Dr. Wehman is Professor of Physical Medicine with joint appointments in the Departments of Rehabilitation Counseling and also Special Education and Disability Policy at Virginia Commonwealth University. He serves as Chairman of the Division of Rehabilitation Research in the Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. Dr. Wehman has his Ph.D. in Behavioral Disabilities from University of Wisconsin-Madison.
As one of the original founders of supported employment, he has worked closely with business and industry since 1980 and has published over 200 articles and authored or edited more than 40 books primarily in transition, severe disabilities, autism, traumatic brain injury and employment for persons with disabilities. He has been the Principal Investigator on 41 million dollars in grants during his career.
As the father of two young adults with disabilities, he brings a strong parental as well as business perspective to his work. He is highly active in speaking to professionals, parents, advocates and businesses on transition and employment for people with autism, traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury and other developmental disabilities. On a daily basis he works with individuals with disabilities, communicates regularly with professionals in the world of business related to disability and diversity, and is active in teaching and mentoring medical students, residents, and doctoral students in rehabilitation medicine, special education, rehabilitation and psychology. A major focus of Dr. Wehman's work is on expanding the partnerships with businesses of all sizes so that more persons with disabilities can gain entrance into the workplace and retain employment successfully.
He is a recipient of the Kennedy Foundation Award in Mental Retardation in 1990 and President's Committee on Employment for Persons with Disabilities in 1992. Dr. Wehman was recognized as one of the 50 most influential special educators of the millennium by the Remedial and Special Education journal in December, 2000. He is also Editor-in-Chief of The Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation.
Catherine A. Anderson, Ph.D., CRC, received her doctorate in rehabilitation psychology and serves as a researcher and project director in the Department of Rehabilitation Psychology and Special Education at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Dr. Anderson has been actively working in the field of rehabilitation counseling as a practitioner, policy maker, administrator, and researcher for more than 20 years. Her research efforts emphasize the identification, implementation, and study of evidence-based employment practices with transition-age youth and their families.
Judy Averill, M.Ed., serves as a transition training associate at the Virginia Commonwealth University Rehabilitation Research and Training Center, Center on Transition Innovations. Since 1989, she has taught students in K–12 school settings from all disability categories and in various service delivery models. Ms. Averill was a transition specialist for a large school district in Virginia. She provided support, training, and consultation to all middle and high school special education staff on transition compliance, effective transition practices, and self-determination and developed various school-to-work programs for students with significant disabilities. She has served on several state- and district-level committees, which included two terms on the Virginia State Special Education Advisory Committee. Her areas of interest include best practices in transition planning, transition from school to work, service delivery issues, and systems change.
Valerie Brooke, M.Ed., has been a faculty member at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) and has worked in the field of employment for people with significant disabilities for more than 35 years. Ms. Brooke is Project Director of the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Employer Practices, Director of Wehman Training for the VCU's Autism Center of Excellence, and Director for Employment Services, a Commission on Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities–accredited program serving individuals from the state vocational rehabilitation program. Ms. Brooke completed an 18-month appointment to the Advisory Committee on Increasing Competitive Integrated Employment for Individuals with Disabilities by the U.S. Secretary of Labor as a provision of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), and she has served on the editorial board for the Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation since 2000.
DiAnne B. Davidsen, Ph.D., began teaching students with disabilities in 1970, and during her career, she has been a classroom teacher, a transition specialist, Director of Special Education, and an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University. Her areas of interest are in preparing individuals with disabilities for success at the postsecondary college and careers level and in working with individuals from diverse populations.
Elizabeth Evans Getzel, Ph.D., is Director of Postsecondary Education Initiatives with the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Workplace Supports at Virginia Commonwealth University. She has extensive experience conducting research, evaluation, and training in the areas of transition planning for secondary students with disabilities, postsecondary education for students with disabilities, and career planning/employment for individuals with disabilities. She currently directs approximately $3 million of grant-funded projects focusing on supported education in postsecondary education, career development for college students with disabilities, faculty professional development focusing on universal design principles, and secondary education transition services. Her research interests include secondary education transition planning, self-determination skills of college students with disabilites, and effective services and supports for college students with disabilities. Ms. Getzel serves as Associate Editor for the Journal of Postsecondary Education and Disabilityand is on the editorial boards for the Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation and The Journal for Vocational Special Needs Education She has authored or co-authored journal articles and book chapters on transition, career development, postsecondary education, and employment. In addition, Ms. Getzel has presented extensively at state, national, and international conferences and at meetings on her projects and research areas.
Ellie C. Hartman, Ph.D., BCBA-D, received her doctorate in educational psychology–special education from the University of Minnesota and currently serves as Senior Scientist at the University of Wisconsin Stout–Vocational Rehabilitation Institute. Through a contract with Wisconsin's Division of Vocational Rehabilitation at the Department of Workforce Development, Dr. Hartman currently serves as Project Manager for Wisconsin PROMISE (https://promisewi.com), a federal research demonstration grant aimed at improving the education, employment, and financial self- sufficiency of teenagers receiving Supplemental Security Income and their families. Dr. Hartman has been actively working in the fields of special education and employment for people with disabilities as a behavior analyst, evaluator, and administrator for more than 15 years. Her research efforts emphasize the importance of inclusion, empowerment, employment, translating research into practice, improving practice through formative evaluation, and improving policy based on evidence.
