Speakers & Workshops
Plenary Speakers
Hal Runkel, Scream Free Visitation
Hal Runkel is quickly becoming America's new expert on human relationships.A Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist, relationship coach and extremely popular keynote speaker, Hal is the visionary founder and president of ScreamFree Living, Inc., the organization that is calming the world, one relationship at a time.
Hal's newest book, ScreamFree Parenting: Raising Your Kids by Keeping Your Cool, was released in hardback internationally by both Broadway Books (secular) and Waterbrook Press (Christian) in September 2007. It attained New York Times bestseller status during its debut week. Married for 14 years, Hal Runkel and his wife have two children, a boy and a girl. As both a husband and a father, Hal practices at home what he's preached to many thousands of families everywhere: the ScreamFree approach to relationships.
Hal, with an impressive academic and social science background, has taken the most advanced approaches to relationship theory and, through thousands of hours of family therapy, organizational consulting and professional coaching in organizations, churches, family businesses and schools, has developed the revolutionary ScreamFree Living methodology to truly revolutionize relationships.
Hal Runkel now presents the ScreamFree relationship programs including ScreamFree Parenting, ScreamFree Marriage, ScreamFree Leadership and others to audiences nationwide through live presentations, teleconferences, Web seminars, newsletters and training classes.He has presented workshops and talks on various subjects at regional, national and international conferences, as well as a variety of church/community settings. Subjects include: organizational dynamics, addictive behaviors, parenting & marriage, anger management, psychological and human systems assessment, and small group and team processes. He's spoken in corporate environments to clients such as Chick-fil-A and RJ Griffin, to clinical professional organizations such as Association for Marriage & Family Therapy annual conferences and pediatrician groups. Hal has spoken to PTA groups, church and community groups, bookstores and other leading organizations, and is now represented by Premiere Speakers Bureau.Seen by millions on NBC's The Today Show (five guest appearances), iVillage Live (NBC) and CW's nationally syndicated The Daily Buzz, Hal is the founder and president of ScreamFree Living, Inc., as well as multiple newspapers and magazines nationwide. He travels coast-to-coast sharing his ScreamFree relationship programs with audiences using teleconferences, web seminars, newsletters, training classes, and the book series.Hal is a member of the Family Firm Institute, the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy and the Georgia Association for Marriage and Family Therapy.
Before starting ScreamFree Living, Inc., Hal had a thriving therapy practice and also served as director of education for Covenant Counseling Institute in Snellville, Georgia.The Houston native and Greater Atlanta resident earned his Masters in Marriage and Family Therapy (MMFT) in August 2000 from Abilene Christian University. His M.S. in Theological Studies was awarded in 1998.
Dr. Eileen Anderson
Associate Professor Eileen Anderson directs the university’s educational programs in Bioethics and Medical Humanities. She is founding director of the Medicine, Society and Culture (MSC) concentration and center for Medicine, Society and Culture. As a medical and psychological anthropologist, she studies how adolescents and young adults adapt to changes in their environments in ways that both advance and harm their well-being. An award-winning teacher and mentor, she expanded the university’s offerings at the undergraduate, graduate and professional levels to provide students a more comprehensive understanding of non-biological factors that affect health, as well as our ideas about well-being and illness.
Drawn to interdisciplinary study since her own days as an undergraduate, Dr. Anderson foregrounds bioethics, medical humanities and social medicine in her research, teaching and program development. Social and cultural constructs, historical and rhetorical influences, literature, art, philosophy – all shape perceptions of health, illness, and recovery, which in turn affect choices, beliefs, and behaviors. Those who appreciate this complex and multi-layered interplay will be able to play pivotal roles in enhancing how care is delivered – and the outcomes it yields.
