Appendix

Committee Member and Staff Biographies

DAVID W. WILLIS (Chair) is professor of pediatrics and psychiatry at Georgetown University, within the Thrive Center for Children, Families, and Communities. There, he leads Nurture Connection, an impact network to advance early relational health at the growing intersection of child health transformation and resilient community building in partnerships with families with a social justice commitment. A board-certified developmental-behavioral pediatrician, Willis was a clinician in Oregon for more than 30 years with a practice focused on early childhood development and family therapy. Most recently, he led the start of the early relational health early childhood system transformation from an initiative at the Center for the Study of Social Policy before its transition to the Thrive Center. And, previously, he was the first executive director of the Perigee Fund, a Seattle-based philanthropy focused on strengthening the social and emotional development of all babies and toddlers, and on advancing the workforce to do so. Prior to that, Willis served as director of the Division of Home Visiting and Early Childhood Systems at the U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration Maternal and Child Health Bureau, in Washington, DC, where he currently continues to be a thought leader in home visiting and early childhood systems. During his career, he has also been a Harris Mid-Career fellow with childhood development nonprofit ZERO TO THREE, the past president of the Oregon Pediatric Society, an executive member of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ (AAP’s) Section on Early Education and Child Care, and chair of the AAP Board’s Early Brain & Child Development Strategic Initiative. Willis has been a national lecturer, advisor to early childhood national policy, and visionary for the transformation

ELISABETH BURAK is a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families (CCF) with more than two decades of experience in federal and state policies to support low-income families. She leads a CCF research project on Medicaid’s role in supporting early childhood development and maternal health and provides expertise and support to state and national leaders on Medicaid policy. Prior to joining CCF, Burak served as director of health policy and legislative affairs with Arkansas Advocates for Children & Families, where she led successful efforts to expand access to both Medicaid for children and the Children’s Health Insurance Program, alongside efforts to improve access to a range of education and social services. She also worked inside state government as the director of policy and planning for the Arkansas Department of Human Services, leading a cross-agency children’s mental health initiative. Burak began her career in Washington, DC, at the National Governors Association and the Finance Project. She holds a B.A. from Smith College as well as M.P.P. and M.S.W. degrees from the University of Michigan.

DOMINIQUE CHARLOT-SWILLEY is a psychologist and assistant professor at Georgetown University’s Thrive Center for Children, Families, and Communities. Her work spans early childhood and pediatric primary care settings. She brings more than two decades of experience serving infants, toddlers, and their families in Washington, DC; Baltimore, MD; and Miami, FL. Her research expertise centers on intervention science that promotes early relational health and provider well-being. As a community-based researcher and mindfulness meditation teacher, she emphasizes co-creation with communities and the importance of leveraging their strengths to develop solutions tailored to their specific needs. She co-founded the Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health Family Leadership certificate program, developed the CPR² (Compassion, Practice, Relationship & Restoration) group-based wellness intervention, and co-created an online platform that enables behavioral health providers to assess and continuously improve both individual and organizational well-being. She serves on the Nurture Connection Steering Committee, the HealthySteps National Advisory Committee, and the Faculty Advisory Network/American Academy of Pediatrics Advisory Board. Prior to joining Georgetown and Children’s National Hospital, she served as a faculty member at Johns Hopkins University; adjunct professor at Howard University, George Washington University, and Montgomery College; and assistant director of a private practice in Maryland. Dr. Charlot-Swilley earned her Ph.D. in clinical child psychology from Howard University, completed her internship training at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and completed postdoctoral training at Johns Hopkins University.

SHAYLA COLLINS is a devoted wife and a mother of two adolescent boys. Both of her children were born with disabilities. She quickly learned that she would have to be a fierce advocate not only for herself and her family but for all families who are thrust into a multitude of difficult to navigate systems. She works at the University of Washington (UW) Center for Child and Family Well-Being as a facilitator of mindfulness, the UW CoLab on a project focused on behavioral health, and the UW Institute on Human Development and Disability with the Washington State Medical Home Partnerships Project. Collins also has strong partnerships with several community and national organizations supporting family engagement and patient-centered care.

DANI DUMITRIU is internationally recognized for her expertise in pediatrics; neuroscience; resilience; family-, patient-, and clinician-inclusive study design; and dyadic measures of parent-child health, such as maternal-infant emotional connection, prenatal and early postnatal influences (including stress) on maternal-infant health, and the relationship between early relational health and life course health outcomes. Dr. Dumitriu is an associate professor of pediatrics (in psychiatry) and the inaugural director of the Center for Early Relational Health at Columbia University. She dedicates 80% of her time to research and 20% to active pediatric practice in the Newborn Medicine Unit at Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital of NewYork-Presbyterian. The uniting principle of Dr. Dumitriu’s multifaceted research program is to actuate a strengths-based pivot in pediatrics: preventing pathology by promoting resiliency. From basic science through clinical and implementation studies, her multi-modal, multi-species, multiscale research focuses on understanding and harnessing the neurocircuits of resilience, toward spearheading novel approaches to universal primary prevention and health promotion.

