Meet our speakers for April 15

Heather Kestian is a senior attorney at the Capacity Building Center for Courts in the ABA Center on Children and the Law where she works with state Court Improvement Project directors in ACF regions one, five, and seven. She co-leads the All CIP Constituency Group and the New CIP Directors Constituency Group at the Capacity Building Center for Courts. She also works in partnership Casey Family Programs to host a community of practice for attorneys who represent child welfare agencies. Prior to joining the ABA, she spent 13 years at the Indiana Department of Child Services in a variety of roles: a local office attorney, local office director, and as a deputy director overseeing the agency’s quality improvement efforts, managing oversight of federal compliance requirements and safe systems work, and supporting child welfare research efforts. She received her bachelor's degree in journalism from Indiana University, master's degree in education from Arizona State University, and law degree, cum laude, from the University of Toledo. 

Ashley Lang has been employed with the Kansas Department for Children and Families for the last 16 years and currently holds the Assessment and Prevention Program Administrator position for the Northeast Region covering nine counties. She received her undergraduate degree in social work from Washburn University.  Prior to her current role, she spent many years working directly with families connected to the child welfare system. She is currently a representative in the National Child Welfare Workforce Institute's Breakthrough Collaborative, with the goal of promoting workplace well-being.  One of her favorite parts about her role is building relationships with community providers in order to remove barriers a family is experiencing.  

Bret F. Mangan (not pictured) is a western Kansas native. He was born and raised in Tribune, Kansas. He received his bachelor’s degree in finance and business administration from Kansas State University and attended Oklahoma City University School of Law. After graduating cum laude from Oklahoma City University School of Law, he returned to western Kansas as an associate at Moser Law Office and later a partner of Moser & Mangan Law Office. In addition to providing general legal services to private clients throughout the region, he has served as the assistant county attorney for Greeley, Wallace, and Sherman counties from 2015 to 2020. He has held the position of Sherman County attorney since 2021. During his undergraduate and law school career, he completed a number of internships, serving as a student ambassador at Oklahoma City University School of Law; as the Dean’s Summer Pro Bono and Public Interest Law Fellow for the United States Attorney’s Office for the district of Kansas; and in the Governor’s Internship program with the Kansas Department of Health and Environment. 

Chief Judge Kevin Berens serves in the 15th Judicial District presiding over all types of cases.  He is also serves on various Kansas Supreme Court Committees and Ad Hoc Committees, including the Access to Justice Committee.

Ivy Wendt (not pictured) is currently the Reintegration Supervisor for Saint Francis Ministries located in Colby, KS. She is currently the only case manager in the office as well. Wendt started her career in child welfare five years ago at Saint Francis Ministries. Previously, she worked as a case manager in a male correctional facility in Colorado. She received a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Fort Hays State University and is currently working on her social work degree. She really enjoys her job and being able to learn new things every day. Her passion is to help families in need. She grew up in Western Kansas and enjoys living in a rural environment. 

Jacob Hess (not pictured) is a detective at the Colby Police Department. He received his bachelor's degree in criminal justice from FHSU. He has been employed as a sworn law enforcement officer in Northwest Kansas since December of 2011. He has been with Colby PD since 2018 and has been in investigations since August of 2022. A large portion of his caseload consists of investigations of crimes against vulnerable populations.  

Janay Kent is an attorney licensed in Kansas and Arizona and has been in private practice for eight years. Her office primarily handles family law cases. She joined the Shawnee County Child in Need of Care panel in August 2021. Throughout her academic and professional career, she has been fortunate enough to be mentored by some of the most trusted and experienced domestic violence experts in Kansas. Under their guidance, she became certified to administer batterer’s intervention assessments and began facilitating domestic violence intervention groups in the community, at the Topeka Correctional Facility, and the Topeka Juvenile Detention Center. While attending Law School, Janay became Director of Operations at the Family Peace Initiative and simultaneously worked as a victim advocate liaison for the YWCA Center for Safety & Empowerment. She also served on the board of directors at Florence Crittenton for six years, including one term as board president. Her husband, Jordon Davin, has been endlessly supportive of her professional endeavors.

Jennifer Martin Smith graduated from the University of Missouri–Kansas City School of Law in 2002. She practiced employment litigation for about five years in Kansas City, Missouri before relocating to Topeka in 2007. After taking off a year to have a child and generally reconsidering her entire purpose in life, she accepted a contract as a Guardian ad Litem in Shawnee County in 2008. She spent the next ten years as a completely solo practitioner managing a notoriously large CINC docket while expanding into Domestic GAL work as well. It was through her domestic GAL work that she met Alan Alderson and ended up joining the Alderson Law Firm in 2018 as “of counsel.” In 2022, she officially became a partner in the firm. She continues to primarily focus on child welfare litigation, including her role as a GAL in Shawnee County and in highly contested domestic cases, while also handling CINC appeals and general family law cases. She never imagined devoting her entire practice to advocating for children and families but now says it is the hardest job she will never quit. She is a frequent speaker for family law classes at Washburn University School of Law and assists in training new CASA volunteers by explaining the role of the GAL in CINC proceedings.  

