734.707.7550
25 People from around the world will be presenting their experience, knowledge,
skills and resources to the participants of this conference!
David Adams
Dr. Adams, Ed.D. is co-founder as well as Co-Director of Emerge, the first counseling program in the nation for men who abuse women, established in 1977. Dr. Adams has led groups for men who batter, and conducted outreach to victims of abuse, for 36 years He has led parenting education classes for fathers for 12 years. He is one of the nation’s leading experts on men who batter and has conducted trainings of social service and criminal justice professionals in 45 states and 16 nations. He has published numerous articles and book chapters, and writes a featured blog on The Huffington Post. Dr. Adams is a Commissioner on the Massachusetts Governor’s Council on Sexual and Domestic Violence and Director of the National Domestic Violence Risk Assessment and Management Training Project. His book, “Why Do They Kill? Men Who Murder Their Intimate Partners” was published by Vanderbilt University Press in 2007.
Bob Agnoli
Robert Agnoli, LCSW CPAIP is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Certified Partner Abuse Intervention Professional. He graduated from Loyola University of Chicago with a Masters of Social Work degree in 1992. He has provided counseling services to individuals and families at The Salvation Army Family and Community Services for 22 years. In 1998 he was one of the co-developers of the Salvation Army’s Partner Abuse Intervention Program, an Illinois Department of Human Services Protocol approved program for perpetrators of domestic violence. He is currently the Domestic Violence Program Coordinator and continues to co-facilitate Partner Abuse Intervention groups. He has trained on a variety of topics including the differences between PAIP and Anger Management, Domestic Violence and Religion and Violence Risk Assessment. He has served on the Illinois Certified Domestic Violence Professionals, inc. Board and currently services on the Illinois Department of Human Services Partner Abuse Services Sub-Committee.
Etiony Aldarondo
Etiony Aldarondo is Associate Dean for Research and Founding Director of the Dunspaugh-Dalton Community and Educational Well-Being Research Center in the School of Education and Human Development at the University of Miami. The recipient of various recognitions for educational excellence and community involvement, including the 2011 Social Justice Award from the American Psychological Association and the 2011 Elizabeth Beckman Award, Dr. Aldarondo’s scholarship focuses on positive development of ethnic minority and immigrant youth, domestic violence, and social justice-oriented clinical practices. His publications include the books Advancing Social Justice through Clinical Practice (Routledge), Programs for men who batter: Intervention and prevention strategies in a diverse society (Civic Research Institute with Fernando Mederos, Ed.D.), and Neurosciences, Health and Community Well-Being (San Luís, Nueva Editorial Universitaria with Dr. Enrique Saforcada and Mauro Muñoz). Dr. Aldarondo has a long history of involvement with grass root advocacy organizations and federal government agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Health and Human Services, and the National Institute of Justice. He is executive director of The Council on Contemporary Families and serves on the advisory committee for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Preventing Partner Violence in Immigrant Communities: Strengthening What Works program and on the scientific advisory boards for Casa de Esperanza, The Melissa Institute for Violence Prevention and Treatment, The National Council for Juvenile and Family Court Judges, and The National Center on Domestic Violence, Trauma & Mental Health.
Graham Barnes
Graham Barnes has been a resource specialist with the Battered Women’s Justice Project in Minneapolis, Minnesota since 2005. He consults with federal grantees nationally on developing their coordinated community response to domestic violence, trains for professional institutes such as the Office on Violence Against Women, presents internationally, through The Advocates for Human Rights and other agencies, and teaches Duluth’s Creating a Process of Change For Men Who Batter Curriculum. Graham has co-authored a number of written resources for practitioners, including the 2011 version of the men’s curriculum.
Previously, Graham was Team Leader of the Domestic Abuse Intervention Project’s National Training Project in Duluth, Minnesota where he developed local Duluth practice on domestic violence into training packages and resources for other communities nationally and internationally. He facilitated batterer intervention program classes in Duluth, and a class for men coming out of prison in Minneapolis.