Jennifer Todd McDonough, M.S., CRC, has more than 22 years of experience in the field of vocational rehabilitation. She serves as Associate Director of Training at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU)'s Rehabilitation Research and Training Center, where she creates unique personnel training programs and provides technical assistance for employment issues for individuals with disabilities across a variety of target audiences. Ms. McDonough is also Project Director of National School 2 Work Autism Research Disability and Rehabilitation Research Project, a randomized control trial study and serves as the Virginia Project SEARCH Statewide Coordinator. In her career with VCU, Ms. McDonough has been an active researcher and practitioner as well as a frequent contributor to the literature, and she is known for her ability to assist people with intellectual or developmental disabilities in securing competitive integrated employment.
Richard Parent-Johnson, Ph.D., retired as a senior research associate in the Center for Disabilities in the Sanford School of Medicine, Vermillion, South Dakota. Prior to his position at Sanford, he was a senior research associate in the Center for Research on Learning at the University of Kansas and there held a courtesy appointment in the Department of Special Education. His doctorate is in sociology from the University of Kansas. Dr. Parent-Johnson has been the principal investigator (PI) , co-PI, or project coordinator on multiple state and federal grants. His most recent work has focused on health care transitions for youth/young adults with disabilities as it relates to interprofessional medical education and clinical practice. He codesigned and then led the University of South Dakota’s Center for Disabilities Transition InAction Clinic. He continues to do consulting work in these areas. Dr. Parent-Johnson’s earlier work focused primarily on the iterative design, development, and dissemination of universal curricular products and processes that serve the individualized transition needs of persons with mild to moderate disabilities (e.g., the Soaring to New Heights curriculum and lesson materials for high-school-age students with disabilities and/or special health care needs( . He also taught and served as the learning specialist at Seattle University. Dr. Parent-Johnson is knowledgeable in mixed methods research methodologies with particular expertise in ethnographic research and qualitative analysis.
Wendy Parent-Johnson Ph.D., is Research Associate Professor and Assistant Director, Kansas University Center on Developmental Disabilities, a Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities at The University of Kansas. She has more than 25 years of experience in the areas of supported and customized employment and transition from school to work for individuals with severe disabilities.
Dr. Parent has published numerous book chapters and peer-reviewed journal articles related to transition and supported/customized employment and has coauthored several books on supported employment. In her efforts to build systems capacity and enhance employment and self-employment outcomes, she provides training and technical assistance to teachers, transition coordinators, families, rehabilitation counselors, job coaches, and individuals with disabilities. She is currently the president of the Kansas Rehabilitation Association and Kansas Association for Persons on Supported Employment (APSE): The Network on Employment and serves on the national Boards of the APSE Foundation and the National Rehabilitation Association. She serves on the editorial board of two journals: Focus on Autism and Other Developmental Disabilities and the Journal of Rehabilitation. Her areas of interest and research are supported/customized employment and transition from school to work for individuals with severe disabilities, with an emphasis on creative funding and support strategies, individual and family involvement, job-coach training and leadership, interagency collaboration and service delivery issues, and systems change.
Cyndi Pitonyak, M.S., has more than 40 years of experience as a special educator; as a teacher at the elementary, secondary, and postsecondary levels; and as an administrator at building and district levels. She provides training and technical assistance to school divisions nationally and internationally. Her special areas of interest are inclusive practices for students with significant disabilities and positive behavior interventions and supports.
William Grant Revell, Jr., M.S., M.Ed., served as a research associate at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Rehabilitation Research and Training Center. He has extensive experience in the areas of policy analysis and funding related to state and national implementation of community-based employment supports for individuals with significant disabilities. He has served as a project director for a variety of national technical assistance and research projects, including the National Supported Employment Technical Assistance Center. He also worked for 15 years for the Virginia Vocational Rehabilitation Agency as a counselor and as the state-supported employment program supervisor.
Joshua Taylor, M.Ed., is a Training and Technical Assistance Associate for the Virginia Commonwealth University Autism Center for Excellence and a Research Associate for the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center. He develops training, provides technical support, and conducts research into best practices for promoting lifelong success for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities in school, work, and community settings. Mr. Taylor has more than 10 years of experience in public schools. His research interests include autism spectrum disorder, transition to adulthood, inclusive education, employment, postsecondary education, community integration, universal design for learning, learning sciences, and disability policy.
Holly N. Whittenburg, M.A. Ed., M.Ed., works as Research Site Coordinator at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU)'s Rehabilitation Research and Training Center. She is also a doctoral student at VCU's School of Education. Her research interests include transition policy and social skills interventions for young adults with autism spectrum disorder. Ms. Whittenburg has also worked as an employment specialist, a special education teacher, and a special education administrator.
