MASOC Board of Directors

Ryan T. Shields, Ph.D., is an assistant professor in the School of Criminology and Justice Studies at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. Prior to joining UMass Lowell, he was the Associate Director of the Moore Center for the Prevention of Child Sexual Abuse at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. His research is primarily centered on the intersection of criminology, criminal justice, and public health. He studies child sexual abuse, sexual abuse prevention, and sex crime policy.

Tanya L. Snyder, M.Ed., LMHC is currently a Clinical Supervisor at William James College’s INTERFACE Referral Service. Previously she was a practicing therapist, trainer, supervisor and program developer at The Counseling & Psychotherapy Center, Inc. Since 1997 Tanya has worked with youth, who have acted out sexually, in a variety of settings, including residential treatment, foster care, group homes and outpatient clinics. She began to work with adults who have acted out sexually in 1999 at the Massachusetts Treatment Center for the Sexually Dangerous, as well at local houses of correction and in the community. She has presented at conferences and trainings nationally in regard to the topic of treating those who act out sexually.

Chardā Davis, M.A.,LMHC, is currently a fifth-year clinical psychology doctoral student at William James College. She received her Bachelor of Science and Master of Arts in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Lesley University, where she specialized in clinical work with children and families.

Following her graduate studies, Chardā worked as a licensed mental health counselor and provided clinical services to children and families in various settings. Chardā provided individual and family therapy at Community Healthlink, a community-based mental health clinic. She also provided consultation services to early childhood education centers in central MA. Additionally, Chardā worked as a school-based clinician at the Central MA Collaborative, consisting of several therapeutic public day schools in Worcester, MA, and within Worcester Public Schools.

During her doctoral training, Chardā has expanded her clinical experiences to include a focus on neuropsychological assessment with children, adolescents, and young adults. Chardā also served as the first MASOC BIPOC fellow during the 2020-2021 term year where she helped provide education around the topics of systemic racism and anti-racism to the board, assisted in the update of a MASOC policy paper (Registration & Community Notification: Does Including Adolescents Make Us Safer), and helped to develop the MASOC student fellowship. Chardā began serving on the MASOC Board of Directors in September 2021

Jeff Butts has had a deep and impactful history of policy advocacy and program development. Jeff’s approach is trauma informed and empirically based providing clinical consultant to defense attorneys seeking to understand their clients’ needs and to formulate appropriate defense and treatment strategies. Jeff was the founding Executive Director of the SMART Team a non-profit created to address the needs of young people deeply impacted by juvenile justice and trauma.  Since 1998, Jeff has served on the faculty of several colleges and universities including Simmons College, Boston University, Suffolk University and Springfield College. He has taught undergraduate, graduate and continuing education relevant to juvenile justice policy and clinical practice.  In 2001, Jeff was honored by the Massachusetts Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers to receive the “Greatest Contribution Social Work for a Social Worker with Less than Five Years Post Masters Experience” and in 2015, he was honored by the Social Innovation Forum for his work founding SMART Team.

Joan Tabachnick is nationally recognized for her expertise in sexual violence prevention and social marketing. Over the past 25 years, she has developed award winning educational materials and innovative programs for a wide variety of national, state and local organizations and asked to participate on national expert panels for a variety of organizations including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and the Unitarian Universalist Association. Her recent work includes a National Sexual Violence Resource publication and online course titled “Engaging Bystanders in Sexual Violence Prevention,” a publication through the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers called “A Reasoned Approach: The Reshaping of Sex Offender Policy to Prevent Child Sexual Abuse,” and new program materials for the Enough Abuse Campaign, titled “GateKeepers for Kids” providing simple guidelines for what all youth serving organizations can do to prevent child sexual abuse. Joan is currently on a fellowship focusing on sexual violence prevention with the Department of Justice SMART Office. Visit www.joantabachnick.com for more information.

Meg has spent her entire professional career in the realms of sexual violence prevention and response, including over a decade of work in higher education with students and professionals.