Initially trained as a teacher, Graham has a Diploma in Teaching, a Bachelors Degree in Social Work, and 20 years experience in community organizing and domestic violence prevention. In 1990, Graham was the founding men’s program coordinator at New Zealand’s Hamilton Abuse Intervention Project, a national pilot that adapted the ‘Duluth-Model’ to a New Zealand cultural setting. He then trained practitioners in this model throughout New Zealand and in Australia. In 1996, Graham worked with Ellen Pence on the development of the ‘Domestic Violence Safety and Accountability Audit’ in Duluth. Between 1998 and 2002, Graham worked for SHINE developing health sector responses to domestic violence in Auckland, and piloting DVFREE―an employer response to domestic violence.
Neil Blacklock
Neil was the founder of the London Domestic Violence Intervention Project (DVIP) in 1989. DVIP developed a model of integrated working between services working with those who perpetrate intimate partner violence and their partners and ex-partners that was widely copied across the UK.
In 2006 Neil moved to Respect, the UK organisation leading on work with perpetrators of domestic violence to develop the National Service Standard for organisations working with men using intimate partner violence. Since 2009 he has been Respect’s Development Director and leads on accreditation and new services including:
- An individual work programme for perpetrators of domestic violence
- Risk assessment, domestic violence and child contact
- Improving workplace responses to domestic violence
- Respect Young People’s Work
Neil is the chair of the European network for work with perpetrators of domestic violence (WWP-EN) and has chaired and authored Domestic Homicide Reviews
Jeffrie Cape
Jeffrie K. Cape LMSW ACSW CAADC is the director of Charron Services LLC and started HEAL (Helping Explore Accountable Lifestyles) a 52 session Batterer intervention program and WEAVE (Women Exploring Accountably Violent Encounters) in Oakland County, Michigan.
Jeffrie has over 25 years of clinical experience and also has a private practice with varied clientele. She was appointed to the Michigan Domestic Violence and Prevention and Treatment Board by Governor Snyder in 2011 She helped develop local standards for batterer intervention programs and was a member of the governor’s task force to develop state standards. She was active in the development and formation of BISC-MI in 1995. She serves on the board and was chair in 2001-2002. She was chair the Batterer Intervention Provider Standards Compliance Council (BIPSCC). She was one of the originators of AQUILA.
Jeffrie also is employed part time at ADA (Alternatives to Domestic Aggression) in Washtenaw County, where she facilitates groups, trains, supervises staff, develops and refines curriculum for community and prison based programs. She participates in a variety of state and local task forces as well as providing local and national training and supervision for agencies and individuals who work with individuals involved in domestic violence.
Shamita Das Dasgupta
Shamita Das Dasgupta is a cofounder of Manavi (New Jersey), the first organization in the U.S. to focus on violence against women in the South Asian community. She has been engaged in advocacy to end violence against women for over thirty years. Shamita has taught at Rutgers University and has worked as an adjunct professor at NYU Law School. In addition to several articles and reports, she is the author of five books, The Demon Slayers and Other Stories: Bengali Folktales (1995, Interlink Books, USA); A Patchwork Shawl: Chronicles of South Asian Women in America (1998, Rutgers University Press, USA); Body Evidence: Intimate Violence Against South Asian Women in America (2007, Rutgers University Press, USA); Mothers for Sale: Women in Kolkata’s Sex Trade (2009, DasGupta-Alliance, India); and Globalization and Gestational Surrogacy in India: Outsourcing Life (2014, Lexington Books). Shamita has served on several national boards including appointed by New Jersey’s Governor to the NJ Domestic Violence Fatality and Near Fatality Review Board. In addition to various awards, her work has received wide recognition in national and international media.
