Involvement 2021 Speaker

Cheryl Sharp, MSW, ALWS (she/her)

Cheryl S. Sharp, MSW, ALWF is CEO of Sharp Change Consulting, Inc. Prior to creating Sharp Change she created and led the National Council for Behavioral Health’s Trauma-Informed Care initiatives as Senior Advisor as well as Advisor for Suicide Prevention efforts.

Mercedes Avila, PhD (she/her)

Dr. Maria Mercedes Avila holds an appointment as an Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics in the Larner College of Medicine at the University of Vermont. She is the Director of the Vermont Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities (VT LEND) Program, an interprofessional maternal and child health leadership training program.

Stan Collins, NREMT (he/his)

Stan Collins has worked in the field of suicide prevention for over 20 years since losing a friend to suicide in high school. Currently he is working as a consultant, focusing on technical assistance in creation and implementation of suicide prevention curricula and strategies.

Mark Gebo, M.Ed. (he/him)

Mark Gebo is a School Counselor with the Bellows Falls Union High School and a Crisis Intervention Specialist (QMHP) with Health Care and Rehabilitation Services.

Amelia Franck Meyer, Ed.D, LISW (she/her)

Dr. Amelia Franck Meyer is the founder and CEO of the national non-profit, Alia: Innovations for people and systems impacted by childhood trauma. Amelia and Team Alia are leading a national movement to keep children safe with, not from, their families.

Shelby Rowe, MBA (she/her)

Shelby Rowe is the program manager for the Suicide Prevention Resource Center, an award-winning artist, mother of three sons and suicide attempt survivor. She is the recipient of the 2021 American Association of Suicidology Transforming Lived Experience Award and the 2016 Chickasaw Nation Dynamic Woman of the Year.

Caroline Mazel-Carlton, C.P.S. (she/her)

Caroline Mazel-Carlton is a suicide attempt survivor who, since moving out of a North Carolina psychiatric group home in 2009, has worked tirelessly to create change in the mental health system and has developed and re-defined peer roles in a number of settings in the public and private sector.

Sanchit Maruti, MD, MS (He/Him)

Dr. Maruti is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, University of Vermont College of Medicine. He is an Attending Inpatient Psychiatrist and is the Medical Director of the Inpatient Psychiatry Service and the Addiction Treatment Program at the University of Vermont Medical Center.

David Rettew, MD (he/him)

David Rettew, MD is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the University of Vermont Larner College of Medicine. He also is the Medical Director of the Child, Adolescent and Family Division of the Vermont Department of Mental Health. Dr. Rettew has over 100 published journal articles, chapters, and scientific abstracts on a variety of child mental health topics, including a 2013 book entitled Child Temperament: New Thinking About the Boundary Between Traits and Illness. He also writes a blog for Psychology Today called, “The ABCs of Child Psychiatry” that has been viewed over a million times.

Victor Armstrong, MSW (he/him)

Victor Armstrong serves as Director of the NC Division of Mental Health, Developmental Disabilities, Substance Abuse Services, with responsibility and oversight of the public community-based mental health, intellectual and other developmental disabilities, substance use, and traumatic brain injury system in North Carolina.

Alison Krompf, MA (she/her)

Alison received her BA in Psychology from Colgate University, a Master’s in Clinical Psychology from Pepperdine University and is currently pursuing her PhD in Organizational Leadership and Policy Studies at the University of Vermont.
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