Held on October 14th, 2022 - This first, public listening session focuses specifically around the questions: Why should the early years sectors move towards climate action? How will climate change impact early childhood development?

www.capita.org | www.thisisplaneted.org

Speakers:

Jacqueline Patterson is the Founder and Executive Director of the Chisholm Legacy Project: A Resource Hub for Black Frontline Climate Justice Leadership.

Laurence Chandy was appointed as UNICEF’s first Director of the Office of Global Insight and Policy in August 2019.

Dr. Aaron Bernstein is the Interim Director of The Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health (Harvard Chan C-CHANGE), a pediatrician at Boston Children’s Hospital, and an Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School.

Joan Lombardi, PhD is a Senior Fellow at the Collaborative on Global Children's Issues, Georgetown University and a Visiting Scholar at the Stanford Center on Early Childhood, Stanford Graduate School of Education.

Luz Drada is a Program Coordinator for Moms Clean Air Force.

Held on November 4th, 2022 - This second, public listening session of the Early Years Climate Action Task Force will focus specifically around the question: How can our health systems adapt to help children build resilience?

www.capita.org | www.thisisplaneted.org

Malaika Ludman is a birth doula and certified lactation counselor who holds a master’s degree in public health. She is Program Coordinator for Birthmark Doula Collective’s Infant Ready program, which provides tools and information to promote perinatal emergency preparedness.

K. Ron-Li Liaw, MD is the Cannon Y. & Lyndia Harvey Chair in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Chair of the Pediatric Mental Health Institute at Children’s Hospital Colorado. Dr. Liaw is a Professor, Vice Chair of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and Division Director of Child and Adolescent Mental Health in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. She serves as the inaugural Mental Health In-Chief at Children’s Colorado to help shape and oversee child mental health vision and strategy, operations, quality, safety, and workforce development system-wide.

Rupa Basu, PhD, MPH, is currently the Chief of the Air and Climate Epidemiology Section at the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) of the California Environmental Protection Agency.

Parinda Khatri, PhD is chief clinical officer at Cherokee Health Systems (CHS), a comprehensive community health care organization in Tennessee that is a Federally Qualified Health Center and Community Mental Health Center. In her role at CHS, Khatri provides oversight and guidance on clinical quality, program development and management, workforce development, clinical research, and clinical operations for blended primary care and behavioral health services within the organization.

Held on December 12th, 2022 - This third, public listening session of the Early Years Climate Action Task Force will focus specifically around the questions: How will climate change impact early care and education systems?

www.capita.org | www.thisisplaneted.org

Corey Zimmerman is the Chief Program Officer at the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. In this role, she is a member of the senior leadership team and also directs the Center’s strategy for making the science actionable. She is currently leading the Center’s efforts to connect the science of early childhood with those working on climate resilience. To this work Corey brings nearly 20 years of experience shaping social policy on behalf of young children and families. She has previously worked at United Way of Massachusetts Bay and Merrimack Valley, the MA Dept. of Early Education and Care, and at Nurtury, Inc.

Sara Mickelson is the Director of Early Childhood Initiatives for Harris County, Texas, where she leads work to support children and their caregivers, primarily through child care and other early learning-focused strategies. This includes creating proof points for county investments in direct access to high-quality care and building community systems to support quality in early learning. She was previously the Chief of Programs for the Oregon Early Learning Division, led early childhood policy work at the Bainum Family Foundation and early childhood workforce initiatives at the Rhode Island Department of Education. She holds a BA from the University of Minnesota and an MA in Urban Education Policy from Brown University. She began her career in Harris County as a Head Start teacher.

Yasmina Vinci is the Executive Director of the National Head Start Association. Prior to joining the National Head Start Association she spent several years as principal and founder of EDGE Consulting Partners. At EDGE, Yasmina pursued local, national and global projects that utilized the knowledge, experience, and connections of her years in human services and early education, to enhance the capacity of organizations to thrive as competent, strategic entities capable of influencing policy. Yasmina founded EDGE after receiving her Master in Public Administration degree from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. Yasmina was also executive director of the National Association of Child Care Resource & Referral Agencies which organized the national campaign that was instrumental to securing the funding for child care in the welfare reform legislation.

Lois Kedrick is the President of Florida Family Child Care Home State Association whose mission is to represent a united voice on behalf of all children, to promote and encourage quality professional family child care through education, legislation, advocacy, mentoring, caring and love. Lois works to support a child’s desire to be a life-long learner, and encourages families with young children to value diversity and commonalities that connect us all. Involvement with early care is important in order to nurture relationships with active learners and to support families.