Ulester Douglas
Ulester is executive director of Men Stopping Violence (MSV), a nationally acclaimed organization dedicated to ending male violence against women. He also teaches at Emory University in Atlanta, and has extensive training and experience working with individuals, families and communities affected by violence. Ulester completed his undergraduate and graduate studies at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and has received numerous awards including a National Institute of Mental Health Fellowship and the National District Attorneys Association’s Stephen L. Von Riesen Lecturer of Merit Award. He has authored and co-authored curriculum, book chapters and peer reviewed articles on family violence. He has been interviewed by national and international media including The New York Times, CNN, PBS, TV One, and the Tom Joyner Morning Show. Ulester serves on the board of the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence and recently received a gubernatorial appointment to Georgia Commission on Family Violence.
Rus Funk
Rus Ervin Funk has been working to combat and end gender based violence since 1983. He is currently the co-founder and Program Coordinator of MensWork: A Project of the Center for Women and Families in Louisville, KY. Rus also serves on the board of directors of the National Center on Sexual and Domestic Violence and is a founding member and current Steering Committee member of the North American MenEngage Network. Rus is an active trainer and provides support throughout the United States to assist local communities and state-networks to initiate men’s engagement efforts. He is also frequently invited by the US State Department to speak and provide TA to host countries on engaging men and the prevention of domestic or sexual violence.
Kim Gandy
Kim A. Gandy is president and CEO of the National Network to End Domestic Violence. From her years as a young activist in her native Louisiana, to her work prosecuting violent offenders, to her energetic participation in the passage of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) in 1994, and its reauthorizations in 2000, 2005, and 2013, Kim has remained profoundly committed to ensuring that women have the opportunity to lead healthy lives in safety and prosperity. Her long career in advocacy, legislative reform and coalition-building includes areas such as violence against women, family law, workplace fairness, poverty and economic issues.
In addition to volunteering at a local shelter, Kim was a founder and director of the New Orleans Metropolitan Battered Women’s Program. She served as an Assistant District Attorney in Orleans Parish, during which time she gained particular insight into the systemic challenges facing survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault. In addition to serving domestic violence survivors pro bono in private practice, Kim wrote state legislation addressing women’s concerns, including Louisiana’s first Domestic Abuse Assistance Act in 1983. On the national level, Kim worked closely with then-Senator Joe Biden and then-Congresswoman Barbara Boxer on the passage and funding of VAWA, and helped organize 200,000 people to rally in Washington the following year in a call for the release of VAWA funding, and with Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney for passage and funding of the 2004 Debbie Smith Act, a law that supports the prosecution of criminal offenders and which expanded VAWA legal assistance to include survivors of dating violence. Kim has also worked extensively on expanded protections from violence for women, including women in the workplace.
Prior to joining NNEDV, Kim was vice president of and general counsel of the Feminist Majority and the Feminist Majority Foundation, where she led their successful campaign to modernize the FBI Uniform Crime Report definition of rape, and was a resident fellow at the Institute of Politics at Harvard University’s Kennedy School. She spent 22 years as a top leader of the National Organization for Women (NOW), first as national secretary, then executive vice president and finally, as president from 2001 to 2009. Kim served on the legislative drafting committees for the Civil Rights Act of 1991 and the 1994 Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, and during her work with both organizations was a guiding force in many landmark cases and legislative gains, such as the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009. A widely sought-after media commentator, Kim has participated in more than 400 major media interviews with news organizations such as TIME, Newsweek, CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, FOX and NPR, and has appeared on programs including “The Colbert Report,” “Oprah” and “The O’Reilly Factor.” A graduate of Louisiana Tech University with B.S. degrees in mathematics and education, Kim holds a J.D. from Loyola University School of Law.
Kit Gruelle
Kit Gruelle is a survivor of domestic violence, who has worked as an advocate for battered women and their children for almost 30 years. As a renowned community educator, she has trained scores of advocates, criminal justice professionals (law enforcement, prosecutors, magistrates and judges), health care providers, clergy, legislators, educators and other allied professionals, and has guest lectured at colleges, universities, medical and law schools, schools of social work and public heath, and departments of sociology, women’s studies, and psychology on violence against women and children.
