Contributor Bios

Project BRAIN wishes to acknowledge the following people for their valuable contributions to this project.

Patricia F. Allen, MS, CCC-SLP, is the Director of the Pi Beta Phi Rehabilitation Institute at Vanderbilt Bill Wilkerson Center and also holds the rank of Assistant Professor at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine. Ms. Allen has over 20 years of experience working with children and adults as a speech language pathologist in medical rehabilitative settings and in schools. She currently provides administrative and clinical leadership for an interdisciplinary team of therapists working with individuals with acquired brain injuries in community, work and school settings. Ms. Allen also teaches graduate level courses in Traumatic Brain Injury and Pediatric Acquired Brain Injury and is active in statewide advocacy and educational efforts on behalf of individuals with brain injury and their families. From 1994 through 2000, Ms. Allen served on the Tennessee Statewide Traumatic Brain Injury Advisory Board, appointed by the Governor. She is a frequent speaker at local and national conferences, particularly on the topic of mild traumatic brain injury.

Timothy J. Feeney, Ph.D., is the Director of the Wildwood Institute, a not-for-profit organization founded to assist schools in the development of collaborative and cost-effective services. Prior to taking over the Directorship of the Institute, Dr. Feeney was Professor of Special Education at the Sage Colleges in Troy, New York. In addition, he has worked as a consulting psychologist in public schools, the Director of Educational Services for a specialized school, and as a Special Education Teacher. He has extensive experience in collaborative program development for students with disabilities in numerous school districts across North America. Dr. Feeney has also directed a number of educational and rehabilitation programs in the private and public sectors and has coordinated publicly funded grant programs in excess of $2,500,000. He has published over 30 journal articles, book chapters, and a book on the topic of collaborative supports for individuals with disabilities.

Beth Urbanczyk, MSCCC, has worked with children and young adults with Acquired Brain Injury for the past 15 years. She is currently serving as a consultant for students with Traumatic Brain Injury in the Nashville Metro School District. Ms. Urbanczyk served as an Adjunct Instructor and Clinical Supervisor for an OSEP funded Pediatric Traumatic Brain Injury Grant in the Speech and Hearing Department of Vanderbilt University from 1998- 2002. She has also served as the Speech Pathologist for the State of Tennessee’s Traumatic Brain Injury Program in Smyrna, Tennessee. She has served as Clinical Discipline Coordinator for Speech/language and School Entry and Re-Entry services in New York and Wisconsin. Ms. Urbanczyk has co-authored several book chapters and journal articles regarding language-based behavioral interventions for children with Acquired Brain Injury, educational programming for children following an Acquired Brain Injury and assessment of Speech/language disorders following an Acquired Brain Injury. Ms. Urbanczyk has served as a consultant to Project BRAIN in the State of Tennessee and is the co-developer of “Brain Injury 101” utilized in team trainings under this project.

Mark Ylvisaker, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Communication Disorders, College of Saint Rose, Albany, New York. Dr. Ylvisaker has over 25 years of clinical and program development experience with children and adults with TBI in rehabilitation and special education settings. He has over 100 publications that address the cognitive, communication, and behavioral dimensions of intervention for individuals with brain injury. His six books on the subject include the recently published "Traumatic Brain Injury Rehabilitation: Children and Adolescents", and "Collaborative Brain Injury Intervention: Positive Everyday Routines" (with Tim Feeney). Dr Ylvisaker is on the editorial board of five scientific journals and serves as a consultant to hospital, school, and community-based programs in 11 countries on five continents.