ANDREW GARNER is a pediatrician, advocate, and author. He has practiced primary care pediatrics with the University Hospitals of Cleveland for more than 25 years. Garner is an active member of the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), has served as the president of the Ohio Chapter, and has participated in three national AAP Leadership Workgroups (on Poverty, Epigenetics, and Early Brain and Child Development). He has co-authored the AAP’s two policy statements (2012, 2021) on childhood toxic stress as well as an AAP-published book Thinking Developmentally: Nurturing Wellness in Childhood to Promote Lifelong Health (2018, 2nd edition 2025). Garner has been recognized for his advocacy on behalf of children and their families, including the Ohio Pediatrician of the Year Award from the Ohio Chapter of the AAP and the Susan Aronson Early

JUSTIN A. LAVNER is a professor and the director of clinical training in the Department of Psychology at the University of Georgia. His research aims to understand and improve family health and well-being, particularly among underserved and marginalized populations. Specifically, Dr. Lavner’s work examines (a) how and why relationships change; (b) the effects of minority and contextual stressors such as racial discrimination, financial strain, and sexual stigma on individual and family functioning and the protective factors that buffer these effects; and (c) preventive interventions to strengthen relational, physical, and mental health among couples and families. He was an associate editor for the Journal of Family Psychology and serves on the editorial boards for a number of other journals, including Child Development, Family Process, the Journal of Marriage and Family, and the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. He received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of California, Los Angeles, and completed his clinical internship at the San Diego VA/University of California, San Diego.

MAYA REDDI is a research associate with the Board on Children, Youth, and Families at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. She currently supports the Committee on Federal Policy Impacts on Child Poverty and the Committee on the Early Relational Health Determinants of Future Health and Wellbeing. Reddi’s areas of interest include mental health and well-being, reproductive health, and child development. She received her B.A. in marketing with a minor in digital media from the University of Texas at Austin as well as an M.A. in psychology from American University.

BARBARA ROGOFF is UCSC Foundation Distinguished Professor of Psychology, University of California, Santa Cruz. She received the 2013 Award for Distinguished Lifetime Contributions to Cultural and Contextual Factors in Child Development from the Society for Research in Child Development. She is a fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, the American Anthropological Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Educational Research Association. Her research focuses on cultural aspects of learning, with special emphasis on collaboration and observation and Indigenous-heritage, Mexican, Guatemalan, and other communities of the Americas. She has held the University of California Presidential Chair and has been a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, a Kellogg fellow, a Spencer fellow, and an Osher fellow of the Exploratorium. She holds a Ph.D. in developmental psychology from Harvard University.

MICHELLE SARCHE is a professor in the Buffett Early Childhood Institute at the University of Nebraska and trained as a clinical psychologist. She is a citizen of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe. Sarche has been partnering with American Indian and Alaska Native tribes in research and evaluation related to children’s development in the context of family, community, culture, early care, education, and home visiting programs and related to health and well-being across the lifespan for over 25 years. Her work has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the Administration for Children and Families. Sarche’s current projects include the Tribal Early Childhood Research Center, the Native Children’s Research Exchange Network and Scholars program, the Center for Indigenous Research Collaborations and Learning for Home Visiting, and the Center for Innovative Research, Capacity Building, and Leadership Development to End Substance Use Harms (CIRCLE). She is a 2018 Ascend at the Aspen Institute Fellow, recipient of the National Indian Head Start Association Child Advocate of the Year award, inductee into the Academy for Community Engaged Scholarship, and recipient of the Society for Prevention Research 2025 Advances in Culture and Diversity in Prevention Science Award. She obtained a B.Sc. in psychology from the University of Wisconsin–Madison and both M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in clinical psychology from Loyola University Chicago.

STACEY SMIT is a program coordinator with the Board on Children, Youth, and Families and the Committee on Law and Justice. She has more than 15 years of experience in project management, administrative support, and event planning, having worked with a range of organizations in the region. Her past roles include supporting the Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education Executive Office and several high-impact initiatives, such as the Decadal Survey of Social and Behavioral Sciences for Applications to National Security; the Committee on the Use of Economic Evidence to Inform Investments in Children, Youth, and Families; the Committee on Supporting the Parents of Young Children; the Forum on Children’s Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Health; and the Committee on Increasing Capacity for Reducing Bullying and Its Impact on the Lifecourse of Youth Involved. In recognition of her contributions, she received the Sandra H. Matthews Cecil Award from the Institute of Medicine (now the Health and Medicine Division) in 2021. She received a B.A. in sociology from the University of Maryland, College Park.