Stephen Elliott
Professor, Arizona State University, USA
Steve is the Mickelson Foundation Professor at ASU. He received his doctorate in 1980 in Educational Psychology from Arizona State University and has been on the faculty at major research universities with enterprise leadership roles, including the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (Buros Institute), University of Wisconsin-Madison (Wisconsin Center for Education Research), and Vanderbilt University (Learning Sciences Institute). At Nebraska (1980-1983), Steve assisted in the leadership of Buros Institute of Mental
Measurements and the School Psychology Program. At Wisconsin (1987-2004), Steve was a professor in School Psychology and served as the Associate Director of the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. At Vanderbilt (2004-2010), he was the Dunn Family Professor of Educational and Psychological Assessment in the Special Education Department and directed the Learning Sciences Institute and Dunn Family Scholars Program. In 2010, he returned to ASU to lead the development of the interdisciplinary Learning Sciences Institute. He typically teaches graduate courses on technical writing and the assessmentof children’s academic and social behavior, and undergraduate courses on research methods and early childhood intervention. He co-directed the National Center on Assessment and Accountability for Special Education from 2011 to 2018, an IES funded research center concerning achievement growth models for students with disabilities. During the past 37 years, he has received over $59 million dollars of research funding primarily from the United States Department of Education.
Steve has authored over 300 journal articles, books, and book chapters, along with 20 internationally used social behavior rating scales. His h-index is 88, his i10 index is 247, and his specialty area research articles have more than 160,000 reads and nearly 40,000 citations. His research focuses on the assessment and intervention of children’s social and academic achievements. In particular, he has published articles on (a) the assessment of children's social emotional skills and academic competence, (b) the design and use of testing accommodations and alternate assessment for evaluating the academic performance of students with disabilities, and (c) the measurement of students’ opportunities to learn the intended curriculum. He is the co-author of the Social Skills Rating System (SSRS) and its revision, the Social Skills Improvement System (SSIS), a social behavior assessment system used as part of many MTSS and PBIS programs worldwide. In 2017, he created the SSIS Social Emotional Learning Edition (SSIS SEL) Assessments and Classwide Intervention Program and expanded it in 2020 to the SSIS SEL Brief + Mental Health Scales along with the SSIS Social Emotional Health CIP-T2 program. Collectively, these assessments and intervention programs are in use in numerous European and Australasian countries.
Steve's scholarly and professional contributions have been recognized by his colleagues in education and psychology as evidenced by being selected as an American Psychological Association Senior Scientist in 2009, the Lightner Witmer Award winner from APA Division 16 in 1984, a Fellow in four APA divisions, and being appointed Editor of School Psychology Review (1984-1990) for two terms. In 2008, he also was selected as a Fellow for "sustained achievement in education research" by the American Educational Research Association. In 1996, he was selected as UW-Madison’s Van Hise Outreach Professor for his “outstanding record of teaching and commitment to providing continued professional development programs for educators and psychologists.” Steve consults with national leaders on the assessment and instruction of PreK-12 students, has served on the Design and Analysis Committee for the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), and has enjoyed courtesy academic appoints with the Australian Catholic University’s Learning Science Institute and the University of Malta’s Centre for Social-Emotional Health. The accompanying vita documents Steve’s training, specific scholarly contributions, funded research projects, professional service, and doctoral student collaborators.
Stephen Elliott
Professor, Arizona State University, USA
Eva Oberle
Associate Professor, The University of British Columbia, Canada
Eva is an Associate Professor with the Human Early Learning Partnership in the School of Population and Public Health. She completed graduate studies at the University of Heidelberg and UBC and conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Illinois at Chicago and CASEL.
She is the current Principal Investigator of the Middle Years Development Instrument (MDI), a population-based survey that measures child and adolescent social-emotional and mental wellbeing, and experiences in schools and communities.