In 1996, while she was working at Family Violence and Rape Crisis Services in Pittsboro, NC, she became the director of the BRIDGES Program, one of the first Coordinated Community Response (CCR) programs in North Carolina. In 2012, she graduated from Appalachian State University in Boone, Noth Carolina with a BS in Sociology (concentration in gender-based violence).
For the last eighteen years, she has been a Subject Matter Expert and trainer for California POST (Peace Officers Standards and Training), helping develop training films and curricula for first responders, public safety dispatchers, and hostage/crisis negotiators. She has served as an expert witness for battered women in both state and federal court. She is the subject of Private Violence, an intimate and compelling documentary on domestic violence which premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and premiered on HBO on October 20, 2014.
Private Violence illuminates the complexities battered women face as they attempt to free themselves and their children from abusive partners (www.privateviolence.com). The film and accompanying outreach program, which Ms. Gruelle is coordinating, will provide a forum for bringing communities together to address and end this hidden epidemic. An interview with Gruelle and director Cynthia Hill can be seen at Democracynow.org. Ms. Gruelle lives in the North Carolina mountains with her chocolate Labrador, Luna.
Chris Hall
Christopher Hall is coordinator for the SHARP batterer intervention program based out of the Retreat in Suffolk County, New York. He has worked with perpetrators of domestic and sexual violence for eighteen years, and has been a facilitator and trainer for Emerge and coordinated batterer intervention training statewide for the West Virginia Coalition Against Domestic Violence. He currently administers the Domestic Violence Intervention and Education discussion group on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/groups/DVEducationIntervention) and is attending Stony Brook University School of Social Welfare working toward a MSW.
Jim Henderson
Jim Henderson is a technical assistance provider for the US Department of Justice Office on Violence Against Women through the Battered Women’s Justice Project. From 1991-2008 Jim was a probation officer responsible for overseeing the policies and practices of Intensive Probation for Stalking and Domestic Violence offenders in Ann Arbor MI. He was assigned to the Washtenaw County Domestic Violence Unit as part of the Judicial Oversight Demonstration Initiative from 1999 to 2005 and works from a system perspective to enhance victim’s safety and defendant accountability. He has provided batterer intervention within the Detroit metropolitan area since 1995. Before joining the criminal justice system in 1991, he worked as the clinical director of Straight, Inc., a family oriented substance abuse program for drug using young people and their families. Jim has been a Certified Addition Counselor II since 1987 and an Internationally Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor since 1990. He received his Master’s degree in social work from the University of Michigan in 1995.
Chris Huffine
Chris Huffine, Psy.D., licensed psychologist, has worked with abusive men for the past 23 years. He is the Executive Director of Allies in Change in Portland, Oregon. Prior to founding that agency in 2004 he worked for 12 years at Men’s Resource Center. During his career he has worked with thousands of abusive men and dozens of female and male victims of abuse. He is the founder of the Tri-County Batterer Intervention Provider Network which has made regular use of facilitated discussions in its 15 years of monthly meetings. He is an adjunct faculty member at Portland State University where he teaches an anger management class and speaks on domestic violence. He regularly speaks publicly and offers trainings on a variety of issues related to domestic violence. He is a member of the advisory group to the Oregon state attorney general to monitor standards for batterer intervention programs and of the Oregon Domestic Violence Fatality Review Team. In addition to his domestic violence work, he does individual and couples counseling with adults on a variety of other issues including mood disorders, stress management, relationship/intimacy issues, and addictions.