Meg held several prevention and community mobilization roles with the Boston Area Rape Crisis Center (BARCC), where she worked to train the professional and student staff of a large range of Boston-area colleges and universities. Meg also was the Director of Intimate Violence Prevention & Response and Health Education at Williams College. There, she incorporated leading edge research on problem sexual behaviors in late adolescents into curriculum design and student support, situational prevention through environmental design, and restorative and transformative justice practices into prevention and response. She was a founding leader of the Campus Advocacy and Prevention Professionals Association (CAPPA) and has been a regular presenter at numerous national conferences.

Ellen Brower Gately, MA, LMHC has recently retired from the BHN Juvenile Court Clinics serving Hampden, Franklin, Hampshire and Berkshire Counties. She is a Certified Juvenile Court Clinician (CJCC-I) and has had 25 years of experience working with youth and families involved with the Massachusetts Juvenile Courts.

Ms. Brower Gately has been interested in addressing problematic sexual behaviors and the traumatic effects of abuse on adults, children and family systems since she began her career in mental health over thirty years ago.

Before coming to the Juvenile Court Clinic, Ms. Brower Gately worked in community mental health. Her work included treating both victims of abuse and those engaging in abusive behaviors. She developed a program within her agency for youth with sexual behavior problems, ran parenting groups at the local battered women’s shelter and led CBT groups for adult sexual offenders living in the community.

Kevin Creeden, M.A., LMHC is the Director of Assessment and Research at the Whitney Academy in East Freetown, MA. He has over 40 years of clinical experience treating children, adolescents, and their families working extensively with sexually and physically aggressive youth. Over the past 30 years, his primary focus has been on issues of trauma and attachment difficulties, especially regarding the impact of trauma on behavior. Kevin has authored several articles and book chapters on the neuro-developmental impact of trauma on sexual behavior problems and harmful sexual behavior. He was also a contributing writer to the ATSA Adolescent Treatment Guidelines and the ATSA Child and Adolescent Committee’s paper on Children with Sexual Behavior Problems 2nd Edition.

Mr. Creeden has served as the board Chair of MASOC (Massachusetts Society for a World Free of Sexual Harm by Youth), the president of the Massachusetts chapter of the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children (APSAC), a Teaching Fellow at Boston College, an Instructor in Psychology at the Harvard Medical School, and a guest faculty at the Boston University School of Social Work and the Simmons School of Social Work. Mr. Creeden trains and consults nationally and internationally to youth service, community mental health, and forensic service programs.

Damen Kelton is a clinical social worker and licensed educational administrator within Massachusetts. He currently serves as a school and district-based program director and private practitioner. His experience spans over 20 years within residential treatment, education, child protection, and clinical, investigative, and support services.

In addition to serving as a district-level and school based manager, he has accrued an abundance of experience in emergency medical settings and crisis / trauma response. This includes work experience within Boston Public Schools, Central office within Somerville Public Schools, the Massachusetts Trial Court (Probation), the therapeutic residential milieu, and child protective and investigative services for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Specifically, working with many of the forensic practitioners and protective staff members across agencies. He serves as a member of the Boston Amateur Basketball Club (BABC) Board of Directors, the Urban Coaches Association (UCA), and has volunteered for multiple organizations and served many youth throughout Boston, Massachusetts, and beyond. He recently served as adjunct faculty at Simmons University, holds a Master’s degree in Social Work and certificate in Urban Leadership, and has subsequently earned postgraduate / advanced certificates in Creative Leadership from Boston University, Advanced Clinical Practice from Boston College, and an Advanced Forensic Social Work Certificate from the National Organization of Forensic Social Work (NOFSW).

Dr. Rachel King is a restorative justice practitioner with RK Resolution LLC, specializing in issues of harassment and sexual misconduct in higher education. She has extensive experience facilitating restorative justice conferences in community and school-based programs and has held numerous roles in college administration, including Title IX Coordinator and Associate Dean of Students. Rachel provides training to schools around the country on how to take a restorative approach to cases of sexual misconduct, including through the Department of Justice’s Office on Violence Against Women campus grant program and the National Organization for Victim Assistance (NOVA).