Her research interests include examining factors that predict positive youth development and resilience and she conducts research in partnership with school districts and communities in BC. Understanding the role of social relationships with peers, teachers, and families in promoting mental health and wellbeing in schools and communities is a central aspect of Eva’s research
Eva Oberle
Associate Professor, The University of British Columbia, Canada
Helen Skouteris
Professor, Monash University, Australia
Professor Skouteris is a developmental psychologist and a preeminent researcher in the fields of health and social care improvement and implementation science. Monash University recruited Professor Skouteris in November 2017 with a team of 8 as the foundation Monash Warwick Alliance Chair in Health and Social Care Improvement and Implementation Science. In this role she has grown scholarship in health and social care, and built exceptional integration between research, education, and health and social care; (2) developed linkages between health and social care; (3) built capacity in the next generation of researchers and practitioners; and (4) nurtured the growth of the field of implementation science. In just 6 years, Professor Skouteris’ Australian first Health and Social Care Unit (HSCU) has grown to 70 personnel, including two consumer advocates.
Under Professor Skouteris' leadership, HSCU has driven the boundaries of health and social care, drawing on theories, extensive evidence synthesis, randomised controlled trials and practice-based knowledge from real world pragmatic implementation research. As the most multi-disciplinary team in the Faculty of Medicine, with expertise in quantitative and qualitative research methodologies, evaluation (including Program Logics) and implementation science, the HSCU is exceptionally well placed to advance approaches to the complex and multifactorial challenges addressing inequity in health, social care, and education practice.
Her current role as Monash Warwick Professor in Health and Social Care Improvement and Implementation Science is full-time and research-focused with research administration as Head of HSCU. Professor Skouteris is also co-lead of the Evidence Synthesis, Qualitative and Implementation Methods Division, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine. Her research income has totalled > $45M over the last 10 years. She has received > $23M in Non-Category 1 Grants (Category 2-3) to develop and/or evaluate intervention programs and to build the evidence base needed to support large scale implementation and ongoing funding. Professor Skouteris has published >360 peer reviewed paper and 7 book chapters. Her H index is 73. Examples of projects that focus on implementation at scale and evaluation include:
1. Professor Skouteris, and her then PhD student Claire Blewitt, pioneered the development of the Social-Emotional Engagement and Development SEED) Program, in partnership with bestchance Child Family Care to support educators to foster social-emotional learning in pre-schoolers. IMPACT: In 2019, the Victorian Department of Education (DE) included SEED as one of the evidence-based offerings to kindergartens through the School Readiness Funding Initiative, after having received one of the highest DET ‘strength of evidence’ rankings. SEED is now licenced to bestchance, is being implemented and scaled across Victorian kindergartens (to date, reaching >300 kindergarten teachers and >3,500 preschool children) and is promoted as best practice by DE. In recognition of her work, Claire was awarded a 3-year postdoc fellowship by bestchance (2022-2024), the 2021 Sax Institute Research Action Award, and the 2021 Bupa Foundation Emerging Health Researcher of the Year commendation award for outstanding research.
2. HEALing Matters (HM) is a Victorian Government funded online training package and knowledge exchange platform for out-of-home care (OOHC) carers that Professor Skouteris’ team co-developed with young people with lived experience and other key stakeholders. The primary aim of HM is to improve the eating, physical activity habits, wellbeing and life skills of young people living in OOHC. Carers benefit from professional development that builds their capacity to improve the lifestyle habits/routines of the young people they care for, allowing them to meet mandated policies in relation to healthy food and access to sport and physical activity. IMPACT: HM is included in Victoria’s most recent Healthy Kids, Health Futures 5-year action plan is being scaled up across Victoria, South Australia, and parts of NSW as best practice in OOHC. The 3-time award winning HM is inspiring policy changes in community services organisations that are embedding the training into their onboarding and professional development requirements. With Victorian Government funding for another 3 years (2023-26) we are also developing OOHC Health Promotion Guidelines.
