers their systems-level work by serving as an intergroup dialogue facilitator in response to marginalization and race-based trauma. 

When Christina isn’t on the clock, you can find them recipe testing baked goods in their kitchen, convincing themself that there’s no such thing as too many plants and subsequently becoming overwhelmed when they get home and have to figure out where to fit another plant, and – most likely on the ground, hurt laughing – re-learning how to roller-skate, which is much more challenging than they remember it being.

Gustavo Loera is an experienced educator, researcher, and technical assistance provider with over two decades in the field. He specializes in designing and implementing impactful programs and strategies to promote mental health wellness and workforce development. His extensive experience includes collaborations with school districts, colleges, universities, government agencies, counties, and community-based organizations, focusing on prevention, early identification, and intervention. Gustavo is also dedicated to fostering inclusivity, diversity, and equity, ensuring people’s full participation in community life. His academic background includes an EdD in K-12 educational leadership from University of Southern California, an MA in clinical psychology, and a BA in psychology and Mexican-American/Chicano Studies from California State University, Dominguez Hills. Gustavo currently serves as a Curriculum Developer for the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence.

Dr. Marlotte is a board certified and licensed clinical psychologist who received her doctorate from the University of La Verne, where she studied clinical and community psychology. Dr. Marlotte completed a predoctoral clinical internship working primarily with underserved populations at an outpatient community mental health center and juvenile hall. Dr. Marlotte’s postdoctoral fellowship was at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, where she specialized in working with adolescents and their families. During her fellowship, Dr. Marlotte provided education on trauma-informed care, multicultural competency, somatic-based treatment modalities, psychological testing, crisis assessment and intervention, and nonsuicidal self-injurious behaviors. She earned her bachelor’s degrees from Occidental College in cognitive science and kinesiology and her master’s degree from the University of La Verne in clinical psychology. Dr. Marlotte is the Director of Learning and Development at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence.

Dr. Charles Martin is a distinguished educator with a focus on e-learning, curriculum design, and language education. He earned his doctorate in Educational Technology from the University of Florida, centering his research on language acquisition, leadership, and e-learning. Dr. Martin has partnered with esteemed organizations such as the United States Army, Microsoft, and Discovery Collective, designing and implementing digital learning experiences for students, educators, and clients alike. He has contributed to instructional design and teaching efforts at the University of California, Riverside, and Morningside University.

Dr. Martin possesses a unique talent for crafting compelling curricula and delivering engaging learning experiences that cater to diverse learners. He holds a BA in History and an MEd in Middle Childhood Education from Georgia State University, as well as an administrative certificate in School Administration from the University of Southern California. Outside of his professional life, Charles cherishes spending time with his wife and daughter and exploring new destinations through travel. He is excited to join UCLA as an e-learning specialist and eagerly anticipates further advancement in his career.

Ruben Martinez is a former community college transfer student who also attended Alabama A&M and California State University (CSU), Fullerton. Ruben received their MS in Clinical Counseling from CSU Fullerton in 2012. Trained as a Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist, Ruben has over 10 years of direct clinical service experience working with children, families, and adults in community settings. Ruben also has experience in crisis intervention, evidence-based practices, and clinical supervision. They are a bilingual Spanish speaker dedicated to culturally and linguistically-informed practices and has research experience that focused on the impact of the "public voice" (Proposition 8) on LGBTQ+ communities and the psychological impact of hyper-masculine settings on LGBTQ+ high competition athletes. Ruben is a Clinical Trainer at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence and provides training, technical assistance, and reflective practice consultation. Ruben is also a lead facilitator with the DMH + UCLA Early Childhood Fellowship and is a certified SEEDS Facilitator.

Laura McMullin has extensive experience in education with expertise in mindfulness and social-emotional wellbeing. Over the past 20 years, Laura has been dedicated to transformative education working within a social justice framework. Through her research, Laura developed a model for integrative education rooted in wellbeing. She is passionate about supporting healing and wellbeing on an individual and collective level and is deeply inspired by the resilience of the human spirit and the power of community in nourishing the potential for personal and systemic transformation. She has fulfilled a variety of roles, including a K-12 public school teacher in both Los Angeles and New York City; university researcher and lecturer; teacher educator; professional development facilitator; curriculum developer and program evaluator.

Laura is a Clinical Curriculum Developer for the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence. Laura has a BA in Sociology from UC Berkeley, a Masters in Social Justice Education from UCLA, and a Ph.D. in Education from NYU where she focused on mindfulness and social emotional wellbeing for teachers.