Heidi Sue LeBoeuf, LCSW, is a native of Worcester, Massachusetts and has been working in sexual violence movement since 1997.  A graduate of Wheelock College’s MSW program, and a former Adjunct Professor, Heidi Sue has been the Director of Counseling at Pathways for Change, Inc. for 16 years. She is also a Social Work Practice Specialist/Advisor at Boston University’s Worcester program. 

From 2012 until 2017 she was on the City of Worcester’s Advisory Committee on the Status on Women where she was voted chair in 2015 and served until 2017.  In 2014 she received the MOVA Access to Justice Award for her work with supporting survivors of sexual violence in their recovery and well-being, as well as being a key stakeholder in developing a regional 24-hour rape crisis hotline in collaboration with three area Rape Crisis Centers (RCCs) in Massachusetts. 

With strong feminist roots, Heidi Sue brings tremendous compassion, dedication and enthusiasm to her role as a social worker and activist as well as to the local communities she supports and continues to be a strong advocate for survivors across Central Mass.  She has been a friend of the MASOC board since 2017 and became a member and Chair of the Capacity Committee in 2021.

Emily L. Mocerino, LMHC, LSW, CAGS is the owner of a private group practice, New Hope Counseling Center, Inc., providing therapeutic services to children, adolescents and their families with a specialization in problematic sexual behaviors since 2017.

In the early stages of her practice, Emily provided intensive therapeutic services to youth engaging in problematic sexual behavior through the Stetson School. She was a licensed school adjustment counselor for the Worcester Public Schools and the Central Massachusetts Collaborative. Within these settings, Emily worked with elementary and high school students and their families and completed thorough assessments, treatment plans, and behavior plans to help students meet their goals.

Emily continues to expand her practice and seeks to continue her determination to eliminate problematic sexual behaviors. Throughout her career, she has noted several successful clients that have completed treatment and gone on to live healthy lives free from sexual harm.

Rachel Portnoy is a bilingual referral counselor at the Boston-based INTERFACE Referral Service located at William James College.  Through matching callers to outpatient mental health services, Rachel continues her commitment to trauma survivors.  She has also worked as a volunteer hotline counselor at the Boston Area Rape Crisis Center and is on the MASOC board of directors.  Rachel graduated from Brandeis University where worked in the Development, Sex, and Aggression lab under Dr. Raymond Knight, studying longitudinal data on recidivism in youths with problematic sexual behaviors. Her thesis focused specifically on sexual violence on college campuses.

Tom Schiff, Ed.D. is an award-winning practitioner with over four decades of experience as an educator, counselor, trainer, and consultant. He has a particular expertise in working with boys and men on issues of health, leadership development, violence prevention and intervention. His work experiences range from residential treatment with abused boys, psychiatric and substance abuse rehabilitation work, organization development and human relations for schools, businesses, and non-profits, violence and substance abuse prevention for college, high school and junior high school students, college health education, and more. Currently Tom works as a consultant in contexts ranging from small local schools to Fortune 500 corporations. Much of this focus is on issues related to justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion (JEDI). He believes it is critical to work to explore, challenge, and dismantle all systems of privilege in order to create a world free from violence and oppression. He also is co-founder and Executive Director of Phallacies, Inc., a non-profit that provides leadership development, health education, and violence prevention for men and boys via innovative educational theater. Using dialogue and theater, Phallacies aims to expand definitions of masculinity, create healthier men and healthier communities.

Dr. Stephanie Tabashneck is a forensic psychologist and attorney in Boston, MA. She is the 2022 Senior Fellow in Law and Applied Neuroscience at the Center for Law, Brain and Behavior at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Tabashneck serves on the American Psychological Association Ethics Committee. Recent publications include the book Substance Use and Parenting: Best Practices for Family Court Practitioners, an article on the opioid crisis and family drug courts, and a chapter in Representing People with Mental Disabilities: A Practical Guide for Criminal Defense Lawyers.