Bengt-Erik Andersson

Bengt-Erik Andersson, born in 1935, is professor emeritus in developmental psychology and education at Stockholm Institute of Education. He has done research on all age levels from adults (shop managers) to infants. He has worked together with professor Urie Bronfenbrenner in an international study about the effects on children’s development of various national family support systems. He has written books about teenage cultures, school adjustments, about the necessary to change school (Blow up the school) and the effects of early day care. He has been a member of the National Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences and a member of the Government’s Child and Youth Delegation.

Lilian Corra is a medical doctor with a strong environmental education and militancy. She has a post degree on Pediatrics and Neonatology but with a vast experience on impacts on health of the environmental changes.

 She founded in Argentina the “Asociación Argentina de Médicos por el Medio Ambiente (AAMMA, 1992), linked to the International Society of Doctors for the Environment, ISDE. Since 1996 is member of the Executive Board of ISDE, and last September 2003 she was elected Next President for the period starting on September 2005.

 Is founder and member of the International Coordination Committee of the International Network on Children’s Health, Environment and Safety (INCHES) promoted by WHO and ISDE, launched in 1999.

 On 1997 Dr Lilian Corra was laureated (because of her background and activities on environment) with the Global 500 Environmental Role of Honor of United Nation Environmental Program, UNEP, during the celebration of the 50 Anniversary of UNEP that have taken place in Soul, Korea at the Earth Day,  and is member of the Global 500 Forum of Laureates by UNEP since the it started.

 Dr. Lilian Corra is consultant of WHO on CEH and participates of the WG of Training Materials on CEH coordinated by WHO. She also participated of the WG on Children Chemical Safety of the Secretariat of the Intergovernmental Forum of Chemical Safety (IFCS) for the Forum IV of Bangkok (Nov.2003)   

At  the present Dr Corra is:

* Member of the International Coordination Committee of the International Network on Children’s Health, Environment and Safety (INCHES)

 * Vice-president, president elect and responsible for Latin America of ISDE.

 * Member of the Steering Committee of the International Pop’s Elimination Network (IPEN)

 * Member of the Coordinating Committee of the Healthy Environment for Children Alliance, HECA, of WHO.

 * Coordinates the Champions Group on Children Chemical Safety on behalf of the IFCS President.

Gillian Doherty

Known for her long involvement in early childhood research, Dr. Gillian Doherty is an adjunct professor in the Department of Family Relations and Applied Nutrition at the University of Guelph. She was the Project Director and a Principal Investigator for the You Bet I Care! Project which identified predictors of quality in child care centres and family child care homes and also the Principal Investigator for the Canadian Child Care Federation’s Partners in Quality and its Training for the Delivery of Quality Early Childhood Development, Learning and Care Services projects. Her other work includes examination of various ECCE human resource and training issues. Gillian has written two text books on early childhood education and published many policy and research articles related to early childhood development, programming, and service delivery.

THELMA HARMS

         Thelma Harms is Director of Curriculum Development at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute and Research Professor Emeritus in the School of Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.  She earned an M.A. in Child Development and a Ph.D. in Early Childhood Education at the University of California at Berkeley, where she was Head Teacher of their Harold E. Jones Child Study Center demonstration program for 15 years.  Thelma has lectured and conducted training throughout the U.S., as well as in Canada, Germany, Portugal, Sweden, Hong Kong, South Korea, Singapore, Australia and Russia.

            Dr. Harms is the lead author of four widely used program evaluation instruments: the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale-Revised (Harms, Clifford & Cryer, 1998, 2004); the Infant/Toddler Environment Rating Scale-Revised (Harms, Cryer & Clifford, 2003); the School-Age Care Environment Rating Scale (Harms, Jacobs & White, 1996); and the Family Day Care Rating Scale (Harms & Clifford, 1989 – now being revised). As extensions of this work there are two newly published resource books, All About the ECERS-R and All About the ITERS-R (Cryer, Harms & Riley, 2003 & 2004).

Thelma Harms has co-authored a number of curriculum materials including: the 7-volume Active Learning Series; the Cook and Learn Series; Nutrition Education for Preschoolers; and the 10-part educational television series, “Raising America’s Children.”  She has also co-edited a book on working with homeless preschool children in shelters, and a book on infants and toddlers in out-of-home care.  In addition to consulting and conducting training Dr. Harms continues to be involved at the FPG Institute with several scales related research and development projects.

 Margaret Tresch Owen

Margaret Tresch Owen received her Master’s degree from the University of Kansas in human development and her Ph.D. in developmental psychology from the University of Michigan.  She is a professor of psychology at the University of Texas-Dallas where she has been on the faculty for the last 10 years and heads its professional program in early childhood disorders.  Her research focuses on children’s development in the context of family relationships, implications of early child care experiences for children’s development, and how children’s contexts of development are interrelated.

Since 1989, Dr. Owen has been an investigator in the ongoing National Institute for Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development, a prospective longitudinal study of the effects of early child care on over 1200 children and their families.  She is also involved in evaluating the effects of “relationship-centered child care” for poor children in Dallas, Texas.