Family Initiatives: Trainer Biographies

MEET OUR EXPERTS
Employment Options’ trainers are individuals that have been closely involved with the family initiatives undertaken by Employment Options over the years. Researchers, consultants, coaches and parents constitute our “experts” team, and work together to make holistic services available to families in need.

Joanne Nicholson, Ph.D. is a clinical and research psychologist, and Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Massachusetts Medical School (UMMS). She directs the Child and Family Research Core of the UMMS Center for Mental Health Services Research. Dr. Nicholson has established an active program of research on parents with mental illnesses and their families in partnership with people in recovery. Her team of researchers, providers, and people in recovery is developing education and skills training materials for parents, integrating the current knowledge on parents with mental illnesses, and evaluating programs for families, including homeless mothers and children, and the pilot Family Options program. Dr. Nicholson and her team have received funding from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), the National Alliance for Mental Illness Research Institute, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, and private foundations. 

Dr. Nicholson is the lead author of “Parenting Well When You’re Depressed: A Complete Resource for Maintaining a Healthy Family”, published by New Harbinger Publications. Written by parents for parents, it is the first self-help manual for parents living with depression or other mental illnesses. Dr. Nicholson established SAMHSA’s National Advisory Group on Parents with Psychiatric Disorders. She writes extensively on the challenges facing these families, and provides training and consultation to professional and advocacy groups. Dr. Nicholson is currently a W.T. Grant Foundation Distinguished Fellow and a Senior Fellow at the UMMS Center for Adoption Research. She is the 2006 winner of the USPRA Loeb Award for her career contribution to research in psychiatric rehabilitation.

Kathleen Biebel, Ph.D. is a Research Assistant Professor at the University of Massachusetts Medical School Center for Mental Health Services Research. Her research focuses on parental mental illness, homelessness, and trauma, and the implementation of mental health services in agency and community contexts. Dr. Biebel has served as Principal Investigator, Co-Investigator, and Evaluator on various SAMHSA/CMHS, NIMH and foundation-funded projects. She is currently co-PI on a project to develop, implement, and test a family care management (FCM) intervention for parents with mental illness and their children in a community mental health setting. Dr. Biebel’s most recent work for the federal government examined innovative and exemplary uses of Medicaid and CHIP to fund system-of-care services for children with SED and their families. In 2003 Dr. Biebel worked for SAMHSA/CMHS as a Family-Centered Care Consultant, advising policy-makers and federal program officers on the design and shape of policy initiatives specific to the concerns of families living with mental illness, with an emphasis on parental mental illness. Dr. Biebel is also Associate Director of the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health Support Program at the CMHSR where she coordinates collaborations between the CMHSR and the DMH, and provides expertise and support for grant writing, data analysis, interagency workgroups, program evaluation, and policy recommendations.

Betsy Hinden, Ph.D. is a clinical and consulting psychologist, and adjunct Assistant Professor in Psychiatry at University of Massachusetts Medical School. Dr. Hinden works as a psychotherapist and consultant with children and families, and has a special interest in working with families in which a parent has a mental illness. Dr. Hinden has been Principal Investigator and Co-Investigator on several research projects, and has co-authored numerous academic and policy papers related to parental mental illness. Dr. Hinden presents regularly at national and regional conferences, and offers training seminars for administrators and providers on critical issues in care delivery for parents with mental illness and their children.

Toni A. Wolf, BA., serving as the Executive Director of a rehabilitation agency since 1989, has provided leadership and a forward looking anticipatory approach to respond to the needs of persons with mental illness. Her consistent enthusiasm for the “clubhouse philosophy” where the transfer of power is with the consumer and her twenty five years of experience in rehabilitation has allowed her to support consumers, families and staff to achieve recovery and growth. Toni also has supported the Clubhouse’s International movement by acting as Chairwoman of the Advisory Board at the International Center on Clubhouse Development. With the support of the Department of Mental Health and the Mass Bar Foundation, Employment Options is now leading the way in Massachusetts in advocacy and providing an array of services to parents with mental illness, keeping families from being fractured and ensuring that parents and children maintain their connections. The Family Project, Clubhouse Family Legal Support Project, and now Family Options funded by AstraZeneca, are the programs in place to help parents with mental illness.

Chip Wilder, LICSW, assumed the Directorship of Family Options in March of 2007. Chip is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker who holds a Master Degree in Secondary Education and a Master Degree in Social Work from Boston University.

Chip has had extensive experience providing mental health services and family support in a range of child and family services including residential treatment, out patient mental health, and psychiatric hospital settings. Chip also has experience in program development including a mental health case management service for Harvard Pilgrim Health Care and from 1997 to his move to Family Options was the Associate Clinical Director of the Massachusetts Mental Health Service Program for Youth, an innovative, nationally-recognized, integrated care initiative. In addition Chip has offered trainings in wide range of professional areas including the group treatment of children and adolescents, case management, family collaboration, and delivering Wraparound. Chip also has been active as a board member of the Parent Professional Advocacy League, the Massachusetts Chapter of the National Federation of Families for Children’s Mental Health.

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