BOARD MEMBERS

Jill Cohen

is a Social Work Supervisor at the Center for Family Representation (CFR), an agency that provides families in crisis with free legal assistance and social work services that enable children to stay with their parents safely and avoid the devastating consequences of the foster care system.   Jill is proud that she began her work in child welfare at CWOP.   She obtained an M.S.W. from the Hunter College School of Social Work and a B.A. from Barnard College.

John Courtney, Chair Emeritus

Co-Director of the Partnership for Family Supports and Justice, has been committed to improving the child welfare system for over 30 years. Previously he was Director of Program Planning with New York City’s Child Welfare Administration and Deputy Executive Director of Little Flower Children’s Services. In those positions, and now with the Partnership for Family Supports and Justice’s Bridge Builders Project, he has helped bring about positive change within child welfare. John has been a CWOP Board member for 15 years.

Kaela Economos

is a social worker and policy specialist at the Brooklyn Family Defense Project.  Prior to that, she was the Program Officer for the Child Welfare Fund, a foundation that provided grants to organizations in New York City working for child welfare system reform and providing direct services to child welfare involved families. She is a former CWOP intern and former Board Member of the Brooklyn Young Mothers Collective. She has supervised MSW students from Columbia University, Fordham University, NYU and Hunter College.

Bevanjae Kelley

graduated from CWOP’s Parent Leadership Curriculum in 2004, and has served on CWOP’s Board of Directors since 2005.  She is a lifelong East Harlem resident.  She has had personal contact with the public child welfare system, and has been a Kinship Foster Parent and adoptive parent of her two grand-daughters.  She has served as a Community Representative at ACS Child Safety Conferences, and as a Visit Host through the East Harlem Community Partnership Project.  She has written about her experiences for Rise Magazine, and also serves on Rise’s Board of Directors.

Sandra Killett, Board Chair

is a graduate of CWOP’s Parent Leadership Curriculum and is currently employed as a Parent Advocate at Children’s Village.  She is a Harlem resident, and a former Board Chair of Community Voices Heard.  She is a participant in CWOP’s Road2Success program.

Jeremy Kohomban, Treasurer

is the President and CEO of The Children’s Village and The Center for Child Welfare Research at the Children’s Village Institute. Dr. Kohomban is a noted expert in child welfare and his leadership successes have been noted by the New York Times, NPR and industry publications. He currently serves on the boards of the Child Welfare Watch, State University of New York (SUNY) Empire College Foundation, New York City’s Youth Advocacy Center, the Council of Family and Child Caring Agencies, the Washington D.C. based American Youth Work Center which publishes the periodical Youth Today, and Charity Navigator’s Advisory Panel. He is the author of a number of articles and a nationally recognized speaker on topics of organizational leadership, system reform and family-focused service delivery.

Diane Medero

is a CWOP Road2Success participant.  She is a former foster child, East Harlem resident, and the mother of a teenaged daughter.  She is currently working for the NYC Department of Health, and studying towards an undergraduate degree in psychology & sociology at CUNY-Hunter College.

Terry Mizrahi

is a professor at Hunter College School of Social Work where she chairs the Community Organizing, Planning & Development concentration and directs the Education Center for Community Organizing (ECCO). She was a founder of CWOP and remains a proud member of the Board since its inception. Her areas of expertise in research, consulting and training are in client participation, community advocacy, health care rights and reform, and coalition building. She had a Fulbright fellowship in Israel in 2006 and continues to build collaborative relationships with Israelis involved in progressive social activism and social change. She was president of the National Association of Social Workers from 2000 – 2003 and continues to be active in motivating social workers to become active change agents.

Tim Ross, Vice Chair

is the managing partner of Action Research Partners, a research consulting firm.  He is the author of Child Welfare: The Challenges of Collaboration published by the Urban Institute Press, and the lead author of the book-length report The Experiences of NYC Foster Children in HIV / AIDS Clinical Trials. Prior to his joining Action Research Partners, Tim led the child welfare research program at Child Trends and served as Director of Research at the Vera Institute of Justice.  He is the father of three children, including one with significant special needs.

Michelle Salvaggio

is a clinical social worker who has volunteered at CWOP for several years as a mental health consultant to our East Harlem Parent Self-Help and Support Group.  More recently, she has begun facilitating staff support groups.  She is an adjunct professor at the Hunter College School of Social Work, where she is also working towards a Ph.D in Social Welfare.  She currently works for the Kingsbridge Heights Community Center.

Te-Yu Shu

is a 20 year old woman in foster care with Forestdale.  She attends LaGuardia Community College in Long Island City New York.  She is a writer for Represent Magazine.  She has co-presented with CWOP Parent Organizers at the Columbia University School of Social Work and at Brooklyn College.

Jessica Wett, Secretary

was a CWOP MSW intern in 2008 – 9.  She graduated from Hunter College School of Social Work in May 2009, and is currently a constituent liaison for US Congressman Jerrold Nadler.  Her work focuses largely on housing issues.