3. In partnership with the Queen Elizabeth Centre (QEC), in 2021 Professor Skouteris led the “Our Children, Our Future report” using population growth, and environmental and socio-economic data to identify geographical areas of demand in the coming decades, to 2050. IMPACT: This report was a catalyst for further funding by the Victorian State Government to expand and upgrade early parenting centres (EPCs). Skouteris and her team has subsequently been funded by State Government to co-create an EPC Outcomes Framework and then to implement and scale up the framework across all EPCs in Victoria (current work). The State Government has also committed funding to First Peoples’ Health and Wellbeing (FPHW) to establish the first Aboriginal led EPC.
Examples of equity and diversity: Professor Skouteris’ resolute commitment to equity and diversity reaches beyond her research programs. For example, Professor Skouteris has mentored and supported the establishment of the Australian Anti-Racism in Perinatal Practice Alliance, the Growing Queer Families Alliance, the Body Positive Birth Alliance, the National Preconception Health Network, the CRE Consumer Advisory Group, and the Health in Preconception, Pregnancy, and Postpartum Early and Mid-career Researcher Collective International, with a shared vision of improving health outcomes during the reproductive years in non-stigmatising and equitable ways for all people. Her work bringing the psychology and sociology of maternal and childhood obesity to international prominence has prompted global paradigm shifts to: (1) recognising mental and psychosocial health research priorities for maternal obesity prevention; (2) understanding the importance of nurturing care to promote childhood growth and development; and (3) reframing the prevention narrative to move the field away from individual blame that is associated with stigma and discrimination. In 2023, the Growing Queer Families Alliance was instrumental in coordinating a special issue for the journal Midwifery (Professor Skouteris was an editor of this special edition). The special issue, titled Caring for LGBTIQ+ families, explored research, policy, practice that contributes to LGBTIQA+ experiences of health/wellbeing across preconception, pregnancy, and the postpartum.
Supervision and mentoring: Professor Skouteris is a very active mentor who prioritises working with, and building the research capacity of, other researchers. Developing the leadership skills of collaborators is a particular interest of hers, especially female early and mid-career researchers, and practitioners. She has supervised 39 PhD students to completion, and she is also an accredited coach with the Institute of Executive Coaching and Leadership. Outside of her own HSCU research team, Professor Skouteris currently mentors 6 postdocs/senior academics across the Faculty of Medicine, Monash, who have approached her personally for mentorship. She has mentored non-academic colleagues to publish their expertise and knowledge. These include primary school teachers (Russell, Colcott), two Aboriginal women (Hunter and Whettam) and a comedian/physiotherapist (Miller). Professor Skouteris is also mentoring early career researchers in Ireland (Matvienko-Sikar) and England (Schoenaker), leading to a 2023 Irish HRB EIA Fellowship, and a 2022 UK MRC Career Development Fellowship. Finally, in 2019 Professor Skouteris helped establish, and she is now the principal mentor of, the National Health in Preconception, Pregnant and Postpartum Early and Mid-Career Researcher Collective that currently has >200 members, with an established governance structure, clear strategic vision, sub-committees, and an annual international research conference. Under her mentorship, the Collective is expanding internationally in the UK and USA and has recently established a PhD postgraduate group.
Editorial position: Professor Skouteris is the Editor-in-Chief, Health and Social Care in the
Community.
Helen Skouteris
Professor, Monash University, Australia
Stephanos Vassilopoulos
Professor, University of Patras, Greece
Stephanos P. Vassilopoulos graduated from the Department of Education, University of Patras and the Department of Psychology, University of Athens, Greece. He obtained an MSc in Developmental Psychology at the University of Sussex and completed his PhD in Psychology at the Department of Psychology, Royal Holloway University of London. He is currently appointed as a full-time professor of Mental Health Counseling at the Department of Educational Sciences and Social Work, University of Patras. He has published more than 100 scientific papers, mainly in prestigious international journals as well as co-authored, edited and translated eight books in counselling and group counseling. He is director of the Relational Dynamics Counseling Lab and Head of postgraduate studies in Children Mental Health, both at the University of Patras, Greece. His main research activities include the investigation of cognitive processes in anxiety and aggression, as well as the development and implementation of psycho-educational group programs for children and adolescents with various socioemotional difficulties or mental health problems.
