In addition to our keynote, Dr Joe Piven, join us this morning for opening remarks from Michael Guralnick, ISEI and Megan Purcell, DEC, along with Special Opening Guest - U.S. Department of Education Deputy Assistant Secretary and Acting Assistant Secretary of Office of Special Education Rehabilitation Services (OSERS) - Katherine (Katy) Neas.
Katy began her career on the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Disability Policy where she worked on the original Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). During that time, she partnered with all aspects of the disability community who taught her a lot about education, employment, independence, and integration of people with disabilities into the community. Along with the ADA, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) has guided her work and focus as well.
Joseph Piven, MD received his MD degree from the University of Maryland in 1981 and completed training in general and child and adolescent psychiatry at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. He continued in research training in the genetics of neurobehavioral disorders, during a postdoctoral John Merck Fellowship at Johns Hopkins. He was on the faculty of the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Iowa from 1990 through 1999. Dr. Piven is currently Thomas E. Castelloe Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Director of the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities, a comprehensive institute for services, research and training in neurodevelopmental disorders. Dr. Piven is an active clinician. He is director of one of 15 NICHD-funded Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities Research Centers. He directs an NIH-funded postdoctoral research training program in neurodevelopmental disorders at UNC, has been the Principal Investigator for 15 years of an NIH-funded Autism Center of Excellence Network study of brain development in infants who develop autism -- The Infant Brain Imaging Study or IBIS. He directs the North Carolina University Center of Excellence in Developmental Disabilities, funded by the Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Community Living. He is founding Editor of the Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders. His research is focused on the pathogenesis of autism and related neurodevelopmental disorders.