Dr. Anderson's perspective on these issues has been informed by extensive research on the mental health and well-being of adolescents and young adults in contexts of socio-cultural change. Her most enduring project is an ongoing longitudinal study of how subjective perceptions of current and future well-being allowed the first mass-educated cohort of Belizean schoolgirls to overcome severe threats to their mental and physical health. Dr. Anderson also led an interdisciplinary team’s study of the psychiatric medication experiences of undergraduates at North American university campuses, where a mix of quantitative and qualitative methods revealed stark differences between reported and actual usage. She is writing a book about the findings and their implications; Young, Educated and Medicated: College Student Mental Health. Building on her earlier work in culture, body image and eating disorders, she led a multi-institutional project examining the ethnography of global obesity stigma among upwardly mobile young people in several countries around the world. This research led to a School for Advanced Research seminar, from which emerged an edited volume (2017) of which she is primary editor and author, Fat Planet: Culture, Obesity and Symbolic Body Capital. Most recently, she has launched a new project examining concepts and practices related to child well-being in the Guardian Ad Litem system in legal contexts, where she leads an interdisciplinary team of child psychologists, pediatricians, ethicists, anthropologists, social workers and legal scholars.
Her training has included work at Harvard Medical School in the Department of Social Medicine and Massachusetts General Hospital, and postdoctoral fellowships in Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture and Neuroscience and Culture, Brain and Development through the Foundation for Psychocultural Research at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.
Cristin Severance WRAL Investigative Documentary Reporter
In November 2023, Fayetteville police responded to a desperate 911 call from a teenager threatening self-harm. What began as a routine mental health check quickly unfolded into a shocking missing persons case. Officers discovered that two adopted children, Blake and London Deven, had been missing for years — and no one had ever reported their disappearance until that day.
Further investigation revealed that the same woman had adopted five children from three different North Carolina counties. Two of those children had vanished without a trace, and there was no credible documentation explaining what happened to them. The case exposed critical failures in North Carolina’s foster care and adoption systems — systems meant to safeguard vulnerable children, but which, in this instance, failed them completely.
We will screen the documentary Broken: A North Carolina Story to explore this heartbreaking case and examine its impact on the safety and protection of children in care. Following the screening, investigative journalist Cristin Severance will join us for a Q&A to discuss her reporting and the broader implications of this tragedy.
Workshops
Will Anyone Believe Me? Disclosures of Child Sexual Abuse
Learn more about the National Forensic Interviewing NetworkLindsey Dula, LMSW
National Forensic Interviewing Network
Doubt. Shame. Embarrassment. Only a few fears experienced by those who have experience child sexual abuse. Practitioners and researchers have discussed the prevalence of child sexual abuse since the 1970s, but over 50 years later, there is still lack of understanding regarding the process of disclosure for victims of child sexual abuse.
This session will discuss the complexities of disclosure, research surrounding disclosures, and how critically important it is for all professionals serving child victims to understand barriers to disclosure.
Content will include discussion regarding adult survivors of child sexual abuse, the impact of trauma, and the benefits of understanding the complexities of disclosures for investigators and legal professionals.
Supervised Visitation in the Child Welfare System: Practices and Partnerships that Work
Claudia Williams
Kate Blair
Bright House
Supervised visitation programs play a vital role in supporting family connections and promoting child safety within complex systems of care. When cases involve child welfare or foster care, visitation becomes a key component of reunification and permanency planning, requiring coordination among multiple professionals and caregivers.
This workshop will help providers understand the essential dynamics of serving child welfare cases, including the role of visitation in family preservation and reunification. Equally important, participants will learn strategies for building effective partnerships with child welfare agencies, foster parents, and the courts. Drawing from Bright House experience, this session will highlight real-world practices that strengthen collaboration, reduce conflict, and keep the child needs at the center.
Attendees will leave with a clearer understanding of what it takes to successfully serve child welfare and foster care cases, as well as concrete tools to strengthen their partnerships with agencies and stakeholders in their own communities.
They're Here, Now What:Strengthening Collaboration in Family Support With Survivor-Centered, Trauma-Informed Approaches
Breanna Allen
Allen Consulting, LLC
When families enter supervised visitation and child access programs, they often bring experiences of trauma, domestic violence, and systemic inequities. This workshop explores the critical role of cross-disciplinary collaboration between advocates, law enforcement, courts, and medical providers in ensuring safety, healing, and justice for survivors and children.
Participants will engage with survivor-centered frameworks, case-based scenarios, and practical tools that can be immediately applied in their programs. Grounded in anti-oppressive and trauma-informed practice, this session highlights how collaborative response teams improve family outcomes, increase survivor trust in systems, and strengthen the effectiveness of supervised visitation services. Attendees will leave with concrete strategies, reflection prompts, and a collaboration readiness checklist, to take back to their programs.