Jerilyn Smith (not pictured) is a Licensed Master Social Worker and is employed by KVC. She has been working in the Kansas child welfare system for 19 years holding various leadership positions in foster care case management, adoption, aftercare, and family preservation. Her current role is Permanency Director for Topeka, located in Shawnee County. She serves as a voting board member on the Juvenile Corrections Advisory Board in Shawnee County and is an active participant on the Crossover Youth workgroup for Shawnee County. Jerilyn also teaches social work practice as an Adjunct Instructor at the University of Kansas in the School of Social Welfare.  

Justin A. Barrett was born in Oberlin, Kansas. He was admitted to the bar, 2004, in Kansas. He was also admitted to practice before U.S. District Court, District of Kansas. He received his bachelor's degree in philosophy from Washburn University and his law degree from Washburn University School of Law. He is a Kansas court approved mediator since 2009. He served as County Attorney in Cheyenne County, Kansas for four years. He was also the Assistant County Attorney for Wallace, Thomas, and Logan Counties until 2009. While he has chosen to focus his practice in the area of criminal defense, with the qualifications to accept all levels of felony crimes except capital offenses, he still serves on the local court appointed lists as both a parents’ attorney as well as Guardian ad litem.   

Morgan Hall grew up in southwest Kansas and moved eastward with each new degree. She obtained an Associate of Arts from Butler County Community College in 2003, a Bachelor of Arts in English from Kansas State University in 2005 and obtained her Juris Doctorate from Washburn University School of Law in 2008. While in law school, she interned for a guardian ad litem in Shawnee County, and upon graduating and passing the bar, she took over the guardian ad litem contract, serving in that roll while in private practice until fall 2013 when she went to work for a DCF contractor, establishing and enforcing paternity and support orders. She is now a Senior Deputy District Attorney at the Shawnee County District Attorney’s office, where she has been since December 2017, handling child in need of care cases and appeals, juvenile offender, and care and treatment cases. 

Nicole Harris Meerpohl is an adoptive mother who went to law school with the goal of practicing as a Guardian ad Litem; specifically working with children in foster care. She has been in private practice since 2018. She has been representing children, as their Guardian ad Litem, in Shawnee County, since July 2019. As of October 2023, she also represents parents in the Child in Need of Care court. She has a passion for working with families and the agency, bringing groups together with the goal of assisting families to be successful.  

Tanya Becker is with the Kansas Department for Children and Families as the Northwest Assessment and Prevention Program Administrator covering 32 counties. She received undergraduate degrees from FHSU in both Justice Studies and Psychology and then received her master's degree in social welfare from the University of Kansas. With over 6 years of working with DCF and 15 years working in the human services field, she brings knowledge and expertise on how to better serve children and families.  

Chief Judge Amy Harth has been a district judge in the 6th Judicial District for 20 years, all of which have included a rural CINC docket. She is a member of the Kansas Judicial Council and chairs its Family Law Advisory Committee. She is also a member of the Supreme Court Task Force on Permanency Planning.  
 

Rebecca Gerhardt currently serves as Director of Permanency and Licensing with the Kansas Department for Children and Families. Her career in child welfare has touched many areas of Kansas and areas of practice. She previously served as lead attorney for the Kansas DCF northeast and southeast regions and as a staff attorney in the Kansas City region. She earned her bachelor’s degree in social work from Pittsburg State University, followed by her law degree from Washburn University School of Law. Throughout her career, she has also worked in both the Lyon County and Jackson County attorney’s offices prosecuting CINC and juvenile offender cases. Prior to law school, she was a social worker with both a contracting agency and an investigator for Kansas DCF. 

Lori Ross is the founder, CEO, and president of FosterAdopt Connect. She and her husband, Randy, have been foster-adoptive parents since 1985. Together, they have cared for more than 400 children in foster care and adopted 23, in addition to their five biological children. Lori and Randy are also the proud grandparents of 17 children so far. She began her professional child welfare career working with the Missouri Children’s Division and the Kansas Department for Children and Families as a teaching foster parent more than 30 years ago. She worked with other families to help found FosterAdopt Connect in 1998, initially as a support group and in 2000 as a nonprofit agency. She has served as the organization’s president and CEO since that time. Throughout her career, she has served on a variety of boards and task forces related to foster care and adoption, including serving as the chair of the Missouri Task Force on Children’s Justice. She also worked with the North American Council on Adoptable Children as a consultant in their Community Champions Network, providing child welfare services in Texas, Colorado, and Ohio. She is currently the board chair for Voice for Adoption, a DC-based national child welfare advocacy organization.  

Robert Wyman is an attorney with the Judicial and National Engagement Team of Casey Family Programs. His team works to safely reduce the number of children and youth in the foster care system by advancing lawyer and judicial leadership, Building high quality legal representation, strengthening the front door of the court, and promoting ICWA as the gold standard of child protection practice. He went to the University of Denver to attain a master's degree in social work and a law degree specializing in the representation of children and youth in the foster care system. He worked at The Defender Association in Seattle for 12 years and supervised attorneys representing parents and youth in the dependency division for eight years. He also co-directed the Court Improvement Training Academy, for the Court Improvement Program in Washington state.  

