ATSS Board of Directors
ATSS's Board of Directors is comprised of elected members who volunteer their time, professional expertise and dedication to helping individuals in crisis. They are elected for terms by the ATSS membership. No payment is made to any Board member, all of whom participate at their own expense.
The staff often draws on the special skills of both elected board and the diverse ATSS international membership.
The Board represents experienced leadership in the expanding field of Traumatic Stress.
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President
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Kent Laidlaw is a retired police officer having served 31 years with the Halton Regional Police Service. His last posting was as the District Commander for the City of Burlington, Ontario. He then served as Senior Advisor – Policing and as a consultant for the Ontario Civilian Commission on Police Services for 8 years. He currently operates his own company, Canuckcare, which offers a wide range of services to the corporate sector, emergency service responders and not-for-profit organizations.
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Vice
President
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Barbara S. Maurer MA, LPC, CTS is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Certified Trauma Specialist. She is a trained art therapist, EMDR therapist and clinician. Ms. Maurer has a private therapy practice, lectures nationally, and provides consultation to agencies, schools, and corporations. Ms. Maurer has taken part in the mental health recovery efforts of many disasters including, September 11th, Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Floyd, and the Southeast Asian Tsunami in Sri Lanka. Ms. Maurer works with survivors in issues of trauma recovery, grief, acculturation, and self care. Ms. Maurer is a lecturer for many non-profit organizations, government agencies and Corporations. Ms. Maurer served with New Jersey’s Governor Cody’s Task Force for Mental Health as the Chair of Emergency Preparedness and Trauma Advisory Board. In January 2006 she was appointed by Governor Cody to the Professional Examiners Board for Licensing of Professional Counselors. Maurer joined New Jersey’s Governor Corzine’s “Campus Security Task Force” along with the Department of Homeland Security, to help improve mental health assessment and response services for the state’s institutes of higher education in response to the tragic events at Virginia Tech. Ms. Maurer currently servers as and Advisory Board member and certification representative for New Jersey’s Disaster Response Crisis Counseling program and is the Vice President of the Association of Traumatic Stress Specialists.
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Secretary
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Linda Hood has worked for 12 years with David Rourke & Associates, running a 24/7 Members Assistance Program for a union. She also has a private counseling practice. Linda has been a member of ATSS since 2008 and most recently served as the conference chair for the 2010 ATSS conference held in Toronto.
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Director of Certifications
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Diane Travers, LCSW, Certified Trauma Specialist is the Clinical Coordinator for Children’s Services at the Mental Health Association of Essex County, Inc where she has been employed for the last eleven years. A clinician for many years, Diane has been responsible for supervising clinicians and graduate students who are serving children and adolescents experiencing behavioral difficulties. She supervises outpatient services for children and many school-based counseling programs primarily in inner city high schools serving adolescents with histories of childhood abuse, domestic violence, gang related violence and other traumatic experiences. Twenty years ago, she started her state’s first trauma response program for children witnessing traumatic events. Since then, she has worked with many children and widows following the terrorist attacks on 9/11. She is a member of the NJ Disaster Response Crisis Counselor Advisory Board which implemented credentialing for trauma responders in the state of New Jersey. She is also an active member of the Essex County Traumatic Loss Coalition and responds to local schools following tragic events. Diane has been an ATSS member for 19 years and has been the Certification Chair for the last five years.
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Elena Cherepanov, Ph.D., C.Psych,
LMHC, CTS |
Elena Cherepanov is a psychologist and psychotherapist with over 15 years of clinical, teaching experience across a range of multicultural settings. She specializes in refugee mental health, broad aspects of community and multicultural psychology, stress and trauma-related psychological problems and crisis intervention. She teaches at Cambridge College, Boston and is a Clinical Coordinator of Supported Housing programs at North Suffolk Mental Health Association in Boston MA. She has published over 40 articles and books. Elena has extensive experience working with trauma victims in the US, Canada and overseas. She has worked in Armenia, Chernobyl, Chechnya and Macedonia (Kosovo) with different NGOs including “Caritas” and “Doctors without Borders”. |
| Chrys Harris, Ph.D., CTS Certified Trauma Specialist  Greer, SC USA chrysharris@traumacenter.biz |
Dr. Chrys Harris has been involved in the practice of psychotherapy in South Carolina since 1975. He has been in the private practice of marriage and family therapy in the Upstate since 1989. Dr. Harris received his clinical training in marriage, family, and sex therapy from the Marriage Council of Philadelphia (post-Doctorate) in 1988. His Doctorate in Child Development and Family Studies from Purdue University was awarded in 1988; his Masters of Arts in Education in School Psychology from Wake Forest University in 1975, and his Bachelors of Science in Psychology from Wofford College in 1973. Dr. Harris has published numerous scholarly writings including a book, journal articles, book chapters, and manuscripts for the popular press. His most recent publication, a journal article, entitled The Forensic Examination of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder is included in the Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma. (2006) (12) 1/2: 83-102. Dr. Harris is an active member of a number of local, state, national, and international organizations. They include the Mental Health Association of Greenville County, the South Carolina Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress, the American College of Forensic Examiners, the Groves Conference on Marriage and the Family, the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, the International Critical Incident Stress Foundation, the Association of Traumatic Stress Specialists, and the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (Charter Member).
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Wayne Maxwell, CTS
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Wayne Maxwell has been involved in the trauma and critical incident stress field for over 30 years mainly in the criminal justice system in Corrections in Atlantic Canada. He holds a Masters degree in counseling psychology and in public administration focusing on management crisis situations and direct crisis intervention in the public sector. Wayne presently has his own company which offers services in consulting, training and direct intervention and counseling in crisis situations which involve trauma. As well as being a member of ATSS since 1998, Wayne is actively involved with a number of associations including, the Naval Officers Association of Canada (Nova Scotia Branch), RCMP Veterans , Nova Scotia Division and the provincial committee of the Nova Scotia Firefighters Association Critical Incident Stress Management Team. He holds certifications with the American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress, the Canadian Counselling Association and the Nova Scotia Association of Counselling Therapists. |
Nominating Committee Chairperson |
Jayne Crisp is an international board Certified Trauma Specialist with 37 year experience as a crime victim assistance practitioner and trauma responder. Jayne is the director of the Violence Against Women with Disabilities project of Safe Harbor, a comprehensive domestic violence program serving four counties in Upstate SC. Jayne is a Training and Technical Assistance Consultant to the Office for Victims of Crime, US Department of Justice; and a training consultant for the Florida Attorney General’s office. She serves on the Greenville County Foster Care Review Board. She has served as Executive Director of Mental Health America for Greenville and Anderson Counties; Director of the Association of Traumatic Stress Specialists; and national director of victim services for Neighbors Who Care, a Christian ministry and subsidiary of Prison Fellowship. She was the recipient of the 1991 National Crime Victims Rights Week Presidential Award, is co-author of Helping a Neighbor in Crisis, is the creator of HOUSEWISE STREETWISE, a Presidential award winning child safety curriculum, and Taking The Stand, a video designed to prepare child witnesses to testify in criminal court. |
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Staff
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