Lorayne Carbon, BA, SUNY Buffalo. MSEd., Bank Street College of Education. Director, SLC Early Childhood Center, 2003-present. Former classroom teacher, childcare center director, and adjunct professor. Workshop leader at seminars and conferences on early childhood education. Special areas of interest include social justice issues in the early childhood classroom and creating aesthetic learning environments for young children. (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Lorraine Ehlers-Flint, PhD, is a clinical and developmental psychologist with extensive experience working with children and their families in private settings, as well as schools, hospitals, and community agencies. She lectures on topics related to children on the autistic spectrum and the use of the Floortime/DIR approach. Dr Ehlers-Flint is also a trainer and supervisor of professionals in psychology and related fields in the US and in Latin America. She is a faculty member of the DIR Institute and the Interdisciplinary Council on Developmental and Learning Disorders (ICDL). Originally from Buenos, Aires, Argentina, Dr. Ehlers-Flint is in private practice in New York. (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Barbara Fields, a graduate of Smith College, subsequently received an MA in Child Development from Sarah Lawrence and a Social Work degree from Hunter College School of Social Work. She has worked with infants, children and parents for over 30 years in a variety of innovative clinical and research settings and has published and/or presented many papers, largely about treatment but also about the integration of psychoanalytic and developmental principles in work with children and their families. She is currently in private practice in New Rochelle and New York City, working with parents and children presenting a broad range of issues, including children on the autistic spectrum and theirparents, as well as individual adults. (Facilitating Play: 2008)

Margery B. Franklin, BA, Swarthmore College. MA, PhD, Clark University. Former Director of the Child Development Institute. Professor Emerita, SLC (psychology faculty from 1965-2002). Areas of interest include language development, psychology of art and play, educational theory and practice. Author of articles and book chapters on children's language, play, artistic development, developmental theory; co-editor of Development and the Arts: Critical Perspectives; Developmental Processes: Heinz Werner's Selected Writings; Symbolic Functioning in Childhood; and Child Language: A Reader. Fellow of the American Psychological Association and past president of the APA division, Society for Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts. (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Ashley Gephart is a native Northern Californian whose background in after-school programming, physical education, and fitness instructing led her to pursue her MA in Health Advocacy at Sarah Lawrence College. After graduating, Ashley became a project coordinator for the Child Development Institute, coordinating and implementing both a pop-up adventure playground at the Yonkers Riverfest and an evaluation of the Ultimate Block Party, a large-scale play advocacy event held in NYC. Ashley is enthusiastic about working with CDI as she continues to follow her passion for youth and community advocacy. (Facilitating Play: 2011)

Rachel Grob, PhD is Scholar in Residence and Director of National Initiatives at the Center for Patient Partnerships, University of Wisconsin-Madison and a consultant to the Child Development Institute (CDI) at Sarah Lawrence College, where she was the director from 2007 to 2010. As a consultant to CDI, she works to promote a developmentally informed view of children, childhood and education through advising on program development, facilitating community partnerships, and conducting research. She has published a number of articles on parenting, early childhood, and advocacy. Her book Testing Baby: The Transformation of Newborn Screening, Parenting and Policymaking, is forthcoming from Rutgers University Press (2011). (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Roger Hart is a Professor of the Psychology and Earth and Environmental Sciences Programs of the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and Director of the Children’s Environments Research Group. His research has focused on understanding the everyday lives of children and youth. He has been particularly concerned with the practical applications of theory and research to the planning and design of children’s environments. In 1978 he published Children’s Experience of Place, a natural history of children’s lives in a New England Town and he is currently engaged in a comprehensive study of how children’s out-of-school lives have changed in this town and how parents deal with these changes. He has published books on the planning and design of cities for children and onchildren’s participation in development with UNICEF and Save the Children. He is also deeply involved in improving play opportunities in New York City and the book Play Gardens will be released shortly. (Facilitating Play: 2008-2009)

Morgan Leichter-Saxby is a co-founder of Pop-Up Adventure Play, focusing on playwork training, resources, and community-based approaches to supporting play through the Pop-Up Adventure Playground model. She is a playworker, playwork trainer, and independent researcher with experience in the US, the UK, and the Gambia. She has worked as a consultant with such groups as Play England, Demos Think Tank, and NYC Parks and Recreation, and delivered training through the National Centre for Playwork Education (UK), among others. She holds a BA (cum laude) from Vassar College and an MA (Distinction) in Material and Visual Culture (Anthropology) from University College London. (Facilitating Play: 2009, 2011) 

Sarah Phillips Mathews, a graduate of Vassar College, also holds a Master’s degree in the Art of Teaching from Sarah Lawrence College. She is currently Lead Teacher in the Fours Class at the Sarah Lawrence College Early Childhood Center, where she has also taught Twos and Threes during the past 18 years. Her previous experience includes research at Children’s Hospital in Boston on early brain development, as well as teaching at the Harvard Law School Childcare Center and the Bank Street School for Children. Her main areas of interest are separation; conflict resolution and community building in the classroom; and block play, on which she leads a yearly graduate seminar. (Facilitating Play: 2011)

