Linda Blanton, Ed.D.

Linda Blanton, Ed.D., is a Professor of Special Education at Florida International University in Miami. She has served in numerous leadership roles, including President of the Teacher Education Division of the Council for Exceptional Children. Dr. Blanton is co-editor of Teacher Education in Transition: Collaborative Programs to Prepare General and Special Educators and co-author of a recently completed guide, Collaborative Programs in General and Special Teacher Education: An Action Guide for Higher Education and State Policymakers. Dr. Blanton was the recipient of the Excellence in Teaching and Teacher Education Award given in special education by Merrill Education, Prentice Hall and the Teacher Education Division of the Council for Exceptional Children.

Bill East, Ed.D.

Bill East, Ed.D. has more than thirty-eight years experience in the fields of education and mental health. He has been a high school teacher, a supervisor in the Alabama mental health system, an adjunct college professor and an educational specialist with the Alabama State Department of Education. Dr. East was the State Director of Special Education in Alabama from 1990-1998, and was honored by the Alabama Federation Council for Exceptional Children (CEC) as the Outstanding Special Educator in Alabama. Dr. East provides leadership for NASDSE, an organization that focuses on partnerships for assisting states to improve outcomes for students with disabilities. He joined NASDSE as the deputy executive director in 1998, and was appointed the position of executive director in 1999. During his tenure at NASDSE, Dr. East has made numerous speeches across the nation on educational policy and other related matters. Special areas of interest and emerging work include development of deaf education service guidelines and training; transition/vocational rehabilitation initiatives; students with disabilities and juvenile justice; mental health; communities of practice and Response to Intervention (RtI).

Jay Engeln

Jay Engeln has 28 years of experience in education and currently serves as the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) Resident Practitioner for School/Business Partnerships. Honors include the 2000 National Secondary School Principal of the Year, the U.S. West Outstanding Teacher Award, Kappa Delta Pi Award for Contributions to Education and 1999 Colorado Principal of the Year. Engeln was a speaker at the White House Conference on Teenagers and provided testimony for a Congressional hearing on the benefits of school/business partnerships. He is an advisor for the Council for Corporate and School Partnerships in Washington, DC and member of the U. S. Chamber of Commerce - Business Education Network Steering Committee. During his tenure as principal of William J. Palmer High School, more than 100 school/business partnerships were in place generating revenue and services that were critical to maintaining essential programs that positively impacted student success.

Marilyn Friend, Ph.D.

Marilyn Friend, Ph.D., has spent her career as a general education teacher, special education teacher, teacher educator, and staff developer. She is currently Chairperson and Professor of Education in the Department of Specialized Education Services at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro where she teaches coursework on inclusive practices and collaboration among service providers. She also currently is serving on the board of the Teacher Education Division of the Council for Exceptional Children. She has consulted with school professionals nationally and internationally as they collaborate to educate their students, assisting them to form productive and efficient work teams, to learn the best ways to manage awkward or adversarial conversations, and to communicate effectively with parents. Her particular areas of interest include skills for collaboration, co-teaching, inclusive school practices, team building, shared problem solving, interpersonal communication, conflict and controversy, and home-school communication. She is the author of a number of books and more than 45 articles on collaboration, inclusive practices and related topics as the co-producer of a series of videotapes about collaboration, co-teaching and inclusion.

Judith C. Richardson

Judith C. Richardson is currently associate director for school improvement for NASSP. As such, she shares information with school/administrative teams on ways to utilize local school assessment data to drive school reform and on ways to implement the reform strategies and tools from Breaking Ranks IIBreaking Ranks in the Middle to improve student achievement. Judith was an urban secondary principal in the District of Columbia Public Schools, where she also served as a central office administrator, high school principal, principal mentor, assistant principal, program director, mathematics chairperson and teacher. She has guided school improvement by closely monitoring instruction, implementing targeted staff development, utilizing disaggregated standardized test data in program design and initiating a national award-winning business partnership. Ms. Richardson has served as assessment team chairperson for the Middle States Accreditation Association and as a full- and part-time mathematics professor at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of the District of Columbia.

Carolyn Roman

Carolyn Roman is attending Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, PA, where she is currently a senior majoring in speech-language pathology. She plans to pursue a Masters Degree is speech-language pathology. Ms. Roman has been involved since high school in various volunteer programs focusing specifically on the needs of disabled students. She has also presented on numerous panels across the country on leadership and transition issues for youth with disabilities. She understands that students with special needs often require advocates, and she hopes to make this the focus of her career.

Ellen S. Romett, Ph.D.

Ellen S. Romett, Ph.D. is the managing director of the Pennsylvania Training and Technical Assistance Network (PaTTAN), Pittsburgh Office, a personnel development project of the Pennsylvania Department of Education. She leads a team of educational consultants and support staff in the development and delivery of training and technical assistances activities to improve the performance of Pennsylvania's struggling students, including students with disabilities. Dr. Romett currently leads the states secondary transition and school-based mental health efforts and in this role she advises the Commonwealth of PA regarding program policy and effective practices. During 2007-08, the secondary transition initiative will address the challenges and demands of meeting the needs of struggling secondary students. Working in cooperation with the state's high school reform effort, Project 720, PaTTAN will provide training around identifying the critical system components for meeting the needs of schools hardest to serve youth. Training will address data collection and analysis and the performance indicators of student success.

Carl Suter

Carl Suter is the chief executive officer of the Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation. He assumed this position in November, 2001. Prior to joining CSAVR, he served as director of the Illinois Office of Rehabilitation Services for five years. He oversaw a budget of nearly $500 million dollars that included programs such as vocational rehabilitation, a $300 million dollar in-home care program for persons with disabilities, three schools for children with disabilities and Disability Adjudicative Services for determining eligibility for benefits for Social Security Supplemental Security Income in Illinois. During his tenure as state director, he led sweeping reforms of the Illinois Vocational Rehabilitation Services Program to provide world-class customer service to the nearly 70,000 individuals with disabilities served through its programs. Mr. Suter has also served as the executive director of the Illinois Council on Developmental Disabilities and as the associate director of the Illinois Association of Rehabilitation Facilities.