Lisa Young Larance
Lisa Young Larance, MSW, LMSW, LCSW is a Fulbright Scholar and social work practitioner whose curricula, peer-reviewed publications, trainings, and practical work focus on meeting the needs of marginalized women and their families. Lisa is the founder of two innovative community-based programs providing intervention, advocacy, and support for women who have used force in their relationships: Jersey Battered Women’s Service, Inc.’s Vista Program (http://www.jbws.org/publications.html) and Catholic Social Services of Washtenaw County’s RENEW Program (www.csswashtenaw.org/renew). Additionally, Lisa developed and implemented the prison-based Meridians for Incarcerated Women program for the Michigan Department of Corrections. To encourage discussion and resource sharing among professionals involved in the lives of women who have used force, Lisa launched the international “W-Catch22” listserv. She continues to moderate and build listserv membership. Building upon the listserv effort, Lisa chaired and spearheaded the first national conference addressing women’s use of force titled: “When SHE Hits HIM: Why Gender and Context Matter” (www.biscmi.org/wshh). Lisa consults for Harmony House’s Nurturing Heart Women’s Violence Prevention Project, in Hong Kong, China; Enlace Comunitario, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, as well as a range of other agencies. As guest co-editors, Lisa and Shamita Das Dasgupta won the 2012 Violence Against Women Best Article Award for their special issue on women’s use of force titled, “Contemporary Perspectives on Battered Women’s Use of Non-Fatal Force in Intimate Heterosexual Relationships.
David Mandel
David Mandel, MA, LPC has been working in the domestic violence field for 25 years. David’s international training and consulting focuses on improving systems’ responses to domestic violence when children are involved, and responsible fatherhood. David has developed the Safe and Together™ model to improve case practice and cross system collaboration in domestic violence cases involving children, and continuum of practice framework for promoting the development of domestic violence informed child welfare systems. David and his staff have consulted to United States’ child welfare systems in a number of states including New York, Louisiana, New Jersey, Wisconsin, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Vermont, Oregon and Ohio. This has included overseeing a statewide network of domestic violence consultants for the Connecticut Department of Children and Families; training domestic violence subject matter experts for Florida’s Department of Children and Families; improving collaboration between child welfare and domestic violence advocates in Colorado; and the development of certified Safe and Together trainer network to support the roll out of differential response in all 88 Ohio county child welfare agencies. David Mandel and Associates collaborates with domestic violence agencies such as the Florida Coalition Against Domestic Violence and the Ohio Domestic Violence Network. In last few years, David Mandel & Associates also provided extensive training in the United Kingdom, Australia, the Republic of Ireland and Singapore. David has written journal articles on batterer’s perceptions of their children’s exposure to domestic violence and the intersection of domestic violence and child welfare practice. His chapter on “Batterers and the Lives of Their Children” was published in the Praeger Series Violence Against Women in Families and Relationships. His Safe and Together blog can be found at www.endingviolence.com.
Fernando Mederos
Fernando Mederos, Ed.D. Harvard University, is a consultant, writer, and trainer who focuses on culturally-and strength-based practice with fathers and men in general, including working with fathers who have a history of domestic violence. He has consulted and taught nationally and abroad. In the US, he has worked with the U.S. Department of Justice (OVW), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, organizations funded by OVW to provide technical assistance to federal grantees, many state child welfare agencies, and domestic violence coalitions, as well as fatherhood programs. He is co-chair of the Board of the National Latino Alliance for the Elimination of Domestic Violence (Alianza). He has also worked in Canada, Puerto Rico, Ireland, Mexico, Costa Rica, and Jordan. Currently, he is Director of Fatherhood Engagement at the Department of Children & Families in Massachusetts; he is responsible for implementing a strength-based and safety-oriented practice framework for engaging fathers in child welfare throughout the state.
Susan Miller
Susan L. Miller is Professor in the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice at the University of Delaware. Her research interests include gendered violence; justice-involved women; victims’ rights; intimate partner violence, gender, and criminal justice policy; and theoretical and policy implications of gender and social control. Dr. Miller has published numerous articles about the intersection of victimization and offending among IPV survivors, including a book Victims as offenders: The paradox of women’s use of violence in relationships. Her most recent book, After the crime: The power of restorative justice dialogues between victims and violent offenders, won the national 2012 Outstanding Book Award presented by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences.