Rebecca Morgan is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with extensive experience developing and delivering trauma and resilience-informed programs for the education, medical, and early childhood sectors throughout LA County at the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence. She has provided training and consultation to frontline professionals on supporting children and adolescents following community-level trauma or tragedy, recognizing and responding to trauma symptoms in both school and clinical settings, and promoting resilience through relationship-based, developmentally appropriate approaches. Rebecca has also played a key role in supporting and developing the curriculum for Families Overcoming Under Stress (FOCUS), providing specialized trainings to help families strengthen communication, build resilience, and support one another during times of stress or transition.

Paulina is an experienced Instructional Designer, eLearning Specialist, and Curriculum Developer with a diverse background spanning community colleges, private and public universities, and health systems. She has collaborated with a wide range of professionals—from entry-level staff to upper-level leadership, including both clinical and non-clinical teams—to design and implement scalable, learner-centered training solutions.

She holds a Bachelor of Science in Community and Public Health from California State University, Dominguez Hills, which grounds her work in a deep understanding of health equity, prevention, and systems-based thinking. Paulina is also passionate about the evolving intersection of education and technology and is actively pursuing opportunities to expand her knowledge in artificial intelligence to stay at the forefront of innovative learning solutions.

With expertise in healthcare, public health, DEI, and professional development, Paulina creates accessible, evidence-based learning experiences that empower individuals and strengthen organizational capacity. Her instructional design approach blends adult learning theory, research-backed methodologies, and innovative technologies to build engaging content tailored to a variety of audiences—from academic institutions to corporate and clinical environments. She specializes in translating complex concepts into actionable training that drives behavior change, supports professional growth, and fosters lasting impact.

Sabella is a Training Coordinator for the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence. She recently graduated from UCLA with a Master of Public Health in Community Health Sciences. She also holds a Bachelor’s degree in Public Health Sciences from UC Irvine. Additionally, Sabella completed her field studies at the Division of Population Behavioral Health last summer, where she contributed to data analysis for a county-based case study and needs assessment. She is excited to return to the Division in this new role, supporting mental health trainings and contributing to a range of impactful projects. She has experience leading evaluation efforts for people experiencing homelessness in the Mobile Clinic Project at UCLA, supporting needs assessment, data analysis, and reporting to improve service delivery.

Dr. Eraka Bath specializes in diagnostic assessment and forensic consultation with adolescents, with an emphasis on high-risk youth, including those with histories of trauma, juvenile delinquency, and foster care placement. Dr. Bath has developed partnerships with the Los Angeles County Juvenile Court system and consults and provides training to the Juvenile Delinquency Court System and the Los Angeles County Department of Probation. Dr. Bath is an Associate Professor at UCLA.

Dr. Todd Franke has 27 years of experience in conducting cross-sectional and longitudinal research in a variety of interconnected fields including child welfare, education, juvenile justice, mental health and adolescent violence. His expertise includes data analysis (multivariate, predictive analytics, machine learning), data visualization, and linking large existing datasets together for the social good. Dr. Franke is a Professor at UCLA.   

Dr. Nastassia Hajal (she/her) is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the UCLA Department of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences in the David Geffen School of Medicine and the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. She also serves as the Assistant Director of the Nathanson Family Resilience Center’s Early Childhood Core. Dr. Hajal is a child clinical psychologist whose primary interests are in parenting and young children’s emotional development in the context of family stress and trauma.

Dr. Hajal is interested in translational work that bridges basic science on developmental psychopathology, parenting, and emotion with clinical research on the promotion of child and family resilience. She has a particular interest in studying caregiver emotional processes using novel methodology, including intensive and ecologically valid techniques (such as experience sampling methodology) and affective neuroscience (such as EEG). Dr. Hajal’s involvement in translational work spans from the translation of basic science findings to develop and refine family-centered interventions, to integration of well-established approaches for implementation into large systems (e.g., UCLA Health System, Los Angeles Unified School District).

Current projects include an NIH-funded clinical trial of emotion regulation, biomarkers, and response to intervention in parents who have their own histories of childhood interpersonal trauma, as well as studies examining parenting, emotion socialization, and response to intervention in Latinx families.

In addition to her research and clinical work, Dr. Hajal loves teaching and mentoring. She serves as an attending psychologist at the UCLA Family STAR (Stress, Trauma, and Resilience) Clinic, where she supervises clinical psychology and psychiatry trainees in the prevention and treatment of child and family traumatic stress. She also provides research mentorship for students and trainees at all levels.

Dr. Hajal received her PhD in Child Clinical Psychology from the Pennsylvania State University. She completed her pre-doctoral clinical internship and postdoctoral fellowship at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine and Jane & Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience & Human Behavior.