Cultivating Growth and Resilience: Harnessing Posttraumatic Growth, Compassion Satisfaction, and Positive Childhood Experiences in Supervised Visitation
Merina Campbell, MSW
Florida State University
Supervised visitation professionals often work where trauma, family stress, and resilience meet. This workshop takes a hopeful, evidence-based look at how practitioners can support growth and healing in both the families they serve and in themselves. Participants will explore three key protective factors: Posttraumatic Growth (PTG), Compassion Satisfaction, and Positive Childhood Experiences (PCEs). Together, these concepts offer a practical framework for helping families recover and thrive after adversity while also supporting professional well-being in emotionally demanding work.
Through guided reflection, hands-on tools, and real-world examples, this session provides concrete strategies that can be applied right away in supervised visitation settings to strengthen resilience, build connection, and support lasting stability for children and families.
Supporting the Supporter: Trauma-Informed Care for Monitors in Supervised Visitation
Anne Swan
Calm Visitation
Emily Landrum, MAEd
Supervised visitation monitors play a vital role in ensuring child safety, maintaining neutrality, and facilitating peaceful connections between children and non-custodial parents. Yet one critical factor often overlooked in training and practice is the monitor’s own trauma history or unresolved triggers. When a monitor experiences stress, vicarious trauma, or personal unresolved experiences, it can unintentionally create a barrier to safety, neutrality, and effective visitation.
This workshop will explore how trauma within the professional can affect judgment, reactivity, and interactions during high-conflict family visits. Participants will gain insight into recognizing early warning signs of secondary trauma, understanding the importance of boundaries, and integrating mindful self-check practices before taking on a case. Practical tools and strategies will be provided for cultivating resilience, prioritizing self-care, and ensuring that the monitor's own wellness does not compromise the child's safety.
Attendees will leave with tangible methods to integrate into daily practice, fostering healthier monitors, safer visits, and more reliable outcomes for families. The workshop will also advocate for trauma-informed care in supervised visitation as a professional standard of practice.
Trauma-Informed Care in Infancy: Strengthening Infant and Toddler Resilience Through Evidence Based Strategies
Amy C Joyner DNP MSN-Ed BSN RN
Marymount University
Jill M. Flynn Ed.D M.Ed, BA
George Mason University
Trauma-informed care in infancy is about rewriting a child's story before its fully written‚creating a foundation of safety, connection, and resilience that can last a lifetime. Trauma-informed care (TIC) for infants is a specialized approach that recognizes the profound impact early adversity can have on neurodevelopment, attachment, and long-term health outcomes. Infants, although preverbal, are highly sensitive to environmental stressors and their caregivers' responses.
This presentation integrates developmental science, relational principles, and evidence-based practices to support healing and resilience in the earliest stages of life. This presentation is essential for those working with young children and families.
Building College-Court Synergy for Trauma-Responsive Supervised Visitation Programs
Dr. Ariane Schratter
Maryville College
Many communities experience a cultural distance between academia and its community stakeholders. Therefore, academic-court partnerships for supervised visitation programs require intentional strategies focused on relationship-building and mutual benefit. Addressing structural challenges is essential for sustained collaboration and community impact.
This presentation aims to explore how Blount County Juvenile Court and Maryville College (Maryville, Tennessee) are building a co-learning environment directed towards a shared vision of sustainable and trauma-responsive supervised visitation. Courts and colleges often operate with different timelines, priorities, and definitions of success. Therefore, establishing shared goals, regular dialogue, and adaptive processes bridge these gaps and create more responsive programming.
Universities/colleges support community-engaged collaborations with varying degrees therefore potentially undervaluing faculty and student community partnership work that can challenge starting or sustaining these partnerships.
Advocating for institutional changes, such as recognizing partnership work in academic metrics (e.g., tenure and promotion criteria) and seeking joint grant funding are effective solutions. Our college-court agreement allows either party to adjust programming in real time and respond to evolving needs. We aim to discuss ways to invest early in relationship-building for collaborative program planning and student mentoring, within a co-leadership model, that validates both academic and community knowledge and needs.