Robbyne Wiley

graduated from CWOP’s Parent Leadership Curriculum in 2003, and has served on CWOP’s Board of Directors since 2005. She has served as a Community Representative at ACS Child Safety Conferences and is a certified Visit Coach through the East Harlem Community Partnership Project. She has written for Rise magazine about her experience with the child welfare system. Ms. Wiley co-facilitated CWOP’s first Multifamily Group for East Harlem families who have recently been reunited after foster care.

CWOP STAFF

Michael Arsham
Executive Director

Executive Director Michael Arsham is a social worker and a life-long New Yorker with over 30 years of child welfare experience. He served Rheedlen Centers for Children and Families (now known as the Harlem Children’s Zone) for thirteen years, staffing, developing, and directing Preventive Service programs in Central Harlem, Manhattan Valley, and Hell’s Kitchen. Mr. Arsham became Director of Social Service Policy for the New York State Council of Family and Child-Caring Agencies (COFCCA) in 1994. He represented Preventive Service providers throughout the city and state, and played a key role in organizing to avert massive proposed budget cuts to these services in 1994 and ’95. He was hired to direct CWOP in November 1998.

Teresa Bachiller
Assistant Director / East Harlem Coordinator

Assistant Director/East Harlem Coordinator Teresa Bachiller began work at CWOP in July 2002. A June 2002 graduate of CWOP’s first East Harlem Parent Leadership curriculum, Teresa has a wide range of experience with the child welfare system as a former group home resident, a Preventive Service client, a mother who regained custody of a child placed in foster care, and a grandmother who had custody of a grandchild. She also has computer and managerial training and experience. Teresa coordinates the East Harlem Parent Leadership Curriculum.

Allison Brown
Special Assistant to the Executive Director

Allison Brown was hired as a Special Assistant to CWOP’s Executive Director in October 2009. She graduated with honors from the Hunter College School of Social Work in May 2009.  Ms. Brown was CWOP’s MSW student intern during the 2007 / 8 academic year. She observed and participated in Parent Self-Help and Support Group, ACS Child Safety Conferences, research and grant-writing, and helped co-organize a community forum on over-representation of African American children in foster care in partnership with US Congressman Charles Rangel’s office. In her current staff role, she supports Parent Organizers in a variety of capacities, including data collection and information management.

Tracey Carter

Parent Organizer Tracey Carter is a 2004 graduate of CWOP’s Parent Leadership Curriculum. Tracey began work as a Highbridge Parent Organizer in July 2004. She is a Highbridge resident, mother of eleven children, and parent leader in the local public schools. She has extensive personal experience with the child welfare and related systems, including the Department of Homeless Services. Tracey is a co-chairperson of the Delegate Agency Policy Committee at Mid-Bronx Headstart, where she also volunteers as a Teacher’s Assistant.

       Sabra Jackson
Parent Organizer

Sabra Jackson graduated our East Harlem Parent Leadership Curriculum in 2005 and served as one of our first Community Representatives staffing East Harlem Child Safety Conferences, which she continues to staff. Ms. Jackson is a former member of the ACS Citywide Headstart Policy Council, a member of the ACS Commissioner’s Parent Advisory Work-Group, and the Statewide Task Force on Office of Children and Family Services / Court Collaboration. She is a board member of Voices of Women, a self-help and advocacy organization of domestic violence survivors. She has guest lectured at numerous universities and conferences, including the National Advocates for Pregnant Women’s conference on drugs, pregnancy, and parenting. She has extensive personal experience with the public child welfare system as both a parent and a service provider, and has reunited with her two children who were placed in foster care.

Teresa Marrero

Parent Organizer Teresa Marrero was born and raised in Highbridge. As a young mother of two, she had the experience of using Preventive Services to avert the foster care placement of her children, graduating from the New York Foundling Pathway program in 2003. Teresa graduated our second Highbridge Parent Leadership Curriculum in June 2006. Teresa staffs Child Safety Conferences for East Harlem families.

Wanda Rodriguez
Maintenance

Wanda Rodriguez is a 2009 graduate of our Parent Leadership Curriculum. She grew up in East Harlem, is the mother of five children, and is a survivor of the child welfare system.

        Rosa Rosado
Assistant Director /Highbridge Coordinator

    Rosa Rosado, CWOP Assistant Director / Highbridge Coordinator, joined our staff in March 2004. Born and raised in the South            Bronx, bilingual and bicultural, Rosa is a fifteen-year veteran of the NYC child welfare system. She has an undergraduate degree in Social Work from Lehman College and a Masters in Social Work from Yeshiva University. She was a Senior Social Worker with the Jewish Child Care Association Foster Care Division, and, most recently, Program Director of Safe Horizon’s Washington Heights Preventive Service Program.