Dr. Tyrone C. Howard is considered one of the premiere experts on educational equity and access in the United States. As the inaugural director of the UCLA Pritzker Center for Strengthening Children and Families, a campus wide consortium examining academic, mental health, and social emotional experiences and challenges for the California’s most vulnerable youth populations, Dr. Howard relies upon his research examining equity, culture, race, teaching and learning. Dr. Howard is a professor and the former Associate Dean for Equity, Diversity & Inclusion at UCLA.

Roya Ijadi-Maghsoodi, MD, MSHPM, is an Assistant Professor-in-Residence in the UCLA Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences and an Investigator at the Center for the Study of Healthcare Innovation, Implementation & Policy within the VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System. Dr. Ijadi-Maghsoodi’s research focuses on addressing social and mental health inequities among under-resourced and minoritized youth, families, and adults in the community, particularly families experiencing homelessness, and youth in schools. She received a AACAP NIDA Career Development Award and several other research awards to adapt and deliver a family resilience intervention to homeless-experienced families. She has been an investigator on PCORI, NIH, and foundation funded studies on the comparative effectiveness of PSH housing types, and a school digital mental health intervention. She is an attending physician in the VA Women’s Health Clinic, co-directs the VA Family Resilience Clinic, and co-directs the UCLA Psychiatry Asylum Clinic. Dr. Ijadi-Maghsoodi is committed to child and family mental health advocacy, previously served as President of the Southern California Society of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and is a volunteer asylum network member for Physicians for Human Rights.

Dr. Jeffrey is a child and adolescent psychiatrist at the Jane and Terry Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. She is the Associate Director of Ambulatory Services within the UCLA Department of Psychiatry and serves as the Associate Director of the Division of Population Behavioral Health. She is the Lead Psychiatrist at UCLA Behavioral Health Associates and the Director of the UCLA/Los Angeles Department of Mental Health Tele Hub Program, where she oversees the delivery of pediatric integrated behavioral health services within the Antelope Valley and through STAND, a program of the UCLA Depression Grand Challenge, at East Los Angeles College.

Dr. Jeffrey is an advocate for improved access to mental health services. Her research and clinical interests include systems of health care delivery and psychedelic assisted psychotherapies. She has completed training in MDMA-assisted psychotherapy with MAPS (October 2022) and the Ketamine Medical Provider Training from the Integrative Psychiatry Institute (December 2021). She also received the Psychedelic-Assisted Psychotherapy Certificate from Integrative Psychiatry Institute (December 2022). She has published articles in the fields of health services delivery and mental health, spanning topics including integrated behavioral healthcare, measurement-based care practices, professional quality of life in Head Start communities, and quality of life in mental illness.  

Dr. Jeffrey is a Distinguished Fellow of both the American Psychiatric Association and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. She teaches within the UCLA Stress, Trauma, and Resilience (STAR) Clinic and serves on the Psychoharmacologic Drug Advisory Committee for the FDA.

Dr. Sheryl Kataoka is a child psychiatrist and health services researcher who has focused her research on improving the access to and quality of mental health care for youth and families living in under-resourced communities. She has engaged in community-partnered research primarily in school settings and has evaluated trauma- and resilience-informed school services. She is a Professor Emeritus with the UCLA Semel Institute’s Divisions of Population Behavioral Health and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, where she serves as the Associate Program Director for the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Fellowship.

Dr. Audra Langley’s body of research seeks to increase equity in access to quality mental health and wellbeing interventions for under-resourced populations of children, including those in schools and involved with the child welfare system. Dr. Langley is the Director of UCLA TIES for Families, an innovative interdisciplinary program for children in foster care, kinship care, or adopted through foster care (ages birth to 25) and their families in Los Angeles County, working in close partnership with the Los Angeles County Departments of Children and Family Services and Mental Health. She is also Co-Director of the UCLA Pritzker Center for Strengthening Children and Families, Director of Training for the NCTSN-funded Trauma Services Adaptation Center for Resiliency, Hope and Wellness in Schools. Dr. Langley is a Professor at UCLA.

Dr. Sung-Jae Lee’s research, training, and community engagement work have been strongly shaped by his pursuit of addressing health disparities affecting HIV prevention and care among vulnerable communities. He serves as an advisor to many masters and doctoral students in the UCLA Department of Epidemiology. He co-directs the UCLA Fogarty AIDS Training Programs in Thailand and Myanmar, and is a Key Faculty for UCLA Fogarty Training Programs in Vietnam and Cambodia. He currently serves as the UCLA PI for the University of California Global Health Institute (UCGHI) GloCal Fellowship Program. Dr. Lee is a Professor-in-Residence at UCLA and is the Director of Research and Evaluation at the Nathanson Family Resilience Center, Division of Population Behavioral Health.