More than Babysitters‚ Recognizing the Critical Nature of Child and Youth Care Workers
Tammy Hopper, MSW, CYC-P
National Safe Place
Whether a child and youth care professional is working in a shelter, group home, out of school time program, detention center, as a child protective service worker, or in a youth development center, the shared commitment to positive and optimal youth development is more significant than the differences in these roles.
For more than 30 years, a movement to ensure options for child and youth care worker certification has gained momentum and a formalized process to gain recognition for the competencies and skills is now available.
The Child and Youth Care (CYC) Certification is identified by the Council on Accreditation and is available at the entry, associate, and professional level. This session will feature an overview of the link between the certification process and ethics, decreased organizational risk, increased staff satisfaction, and employee retention.
Elevating Community Support for Our Missions
Marcie Smith
The Children's Haven, Inc.
Empathetic Distress is a mindset that leads to serious problems for people in the workplace. Feeling a sense of burnout can not only affect While most people are motivated to help others, factors like empathy fatigue, organizational distrust, and the scale of problems can lead to feelings of disconnection or indifference with nonprofit missions. Organizations offering supervised visitation programs can struggle to have their community connect with their work. Families separated by foster care involvement participate in court-ordered supervised visitation to aid in the reunification process. It understandable that members of our community can assume that children are in foster care due to abuse and neglect caused by their parents or caretakers. And this is oftentimes absolutely true. Fostering empathy for parents in these situations sometimes feels impossible. However, our organizations depend on community support from advocacy to funding. It is essential that we utilize innovative storytelling, leverage partnerships, and increase awareness around end goals and impact to build community support for our work. When it comes to supervised visitation, we are telling the family’s story and we have to garner support for the family unit, not just the child. This workshop will share innovative strategies to connect with your community and enhance support for your supervised visitation program. provider, but also the people who are receiving services. The focus of this session is to reflect on what it means to thrive as a human being and to learn tools designed to reflect on our purpose in doing the work and developing the compassion and self-compassion to show up for ourselves, our loved ones, our clients and any other being we encounter in the emotionally healthiest way possible.
We have assumed a huge responsibility for the care and welfare of others. But if we ourselves are in distress and overwhelmed by life and work, we cannot be in a position to best access the wisdom we need to be able to find the solutions that are most beneficial to our clients. This presentation reaches all people because we touch on the fundamental aspects of being a human being working in stressful environments.
Changing our mindset as to how and why we do the work will lead to a happier and healthier life which will also flow naturally to the way we more positively approach all aspects of our life. This session will allow us to reflect on the way we want to show up in the World, both for ourselves and others, so that we may be of better service to our communities.
Stalking and Supervised Visitation: How to Recognize and Respond to Promote Safety
Jennifer Landhuis
Emma MacDonald
Stalking Prevention, Awareness, and Resource Center (SPARC)
Many offenders engage in stalking behaviors to perpetuate the cycle of abuse and control after a relationship has ended, and supervised visitation centers can become the frontline of the offender's criminal behavior. It is imperative that supervised visitation centers and staff be equipped to recognize and respond to stalking behaviors to promote safety and security for participants.
This session will provide practical tools for identifying stalking behaviors within a supervised visitation center and give guidance on how centers can structure their services to promote safety for victims of stalking.
The session will also discuss how technology plays an integral and unique role in facilitating this dangerous form of victimization and provide useful tips for promoting digital safety for staff and visitation center partners.
From Burnout to Balance: Sustaining Compassion in Supervised Visitation
Emily McKee
Kymari House
Supervised visitation professionals carry the emotional weight of families in crisis while striving to maintain neutrality, safety, and empathy, a combination that can quietly lead to burnout if left unaddressed. In this session, participants will explore the realities of compassion fatigue in visitation work and learn sustainable, HOPE-informed strategies for balancing empathy with self-preservation.
Drawing from Kymari House's experience in maintaining a stable, high-performing team with zero turnover, this workshop provides practical tools to strengthen resilience, foster reflective practice, and build a culture of wellness. Participants will leave with realistic, actionable steps to sustain both themselves and their teams, ensuring that compassion remains a renewable resource.
