News And Events

I’m the director of the Early Childhood Center at Albert Einstein in the Bronx, a therapy program for children under 5 and their parents and caregivers. We have a project with Bronx Family Court to provide parent-child therapy to children in foster care and their parents.

Last year we hosted a Rise writing group for mothers with children in foster care and we’ll host another group this spring. I think it’s one of … Read More

I’m a journalist at AL-Jazeera America. I learned about Rise in the course of doing research on child welfare a couple years ago and I’ve been reading it ever since.

As a journalist writing about child welfare in New York City, Rise is a critical resource. The other things you read in this field are written by policy people and so-called experts, but it’s rare to get the perspective of folks who are … Read More

I’m a family court judge who decides domestic violence and custody cases in Queens Family Court. I was also the commissioner of the Administration for Children’s Services (ACS) in New York City for two-and-a-half years, until last December.

While I was at ACS, I invited Rise writers to read their stories and speak on a panel in front of about 300 managers at an ACS Leadership Forum. Rise writers also spoke at an ACS Convening on … Read More

I’m the deputy director at the Center for Family Representation, which represents parents who are charged in Family Court in Manhattan or Queens with allegations of neglect or abuse. We use Rise stories in three ways.

First, we use Rise in initial training and orientation for new staff. We have teams that work with parents—lawyers, social workers and parent advocates. Our parent advocates are parents who  themselves had child welfare cases and some … Read More

When my grandson was 5 weeks old, he was a bubbly little baby boy, living at home with his parents and grandparents. One day he was not feeling well and had a slight temperature. My daughter and son-in-law took him to the hospital. While being examined, the baby let out a horrific scream. The x-ray showed he had a fractured femur—his leg was broken and we didn’t know how it happened.

An unexplained … Read More