Stephanos Vassilopoulos
Professor, University of Patras, Greece
Kimberly Schonert-Reichl
Professor, University of Illinois Chicago, USA
Dr. Kimberly A. Schonert-Reichl is the NoVo Foundation Endowed Chair in Social and Emotional Learning and Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She received her MA in Educational Psychology from the University of Chicago, her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Iowa and completed her postdoctoral work as a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Fellow in the Clinical Research Training Program in Adolescence at the University of Chicago and the Department of Psychiatry at Northwestern University Medical School. Prior to her graduate work, Kim worked as middle school teacher and then as a teacher at an alternative high school for adolescents identified as at risk for high school completion.
Known as a world renowned expert in the area of social and emotional learning (SEL), Dr. Schonert-Reichl’s research focuses on identification of the processes that foster positive human qualities such as empathy, compassion, altruism, and resiliency in children and adolescents. Her projects in this area include studies examining the effectiveness of classroom-based universal SEL programs including such programs as the Roots of Empathy, MindUp, and the Kindness in the Classroom Curriculum. Her work also includes a focus on SEL and teachers – and she has authored several articles on teachers’ well-being and the integration of SEL into teacher preparation programs. Some of her other projects include collaborations with neuroscientists and psychobiologists examining biological processes, including stress physiology and social epigenetics, to children’s social and emotional development in school settings. Dr. Schonert-Reichl’s work also includes a focus on SEL assessment. For example, over the last decade she has led the development and implementation of the Middle Years Development Instrument, or MDI, a measure that captures children’s voices regarding their social and emotional well-being, physical health, and resiliency inside and outside of school. The MDI has been administered to over 300,000 children worldwide, and has been translated into Italian, French, German, Hebrew, and Spanish.
Dr. Schonert-Reichl is the recipient of several awards, including the 2021 Janusz Korczak Medal for Children’s Rights Advocacy, the 2019 Postsecondary Leader of the Year Award - Canadian Edtec, the 2015 Joseph E. Zins Distinguished Scholar Award for outstanding SEL research, and the 2009 Confederation of University Faculty Associations BC's Paz Buttedahl Career Achievement Award in recognition of sustained outstanding contributions to the community beyond the academy through research over the major portion of a career. Kim has over 175 publications in scholarly journals, book chapters, and reports, has edited two books on mindfulness in education, and has a co-edited book (with Sara Rimm-Kaufman & Michael Strambler) titled “SEL in Action” published by Guilford in April, 2023.
Dr. Schonert-Reichl has over 170 publications in scholarly journals, book chapters, and reports, and has edited two books on mindfulness in education, including a co-edited book (with Dr. Robert W. Roeser) published by Springer Press in 2016 titled “Handbook of Mindfulness in Education: Integrating Theory and Research Into Practice.” She has presented her research at over 300 scholarly conferences and has given over 400 presentations on the topic of children’s social and emotional development and social emotional learning to lay audiences, including parents, community organizations, educators, and policy makers. Dr. Schonert-Reichl’s research has been highlighted in several magazines and newspapers across Canada, the US, and internationally, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Le Monde, The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, Scientific American Mind, Neurology Now, The Huffington Post, The Telegraph, The Atlantic, The Daily Mail, and the The Los Angeles Times.
Dr. Schonert-Reichl is a Board Member of the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), a Steering Committee Member for Karanga: The Global Alliance for SEL and Life Skills, the Chair of the Scientific Research Advisory Committee for the Goldie Hawn Foundation, and an advisor to UNESCO’s Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development (MGIEP) on SEL. She served as an advisor to the British Columbia (BC) Ministry of Education on the development and implementation of the redesign of the Curriculum and Assessment Framework that focuses on the promotion of students’ personal and social competencies (SEL) and was an Expert Advisor to the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development’s (OECD) Education 2030 initiative.
Kimberly Schonert-Reichl
Professor, University of Illinois Chicago, USA