Edward Miller is an internationally known journalist and children’s advocate. Among his 12 published books are Crisis in the Kindergarten: Why Children Need to Play in School and Fool's Gold: A Critical Look at Computers in Childhood. As editor of the Harvard Education Letter he twice won the Distinguished Achievement Award of the Educational Press Association of America. He has taught at Harvard University and at Sarah Lawrence College. Ed was co-founder of the Opus 118 Harlem School of Music, is a founding partner of the U.S. Alliance for Childhood, and is coordinator of the New York Coalition for Play. He received both his AB and EdM degrees at Harvard. (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Robin Moore is professor of Landscape Architecture, College of Design, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, USA, and an expert in the design of play, learning, and educational environments. He holds degrees in architecture from London University and in city and regional planning from MIT- where he first became interested in integrating environmental design and child development. Pursuing this interest for 30 years, he has conducted a series of action-research projects in both North and South America, and England. He is former chair of the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA) and has held faculty appointments at UC Berkeley and Stanford University. His most recent publications include Natural Learning (1997), co-authored with educator Dr. Herb Wong, and "Healing Gardens for Children," in Healing Gardens (edited by Cooper Marcus & Barnes, 1999). Other books include Plants for Play (1993), Childhood's Domain: Play and Place in Child Development (1986, 1992); and the co-authored Complete Playground Book (1993), the Play For All Guidelines (1987, 1992), and the Play For All CD (1995). He is past president of the International Association for the Child's Right to Play (IPA) and a principal in the design and planning firm of Moore Iacofano Goltsman. (Facilitating Play: 2010)

Cindy Puccio is in private practice in NYC and Westchester, seeing typically developing children for play therapy and doing Floortime/DIR with children with special needs, mainly children on the Autistic spectrum. Right out of graduate school, she worked for four years at The Learning Center in Riverdale doing psycho-remediation with children with a range of language needs and disorders. She then moved to Los Angeles and worked part-time at a mental health agency and part-time in a public elementary school doing individual, family and group therapy. When she returned to New York, she resumed her private practice. She has an MA in Child Development from Sarah Lawrence College and an MSW from NYU. She is currently pursuing her PhD in Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health and Developmental Disorders. (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Marie Reynolds is a part-time associate at the Family Life Ministries Counselling Centre in Kingston, Jamaica, where she practices play therapy to address young children’s emotional and behavioral needs. Privately, she conducts in-home play therapy with children on the Autistic spectrum and their families. Marie is dedicated to increasing Jamaica’s awareness of the power of play and to expanding Jamaican children’s access to play and play therapy. To this end, she is a participant in the Jamaica Play Coalition and lectures an introductory play therapy graduate course at the Mico University College. She received her MSW from New York University, and she also holds an MA in Interdisciplinary Studies (Counselling Psychology emphasis). (Facilitating Play: 2009-present)

Barbara Schecter is Director of the Graduate Program in Child Development at Sarah Lawrence College. She is a developmental psychologist with a special interest in cultural psychology, developmental theories, and language development. She is an author and researcher on cultural issues in development and metaphoric thinking in children. In addition to her many other graduate and undergraduate course offerings, she has developed a new course on "Play and Culture," which she taught during Spring 2008. Barbara currently holds the Roy E. Larsen Chair in Psychology. She received her BA from Sarah Lawrence College and her MA and PhD from Teachers College Columbia University. (Facilitating Play: 2008-present)

Sharon Unis is a co-founder of Pop-Up Adventure Play. With Morgan Leichter-Saxby and other volunteers from the New York Coalition for Play, she took the lead on creating the first Pop-Up Adventure Playgrounds in New York City during the summer of 2010 and supported several play outreach efforts the following fall, including a consultation with the Sarah Lawrence College Child Development Institute and Groundwork Hudson Valley. Sharon and Morgan are working together to further develop the potential and delivery of low-cost, open-ended playspaces in neighborhoods. Her recent experience includes work with the Brooklyn Botanic Garden Children’s Garden and the NYU Child Study Center. She earned a BA in Economics and Environmental Science from Barnard College. (Facilitating Play: 2011)

Sara Wilford, MS, MEd, is director of the Art of Teaching graduate program at Sarah Lawrence College. Since 1982 she has been a member of the psychology faculty teaching courses connecting child development theory to educational practice. She has held the College's Larsen Chair in Psychology and received a Bank of New York Award for Inspirational Teaching. A former elementary grades public school teacher and early childhood center director, Sara was a member of CHILD Magazine's Editorial Advisory Board from its inception, and a regular contributor to Scholastic's Early Childhood Today. As a member of Westchester Community College's Early Childhood Advisory Committee she has received an Outstanding Service Award. Sara's writings include two books for parents, and a new text for early childhood educators titled Nurturing Young Children's Disposition to Learn. (Facilitating Play: 2009)

Penny Wilson ran an inclusive Adventure Playground in London for many years. This project provided the time and space for children with and without disabilities to play together with the support of a talented team of playworkers. She now works for the Play Association Tower Hamlets, PATH, as the Inclusion Worker. She writes about play and playwork and trains people too. With the Alliance for Childhood, she has worked in many areas of the United States, to re-kindle awareness of the need for children to have free play time. (Facilitating Play: 2008)