Dr. Patricia has sustained a career-long focus on developing and disseminating preventive interventions, practices, and policies that support child and family resilience in the context of trauma and adversity. Her research and leadership have focused on the study of translational and implementation processes needed to bring evidence-based prevention to scale within systems of care and community settings. Dr. Lester is the director of the UCLA Public Partnership for Wellbeing. She is the Jane and Marc Nathanson Family Professor of Psychiatry and directs the UCLA Division of Population Behavioral Health within the Department of Psychiatry. She also serves as the Director of the Nathanson Family Resilience Center, Co-Director of the Center for Child Anxiety Resilience Education and Support (CARES), and the leadership team for the UCLA Pritzker Center for Strengthening Children and Families.

Dr. Norweeta Milburn research interests include homelessness, substance use/abuse, mental health, family interventions, and health equity for under-resourced and underserved populations. She has led studies examining the paths of youth into and out of homelessness, and the development and testing of behavioral family interventions for youth experiencing homelessness and youth exiting the juvenile justice system. Dr. Milburn is a Professor-in-Residence at UCLA and is a co-director of the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence.

Dr. Orellana is a licensed clinical psychologist  at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior. She is the Director of Clinical Training for the Division of Population Behavioral Health and she also serves as the Associate Clinical Director for the Stress, Trauma, And Resilience (STAR) Clinic. Dr. Orellana received her doctorate degree from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Dr. Orellana completed a clinical internship in trauma psychology, treating children with developmental disabilities and other at-risk populations. As a post-doctoral fellow at USC/UCEDD Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, she also received specialized training in the prevention and treatment of traumatic stress in children and families. Dr. Orellana’s research interests focus on family resilience, risk reduction and abuse prevention for Latinx, at-risk youth, and best practices for treatment of this population.

Dr. Paley is the Director of SEEDS (Strategies for Enhancing Early Developmental Success), a program developed by Dr. Paley and her team to promote the development of self-regulation in early childhood as a foundation for children’s school readiness and long-term well-being.  SEEDS focuses on equipping professionals and parents/caregivers with the skills to build supportive relationships and provide effective co-regulation to the children in their care.  SEEDS has been implemented in a number of community settings, including with the LAUSD Trauma and Resilience Informed Early Enrichment Program to support early childhood educators and preschool families. Dr. Paley is also the Director of the DMH + UCLA Early Childhood Fellowship, an immersive training program for professionals and paraprofessionals who work in county and community agencies to support the well-being of young children and their families, many of whom contend with a multitude of challenges, including exposure to violence, housing and food insecurity, and family separation. The aim of the Fellowship is to enhance Fellows’ knowledge, skills, and practices in providing high quality, culturally responsive, trauma-informed care to children birth to six and their families. Dr. Paley is a licensed clinical psychologist and a Clinical Professor at UCLA.

Dr. Natalie Ramos is the Medical Director for the EMPWR program for LGBTQ youth and is the Principal Investigator for a new study on resiliency classes for LGBTQ adolescents with depression and anxiety. She sees both pediatric and adult patients through Behavioral Health Associates (BHA), the Stress, Trauma, and Resilience (STAR) Clinic, and the Faculty Practice Group. Dr. Ramos is an Assistant Clinical Professor and a Child, Adolescent, and Adult Psychiatrist at UCLA.

Susan Cohen is the administrator for human relations for the Division of Population Behavioral Health and the Deputy Director of the Prevention Center of Excellence. As a life-long Angeleno, she has spent the balance of her career working on behalf of various vulnerable populations within LA County Non-profit organizations. As an undergraduate and graduate alum of CSU, Northridge, Susan holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in public health with a focus on community based health. Her areas of leadership lie at the intersection of substance use disorders, LGBTQ+ health care, health disparities, women’s health, and organizational management. Ms. Cohen has been a faculty member in the health sciences departments of Mt. San Antonio College, College of the Canyons, and most recently, CSU, Northridge, where she has taught public health courses for 20 years and has coordinated their field placement programs for both health administration and public health majors. She enjoys traveling, spending time with her spouse and two teenage sons, their two dogs, and exploring new-found places in Los Angeles.

Dr. Catherine Mogil works with children of all developmental stages and has been involved in several intervention development and translational research projects examining the efficacy of parent-assisted interventions for infants and toddlers in foster care, school-aged children with developmental disabilities, and adolescents with Autism Spectrum and other disorders. Dr. Mogil consulted for the National Military Family Association and was invited to co-chair NATO’s Human Factors Panel Research and Technology Task Group on the impact of military life on children in military families. Dr. Mogil is an Associate Clinical Professor at UCLA and the co-director of the UCLA Prevention Center of Excellence.