Jeremy Nevilles-Sorell
Jeremy NeVilles-Sorell has worked in the field of domestic violence since 1994 on issues affecting children who have experienced domestic violence, supervised visitation, batterer’s intervention, and providing training and education. He worked for four years coordinating the Duluth Family Visitation Center serving families with a history of domestic violence and dealing with visits and exchanges of children between parents. Jeremy concurrently worked during that time at the Women’s Transitional Housing Coalition in Duluth, Minnesota, as the Children’s Program Coordinator providing activities and groups for children who have witnessed violence. He joined the staff of Mending the Sacred Hoop Technical Assistance Project in 1998, a national program to assist American Indian Tribes and Alaskan Native Villages to develop responses to violence against Indian women through training and technical assistance, and has been a Co-Director of Mending the Sacred Hoop since 2002. He is also involved with community groups and educational efforts to engage and promote non-violent lifestyles for men. Jeremy has conducted groups with teenage boys and girls on domestic violence, facilitated groups for Native men who have battered, and organized community education events.
Michael Paymar
Michael Paymar is the executive director of Education for Critical Thinking an organization committed to ending gender violence. He is a co-founder of the Duluth Domestic Abuse Intervention Project (DAIP) Men’s Program with the late Ellen Pence and other advocates. In 2014, on behalf of the DAIP, Michael accepted the Gold Policy Award for helping to create the Duluth Model by the World Futures Council in conjunction with UN Women and the Inter-Parliamentary Union.Michael and Ellen Pence authored Creating a Process of Change for Men Who Batter one of the most widely used treatment programs for offenders in the country. Michael Paymar and Ellen Pence also wrote the award-winning documentary With Impunity: Men and Gender Violence.
Michael is the author of the book Violent No More: Helping Men End Domestic Abuse. The 3rd edition of the book and accompanying workbook for offenders was released this year by Turner Publishers. Michael served on the Duluth City Council for eight years and the Minnesota House of Representatives for 18 years. In the Minnesota House of Representatives, Michael chaired the Public Safety Committee which has oversight over the Department of Public Safety, Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, Department of Corrections, Department of Human Rights and crime victim programs. He was a leader in combating sex-trafficking, providing funding for domestic abuse and sexual assault programs, prison reform, human rights and gun violence prevention. Michael earned a Masters Degree in Public Administration from Hamline University and a Bachelor of Arts Degree from the College of St. Scholastica. He trains and lectures nationally and internationally on policy development and gender violence.
Tony Porter
Tony is an educator, activist, lecturer and author who have been working in the social justice arena for over twenty years. He is both nationally and internationally recognized for his effort to prevent domestic violence and sexual assault, while promoting healthy and respectful manhood. Tony is the co-founder of A CALL TO MEN: The Next Generation of Manhood. He is the author of “Well Meaning Men… Breaking Out of the Man Box – Ending Violence Against Women” and visionary for the book, “NFL Dads: Dedicated to Daughters”.
Tony is an advisor to the National Football League providing policy consultation, working extensively with player engagement and facilitating training. He is also a training consultant for the National basketball Association and Major League Baseball. Tony’s message is welcome and supported by many grassroots and established organizations. He’s currently working with numerous domestic and sexual violence programs, colleges and universities. He has worked with the United States Military Academy at West Point and the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis.
Tony is an international lecturer for the U.S. State Department having extensive global experience to include Brazil, India and Africa. He is working extensively with the United Kingdom providing training and leadership to A CALL TO MEN – UK. In addition, he has been a guest presenter to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women and a script consultant for “Law & Order: Special victims unit”.
