Fun Fact #18
SPAN's staff is extremely talented and always "WRITE"!
Not only do they do outreach and training, policy advocacy, material creation, and more...many SPAN employees are also published (both print and digital) and/or have been interviewed for a variety of articles
and media broadcasts.
SPAN is proud of the work its staff has created
to share their wealth of knowledge and expertise
while furthering our mission of promoting
advocacy and spreading awareness!

Senior Trainer Nicole Pratt was interviewed by NJ Spotlight during Mental Health Awareness Week in May 2017, and presented her story via live webcast (at 1:16:36) during a national mental health event at George Washington University in Washington DC.

SPAN's most recent addition, Pam Aasen , Director for the Early Hearing Detection and Intervention Program, published her 2016 piece on Parent-Professional Partnerships for Sound Intuition.

In addition to a long list of items, Family Voices NJ Coordinator Lauren Agoratus has a catalog of articles in Exceptional Parent magazine. Many of these were coauthored by her SPAN colleagues: Brenda Figueroa , Fanny Ochoa and Michele Tyler , Erin Seigh , Maria Docherty , Myriam Alizo , and Denise Bouyer-Hargrove .

Tatsiana DaGrosa , the NJ Statewide Parent to Parent Southern Regional Associate, shared a byline with Lauren Agoratus in the Winter 2017 issue of Behavioral Health News, and has been quoted several times by NJ CDD for their Words of Wisdom Campaign as a member of Regional Family Support Planning Council #9.

Parents as Champions for Healthy Schools Project Co-Directors Karen Straim and Joanne Aidala share authorship for this article in Exceptional Parent magazine.

Debra Jennings , Co-Executive Director, has done a podcast with the SWIFT Center, a blog on Disproportionality, another with NAFSCE (National Association for Family School and Community Engagement), as well as a video for RTI Action Network. Debra's blog was published by OSERS for their Age of Majority series, and she has many more items on her long list.

Communications Director Jessica Wilson 's blog was published by the Department of Education for Down Syndrome Awareness Month 2017. She wrote a press statement on the Parkland, FL school shooting, and has other pieces in a variety of online and print publications.

Co-Executive Director Diana Autin has multiple publications and interviews on her CV (too long to list all here), including this series of discussions ( CLIP 1 , CLIP 2 , CLIP 3 , CLIP 4 ) with Peter Marshall for CADRE as well as articles for Exceptional Parent magazine and more.

SPAN's staff are individually and collectively supporting our mission through their publications. Our donors individually and collectively support our mission through their generosity, for which we are immensely grateful.

In advocacy,
Diana Autin & Debra Jennings
Co-Executive Directors