Dr. Pegah Naemi Jimenez, Ph.D., is an associate researcher at the School of Social Welfare. Her research and scholarship focus on cross-system approaches to promote child and family well-being. She applies advanced analytic, data-driven, and critical anti-racist approaches and frameworks to family-organizational and institutional level issues that impact families, in partnership with community organizations to support decision-making in child and family programs. Presently, she serves as principal investigator for three states and federally funded a multi year implementation, process, impact, and outcomes evaluations, including the Missouri Children’s Trust Fund Safe Sleep Initiative, which she examines the safe sleep programs and activities of five different local grantees; Kansas Bravely Raising and Activating Voices for Equity (KS BRAVE), an initiative that centers the experiences of Black and Brown families, youth, and communities to co-create effective solutions to activate racial equity and eradicate systemic racism in child welfares; and THRIVE a promising sexual health intervention for youth involved in foster care and child welfare professionals. She is also an evaluator and researcher on several other multi-year evaluations of federal child and family well-being projects. She practices as a researcher with integrity and a critical perspective, interrogating systems, policies, and procedures that negatively impact children, families, and communities; and developing evidence to inform transformational change.

Shanelle Dupree is the inaugural executive director of the Racial Equity Collaborative, a social service non-profit. As co-founder, she has ushered in statewide conversation, community, and action on eliminating racial disparities in helping systems. The REC serves as a national model for engaging community partners in addressing systemic racial barriers for families of color in helping systems. In 2019, she was appointed by the Kansas governor to serve as a social service administrator where she managed resources and staffing for 450 employees, administered policy implementation, and served as the Chair of the Juvenile Justice Oversight Committee until 2024. As a licensed Kansas attorney since 2008, she practiced law for nearly a decade representing children and adults in child welfare, high conflict family law, and juvenile justice cases. She successfully created and taught a series of legal and social child welfare informational classes for five years. She is the wife of a pastor and elected official, mama of four, author of three books, and bible study teacher at her local church. She enjoys reading, writing, and watching comedies.

​Nina Shaw Woody serves as executive director and therapist at Kansas Family Advisory Network. She is an ordained minister of the gospel, has a master's degree of social work from Newman University and a bachelor’s degree in organizational management and leadership from Friends University. She acknowledges she was "called" to be a social worker just as much as she was called to be a minister of the gospel. She has a love for families and a passion to make a difference, not only to families involved in child welfare but also families who want to bring about positive change to impact their future. She feels it is an honor to serve and represent the families of Kansas. She and her husband, Conway Woody, are proud parents of eight beautiful children and 19 grandchildren. 

Ashely Grippando (Richey) watched her family be torn apart by addiction as a child. She never thought that addiction would become part of her story, but quickly after high school, she began experimenting with substances. It didn’t take long before her life was in shambles and her children had to be placed in care. It took 2 years, but with persistence and dedication, her family was safely reunited. After reunification, she got her RN and now serves as a nurse at Valley Hope of Atchison, an inpatient drug and alcohol treatment center. Her mission is simple, to help others, love people, and to show the world that recovery IS possible.  

Billy Shadden (not pictured) grew up in Fort Scott, Kansas surrounded by a family with deeply rooted substance abuse issues. He was exposed to the criminal lifestyle early, leading him to follow the same path. He spent time in and out of incarceration for many years. In 2012, the police executed a search warrant on his house pertaining to drugs, leading to the removal of his two children. At this time, he began working on the case plan tasks assigned to him and completing treatment, regaining custody in late 2013. Since then, he has continued making strides to turn his life around. After getting his record expunged, he gained employment with DCCCA, a placement agency that works with DCF. He is currently a peer mentor, focusing on helping parents in similar situations as he was in. 

Sean Grippando spent nearly his entire teen and adolescent life in the grips of addiction, He found himself faced with one of the most challenging moments in his life. His children were placed in state care due to substance abuse concerns. After 2 long years, he finally found his way out and took every opportunity he got to show others that recovery is possible. His love for his children proved to be exactly what he needed in order to stop him on his continued path of destruction. He often shares that “he didn’t think his children were ever coming home, he didn’t think he would ever make it out”, but today, he comes before you with a reunited family and 8 years clean. 

Sierra Jones (not pictured) is advocate for all youth in foster care as well as a woman with lived expertise in the field of child welfare. She has the unique privilege of being able to “foster” her biological child for her last two years in care, and she thrived upon reunification. She is also on the board for the Kansas Foster Accountability Advisory Board, a member of the SOUL implementation team that is working to implement a fourth permanency option for youth in care, and she is a member of the planning committee for this year's child welfare summit. She overcame prison, drug addiction, and mental health issues over the course of the last 3 years and is striving to let her story help heal other families. Though she has went through many adversities, she would not change a single piece of her story because it made her into the woman she is today.