Rebecca Thomforde Hauser
Ms. Thomforde Hauser is the Associate Director of Domestic Violence Programs at the Center for Court Innovation in New York, NY. As the Associate Director, Ms. Thomforde Hauser assists jurisdictions nationally and in New York State to plan and implement Domestic Violence, Integrated Domestic Violence, Sex Offense and Youthful Offender Domestic Violence Courts. At the Center, Ms. Thomforde Hauser provides training to judges and court stakeholders on a variety of domestic violence issues, facilitates site visits to model courts, and provides on-going technical assistance to courts and stakeholder agencies. Additionally, Ms. Thomforde Hauser is the Batterer Accountability Coordinator for the state of Vermont, overseeing the certification process of batterer intervention programs, providing training and techinical assistance to batterer programs, working with the Department of Corrections in Vermont to craft policies and procedures that enhance victim safety and offender accountability, and reporting to Vermont’s Council on Domestic Violence. Before coming to the Center, she was a Victim Witness Advocate at the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office in Boston, providing crisis intervention, case management, and court advocacy to domestic violence victims as well as other victims of violent crimes. While in Boston, she also worked at Safe Havens: The Interfaith Partnership Against Domestic Violence, creating curricula and coordinating a year-long training domestic violence education program for clergy and laity from Christian, Jewish, and Muslim congregations throughout the greater Boston area. She graduated from Earlham College, where she received a Fulbright Scholarship, and Boston University School of Theology. Ms. Thomforde Hauser lives in Vermont with her husband and their two sons.
Rodney Vlais
Rodney Vlais is a psychologist and social change activist with No To Violence in Melbourne, Australia. Over the past ten years he has woven together experience in providing training, systems advocacy, men’s behaviour change program facilitation, practice development and policy writing in responding to and preventing men’s violence against women. Rodney was previously involved in a number of other social justice struggles at the global, national and local levels, both in Australia and overseas. He is passionate about working alongside women to transform patriarchal institutions and structures, and in helping men identify and loosen gender-based and other forms of privilege.
Anna Wai Man Choi
Dr. Choi, Wai-man, is an Assistant Professor and the MSW Program Deputy Program Director in Department of Social Work and Social Administration in HKU. She is also an accredited family mediator, registered social worker and approved counseling supervisor. She has been involved in research regarding intimate partner violence, in-law conflict and separation violence. She was previously the center-in-charge of a local women’s shelter and has tremendous experience in handling couples conflicts and addressing the needs of families with violence. She has more than ten years of working experience as a social worker to practice in various family service settings. Her research networking and foundation are good, especially in family study and service evaluation.
Oliver Williams
Oliver J. Williams, Ph.D., Professor of School of Social Work at the University of Minnesota, in St. Paul. From 1994 to 2011 he was the Executive Director of the Institute on Domestic Violence in the African American Community (IDVAAC). In October 2011 he began serving as Co-Executive Director of IDVAAC. He has also served as the Director of the Safe Return Initiative that addresses the issues of prisoner reentry and domestic violence from 2003-2014. He has worked in the field of domestic violence for more than thirty years. Dr. Williams has been a clinical practitioner; working in mental health, family therapy, substance abuse, child welfare, delinquency, sexual assault, and domestic violence. He has worked in battered women’s shelters, developed curricula for batterers’ intervention programs and facilitated counseling groups in these programs. He has provided training across the United States and abroad on research and service-delivery surrounding partner abuse.
He has been appointed to several national advisory committees and task forces from the Center for Disease Control, U.S. Department of Justice, Office on Violence Against Women, U.S. Office on Women’s Health, and the U.S. Department of Education. He has been a board member of various domestic violence and human service organization including the early days of the National Domestic Violence Hotline. In 2000, he was appointed to the National Advisory Council on Domestic Violence by the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services and U.S. Attorney General. In 2010 he participated in a Roundtable with the U.S. Attorney General on issues related to fatherhood and participated in a Whitehouse Roundtable on Fatherhood and Domestic Violence. He has conducted training for the U.S. Military Family Advocacy programs and presented to numerous Family Violence, Research and Practice organizations in the United States and Abroad. Dr. Williams’ research and publications in scholarly journals, books and DVD’s have centered on creating service delivery strategies to reduce violent behavior. Dr. Williams has also received many awards among them include an award from the American Psychological Association, a International “Telly Award” for his documentary work; the National “Shelia Wellstone Institute Award” related to his National work on Domestic Violence and a Distinguish Alumni Award from the University of Pittsburgh, School of Social Work. Dr. Williams received a bachelor’s degree in social work from Michigan State University; a Masters in Social Work from Western Michigan University; a Masters in Public Health and a PH.D in Social Work both from the University of Pittsburgh.