Dr. Nancy K. Young is the Executive Director of Children and Family Futures (CFF), a California-based research and policy institute whose mission is to improve safety, permanency, well-being and recovery outcomes for children, parents and families affected by trauma, substance use and mental disorders. CFF operates a number of evaluation and technical assistance programs. Since 2002, she has served as the Director of the federally-funded National Center on Substance Abuse and Child Welfare and the Director of the Administration on Children and Families technical assistance program for the Regional Partnership Grants since 2007. In 2010, she began serving as the Director of the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s technical assistance program for Family Drug Courts and the Statewide System Reform Program in 2014. She led the effort to create the foundation-funded Prevention and Family Recovery Program to implement evidence-based parenting and children’s intervention in family drug courts in 2013. In addition, Dr. Young has been involved in numerous projects related to public policy analysis, strategic planning and program evaluation through her work with these programs and serving as a consultant to various states, counties, tribes, communities and foundations on behalf of the children, parents and families affected by substance use and mental disorders involved in the child welfare and judicial systems. Dr. Young is a graduate of California State University Fullerton and received her M.S.W. and her Ph.D. from the University of Southern California, School of Social Work

Denise Moore is the Des Moines Service Area Parent Partner Coordinator. Her experience with substance abuse and the child welfare system led her to a moment in time that inspired her to seek services and make the changes she needed to become clean so that she could return to her children. What she learned through that experience has motivated her through a variety of programs to assist and provide hope to parents who have been involved with the child welfare system.

Ms. Moore is employed with Children & Families of Iowa and provides coordination of the Parent Partner Program for 15 counties in central Iowa. She has been an integral piece of the development and implementation of a statewide program. She is a certified facilitator for Casey Family Programs Strategic Sharing Curriculum, a Master Trainer for Building a Better Future Curriculum, a Trainer for Breaking Barriers: Working More Effectively with Birth Parents (foster parent curriculum), a Family Team Facilitator, and a Youth Transition Decision-Making Team Facilitator for the State of Iowa. Ms. Moore has a B.S. degree in Human Services.

Ms. Moore is a member of the Iowa Child Welfare Advisory Committee, Iowa Children's Justice Advisory Committee, Iowa Cultural Equity Alliance, Iowa Statewide Parent Partner Steering Committee, a founding member of the Birth Parent National Network, Community Partnerships for Protecting Children Executive Committee, and the Des Moines Area Community College Human Services Advisory Committee.

On January 20, 2011, she was awarded the Ruth Massinga/Casey Excellence for Children Birth Parent of the Year Award from Casey Family Programs for her exceptional service and commitment to birth parents. Ms. Moore has gained the admiration of parents, frontline workers, and administrators as she helps to guide the child welfare system toward improved outcomes for children and families.

Sherri Levesque, M.Ed., has over 27 years of experience in child welfare and is an expert in the areas of continuous quality improvement (CQI), program implementation, policy development, and training. In her current role as the Program Area Manager for CQI for the Capacity Building Collaborative Center for States, Ms. Levesque oversees the development and implementation of the Center’s national strategy to achieve improved functioning of CQI systems in child welfare agencies.

Ms. Levesque provides consultation and subject matter expertise in these areas to Center staff, child welfare agencies, and the Children’s Bureau. Ms. Levesque also led the application of Appreciative Inquiry to a program improvement planning process, and is an expert in the assessment phase of child welfare service delivery. Ms. Levesque brings first-hand experience as a front line worker, supervisor, trainer, and senior administrator in a public child welfare agency in the areas of investigation, foster care, permanency, adolescent services, and foster care licensing.

Kim Bishop-Stevens, MSW, LICSW, is the Manager of Substance Abuse for the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF). She is responsible for the development of policies, best practices and grants related to substance abuse in the child welfare system. Bishop-Stevens also serves as DCF’s primary liaison for substance abuse interagency initiatives with sister state agencies. In 2003, she was named a Robert Wood Johnson Developing Leadership in Reducing Substance Abuse Fellow. She began her career working as a clinical social worker with individuals and families impacted by substance abuse. Following this clinical work, Bishop-Stevens worked for the statewide substance abuse provider organization representing community substance abuse providers on policy, program and funding issues before joining DCF in 2000.