| Parents Advisory Council |
What is the Parent Advisory Council?FRIENDS has established a Parent Advisory Council to provide useful overall program direction and guidance to the activities of the Resource Center. Committee members share their experience and expertise in child abuse prevention and family strengthening through their active participation in FRIENDS workgroups and the annual Grantee’s meeting, development/review of FRIENDS written materials, and by providing resource center staff with consultation and advice. Members of the team include: Sam Bowman Eliza Cooper has more than 10 years of experience as a parent leader and in parent leadership trainings. Eliza co-founded a chapter of Mocha Moms ( a support group for at-home-moms of color) in Washington DC in 1998 and served on their National Board for three years. She served on the Executive Parent Board of her children's Charter School for three years, where she joined a Parents Anonymous® Group in 2001. Eliza was nominated and accepted on the National Parent Leadership Team(R) of Parents Anonymous® where she became a certified parent leader trainer for over 6 years. For four years Eliza worked as a Parent Education Consultant in Washington, D. C. and a member of the Black Alliance for Educational Options (BAEO) and was one of the founders of a BAEO chapter in that city. She also served on the Board of the National Center On Shared Leadership for one year. Currently, Eliza is locally active with The Family Tree of Maryland and nationally with the FRIENDS National Resource Center as a member of their Parent Advisory Council. She is editor of the quarterly Newsletter Parents & Practitioners. Eliza continues to participate in local and national trainings, workshops and conferences. She is also active with University of Maryland Extension, 4-H Baltimore City as a trainer and as the Lead Volunteer Educator for NW Teen Corps. Jill Gentry is a national parent leader. She has been involved with CBCAP programs in Oregon for over 15 years through Parents Anonymous. Currently, Jill is on the OR State CBCAP Steering Committee for Family Support and Connections. Jill has been working at the National level for over ten years. She served on the Parents Anonymous National Parent Leadership Team, and with other organizations and programs such as Family Support America and Oregon’s Improving Permanency Options Project. Last year Jill was selected to be a member of FRIENDS NRC CBCAP Parent Advisory Council. Jill is the mother of two grown children and has guardianship of her 9 year old niece. She is also a grandmother and able to share all the wisdom she has acquired as a parent leader, not only with other parents and practitioners, but with her children who are now parents as well. Art Hernandez would be proud to be part of the FRIENDS National Advisory Committee. Child Abuse Prevention and Family Strengthening are a passion of his. Art serves on the California Parent Leadership Team and on the National Parent Leadership Team both sponsored by Parents Anonymous. He is also a board member of Prevent Child Abuse Riverside County. The work he does for these organizations is extremely rewarding. Knowing that he is taking an active role as a parent in his community encourages him to engage other parents to do the same. Art has previously presented at the CBCAP grantee’s conference. He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or by phone at (951)303-4311. Dawn Patzer is a married mother of three teenage daughters. She has been involved with mutual self help support groups for thirteen years. Currently, she co-chairs the Parents as Leaders team of Circle of Parents. Dawn helped develop the curriculum and is a trainer of the Parent Leadership Ambassador Training presented by Circle of Parents and sponsored by the FRIENDS National Resource Center. She is employed by the Katy Independent School District as a Special Education Adaptive Behavior Paraprofessional in Katy Texas. |