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The CalFAS Board of Directors

President
Amber Kesterson,
Amber Kesterson has dedicated herself to do all she can to educate herself, her family and her community.  Her husband Dan and she have been foster parenting in Sutter County for 12 years mainly with medically fragile, special needs infants and toddlers.  The have adopted six children, all with special needs and prenatal alcohol exposure.  She has always loved children and the unique way they can bless a life and in addition to her adoptions she continues to do foster care and enjoys working with birth families.
She is the 0-3 parent representative for Tri-Counties Steering Committee providing services for children with special needs, Board Member of the Sutter Youth Organization and Sutter Buttes Day Chairperson. Active Member, Vice President Elect and Trainer of the Yuba Sutter Foster Adoptive Parent Association.  She has been invited to be a guest speaker for Sierra Adoptions pre-service classes on "Special Need Infants."
The County of Sutter has generously provided for her to attend the NACAC conference the past few years where she has learned a wealth of information. She feels fortunate to have sat in on two SAMHSA, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Town Hall Meetings, listening to testimonies of families and individuals affected by FASD.
Amber reports that, "my greatest teachers are my children who are always amazing me with their disability and how they learn to live with them". Read more about their journey together here: Amber's Journey.

Treasurer

Peggy Combs,

Peggy is the birth mother of Tracy, who was diagnosed at age 2 with FAS.  Peggy has shared her story of overcoming addiction and raising a child with FAS at conferences across the country.  Tracy had the pleasure of being introduced by Senator Dashle at the NOFAS fundraiser in Los Angeles and recently Tracy spoke for her first time in San Francisco at SAMHSA’s “Building FASD State Systems” meeting.

Peggy and Tracy have participated in many Hill Day events educating policy makers at both the State and Federal level.  Their story also is featured in Bonnie Buxton’s “Damaged Angel’s”.  Besides raising her daughter, Peggy is on the steering committee for the FASD Center for Excellence and a member of the “Circle of Hope”, a birthmother network sponsored by NOFAS.

Director
Tyla Sawyer,

Tyla Sawyer is an adoptive parent of two young girls with Alcohol Related Neurodevelopmental Disorder (ARND).  Since their adoption she has done extensive research on FASD and has learned to advocate for her daughters.  She has spoken to youth classes about the dangers of drinking while pregnant and brought FASD training to the very agency where she and her husband fostered and adopted as part of the Model Approach to Partnerships in Parenting (MAPP), a program to train foster parents.  She has participated in Bruin Buddies, a manualized approach to teaching social skills to children with FASD developed at UCLA with the CDC.  This program also teaches parent advocacy.  She has a background in marketing communication, early child education, and helped to develop a foster parent mentor program.  Tyla designs and edits the Los Angeles FASD Taskforce newsletter.  She is also proud of the work her teenager daughter has done in bringing the message of no alcohol while pregnant to her peers.

Director
Barbara G-A Fowler,

Barbara G-A Fowler was a small business owner for 25 years and a foster parent for 10 years before returning to school. In spring of 2007 she will be completing her Bachelor of Arts in psychology at California State University, Bakersfield and plans to begin work on her Master’s Degree that fall. Her passion is to educate her world about the cause, prevention, and appropriate diagnosis and treatment of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders and to fight for appropriate education, expectations, and understanding of those who live every day of their life with the central nervous system (CNS) damage (AKA - brain damage) caused by prenatal exposure to alcohol.

Barbara and her husband, Jim, are active members of RiverLakes Church where they were instrumental in the development of a special needs Sunday school class. This unique class, with one-on-one mentors makes it possible for parents and foster parents of special needs children to go to church and to worship knowing that their children are in a safe and appropriate environment.

Barbara is also in the 2006 Leadership Development Training Program of the Kern County Network for Children where she and her team mates, have developed a pilot program called "Generations." Through this project fourth graders are connected with local senior citizens in order to build generational bonds and give the children a sense of history and connection to their community. It is the hope of the team that the interaction will also give purpose to the lives of the seniors and will continue long after our July graduation. The children have written and illustrated the stories shared by the seniors and their work is being published.

The CalFAS Advisory Board of Directors

Founder
Diane Zinsmeyer Kerchner, MS Candidate
Diane Kerchner is an educational therapist, Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration FASD Center for Excellence Field Trainer and special educator.  She is the adoptive mother to Rusty who was prenatally exposed to alcohol.  She currently chairs the newly-formed Los Angeles FASD Task Force and she testified at the Los Angeles FASD Town Hall in 2003.  Raising Rusty has forever redefined the meaning of success, as well as teaching her more about love than she realized she needed to learn.  Read about her and her son in an article in University of California Fullerton's, The Daily Titan, "Child receives second chance."

Teresa Kellerman,

Teresa Kellerman is an experienced presenter who conducts FAS workshops for agencies, families, and providers around the U.S. She is the FAS trainer for the US Department of Justice Drug Courts, Family Courts, and Tribal Drug Court Programs. She also conducts trainings for the Arizona Department of Health. Teresa is the adoptive parent of special needs children, including John, a young adult with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome who sometimes accompanies Teresa as a co-presenter.

Read Teresa's complete bio.

Susan Doctor, Ph.D.

Prior to her September 2002 retirement, Susan Doctor, PhD was an assistant professor at the University of Nevada, Reno in the Center for the Application of Substance Abuse Technologies (CASAT). In that capacity, among many other things, she taught various classes ranging from Alcohol/Drug Prevention, to her specialty, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome (FAS) and Fetal Drug Effects (FDE). Although no longer employed full time by the university, Susan continues to teach one class per semester.

Read Susan's complete bio.

Mary J. O’Connor, Ph.D.

Dr. O’Connor, PhD, ABPP is an Adjunct Professor at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at the UCLA Geffen School of Medicine.  She holds a specialty board certification in Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology and has taught medical students, psychiatry residents, and child psychiatry fellows for over 20 years. The overarching emphasis of Dr. O’Connor’s research career has been the development, evaluation, and dissemination of empirically supported assessment and treatment methods for high-risk children. Her early work focused on the longitudinal outcome of children with premature birth.  Her current work examines psychosocial and psychiatric risk due to prenatal alcohol exposure. Over the past 15 years, Dr. O’Connor has conducted research on the prevention of alcohol consumption in pregnant women, intervention with children with prenatal alcohol exposure, and medical and allied health education on prevention, diagnosis and treatment.   All of her recent work has been on collaborative national initiatives with the long-term goal of developing best practice models to be disseminated on local, state, and national levels.

Tom Wentz, Ph.D./C.D.C.

Tom Wentz earned his Ph.D. in teacher education and child study (Fetal Alcohol Syndrome/Children of Alcoholics) in 1995, from the University of North Dakota. He is an educator, alcohol and drug counselor, FAS consultant, has published and presented his research at the regional and national levels in the areas of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) and adolescent alcohol and other drug use.

Read Tom's complete bio.

Traci Henke,

Traci is a successful small business owner and the birth mother of a teen-aged son with Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. Traci was in the grips of a 20 year long addiction during her pregnancy with her son but soon after his birth began her recovery and now has dedicated herself to advocating for him and for other individuals with FASD. Her special desire is to reach out to other birth mothers and support them in their recovery. Traci writes, "Isaac was born when I was drinking about a quart of whiskey a day. Being a recovered addict/alcoholic and raising a FAS child is extremely difficult. It is by the grace of God that we both survived what I have put us through. We are here and willing to share what knowledge and experience we have with anyone in need." Please read more at  Traci's Journey”