Partners

Nikki Montgomery, MA, MEd, GPAC is the Director of Strategy and Communications at Family Voices and the Project Director for the ACL Health Care Transition Project.

Nikki’s passion for empowering youth and families spans the last two decades, during which she has been a K-12 educator, a healthcare communications director, a patient advocate, and the parent of a teenaged son with a rare, complex genetic condition and autism. In addition to a graduate certificate in Patient Advocacy, for which her research was focused on increasing the capacity of parents of medically fragile children, Nikki has a master’s degrees in English and in Educational Psychology, with thesis research on critical thinking and health literacy for parents of children with special health care needs.

Nikki is the author of the Super Safe Kids pediatric patient safety curriculum and currently serves on the Global Patient & Family Advisory Board for The Beryl Institute, among many other health advocacy roles. She has served on the Editorial Board for Pediatrics® journal as well as the Board of Directors and safety committee for Rainbow Babies & Children’s hospital, where she also led the Patient and Family Partnership Council.

Throughout her career she has had the privilege of advocating alongside, and for, people with disabilities and their families. Sheli has served on the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities and as the co-director of the National Community of Practice for Supporting Families of Individuals with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities. She has her Masters in Occupational Therapy from Rockhurst University and earned her doctorate in Public Administration and Sociology from the University of Missouri, Kansas City with a focus on family support research and policy for families of individuals with disabilities across the lifespan.

Jane St. John manages Charting the LifeCourse fidelity and provides content and product development for the LifeCourse Nexus team at the UMKC-Institute for Human Development, UCEDD. She specializes in supporting families, supported decision making, and family leadership and training. Jane was instrumental in the development of the Charting the LifeCourse framework, products, and training. Additionally, she currently serves on the Missouri Guardianship Statutory Reform Task Force, Mo-WINGS, and leads the Missouri Consortium for Supported Decision Making. Jane earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology from Rockhurst University.

Jane is the parent of three young men. Her son Ben, who is in his thirties, has an intellectual and developmental disability, and is supported to make his own choices and decisions in his good life. Jane is a strong supporter of community inclusion, working closely in her community to promote inclusive practices.

Since 2013, with Dr. White, she has guided national, DC, and other state transition efforts focused on building the evidence base, ensuring youth and family engagement, implementing evidence-informed transition improvements, improving payment options and managed care provisions, and operating a national transition clearinghouse. She has published extensively on transition as well as on financing and coverage issues affecting children and adolescents. Ms. McManus received her Master’s in Health Sciences from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

In her role at Got Transition, Dr. White leads a large group of integrated care systems in transition quality improvements and provides training and technical assistance to clinicians interested in incorporating the Six Core Elements of Health Care Transition into various systems of care, including primary and specialty care, behavioral health, school health, and care coordination. She previously led the Adolescent Employment Readiness Center at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, DC. Dr. White received her medical degree from Harvard Medical School before completing a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellowship and a Master’s in Education from George Washington University Graduate School of Education and Human Development.

With over 15 years of administrative experience, Ms. Shorr recently worked with the Ohio Innocence Project in Cincinnati as the Administrative Director. She received a Master’s of Science degree from Northern Arizona University in Criminology and Criminal Justice and a Bachelors of Sciences degree from Indiana University in Applied Health Sciences.

Dr. Josie Badger received her Bachelor’s degree from Geneva College in Disability Law and Advocacy, a Master’s from the University of Pittsburgh in Rehabilitation Counseling, and a Doctorate from Duquesne University in Healthcare Ethics. In 2012, she was crowned Ms. Wheelchair America. In 2014, Josie founded J Badger Consulting Inc. where she provides youth development and disability consulting services for organizations, on transition and leadership development.

She works with SPAN Parent Advocacy Network, supporting RAISE and the National Healthcare Transition Center for Youth with ID/DD. She is the Campaign Manager of the United Way of Southwestern PA’s #IWantToWork Campaign, to improve the employment of people with disabilities, is the lead Field Organizer for the Family Care Act that supports paid family leave, and is the developer of TRAIL, a statewide advocacy and lobbying training program. She serves as a board member of the United Way of Southwestern Pennsylvania, The Woodlands Foundation, the Mary Grace Hospice Foundation, PA Assistive Technology Foundation, and is the Secretary of FISA and co-chair of the Grants Committee.

Leann Smith Dawalt