The Help Group is privileged to welcome Drs. Lynn & Robert Koegel, Dr. Stephen Hinshaw and Dr. Wendy Stone as keynote speakers for its 2015 Summit: Advances and Best Practices in Autism, Learning Disabilities and ADHD.  These internationally acclaimed presenters are at the forefront of their fields and offer a wealth of experience and expertise in research and clinical practice to share with attendees at this year’s Summit, which will be held Friday, October 23^rd and Saturday, October 24^th at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles.

Dr. Wendy Stone will deliver the opening keynote on Friday morning. Dr. Stone has been at the forefront of early identification and treatment of autism for more than twenty years. She is Professor of Psychology and Founder and Director of the READi Lab at the University of Washington. The READi Lab, which stands for Research in Early Autism Detection and Intervention, conducts research, training, and outreach activities related to early detection and intervention for children with autism.  Dr. Stone’s primary research interests are in early identification and intervention in autism, understanding the influence of early social-communicative development on later behavioral and diagnostic outcomes, and improving community health care practices for toddlers with autism through early screening and evidence-based interventions.

Dr. Stone will present her keynote address on “Identifying and Treating Toddlers with ASD: Is it time for a Paradigm Shift?” This presentation will describe the early behavioral features of autism, the limitations of our current service delivery model, and an alternative model for expediting access to early and specialized services for toddlers with autism. Additionally on Saturday morning, Oct. 24, she will be presenting “Engaging Children with ASD in Everyday Family Routines: Strategies for Parents of Young Children.”

Dr. Stephen Hinshaw will deliver the 2^nd Keynote Friday morning. Dr. Hinshaw investigates the earliest signs and progression of childhood psychiatric disorders, particularly attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).  He has authored, ADHD Explosion: Myths, Medication, Money, and Today’s Push for Performance,The Triple Bind: Saving Our Teenage Girls from Today’s Pressures, The Mark of Shame: Stigma of Mental Illness and an Agenda for Change, and The Years of Silence Are Past: My Father’s Life with Bipolar Disorder. A significant public voice, he has been interviewed by Time magazine, USA Today, The New York Times, The Washington Post, among other publications, and has appeared on The Today Show and Good Morning America.

Dr. Hinshaw’s Keynote, “ADHD: An Overview of What You Need to Know” will include the core issues–ranging from definitions, causes, underlying models, lifespan development, sex differences, basic treatments, and key reasons for the explosion of diagnoses in recent years–that make ADHD so compelling and controversial.  The material emanates from his fall, 2015 book, with Katherine Ellison: “ADHD: What Everyone Needs to Know” (Oxford University Press). This will be the west coast launch of his new book and will include a book signing that day.

To cap off a full day of presentations are Dr. Lynn Koegel and Dr. Robert Koegel with the Keynote, “Motivating Children with Autism to Engage in Social Communication and Academics Using Pivotal Response Treatment”.  The presentation will include procedures for improving the pivotal response of motivation in children with autism; recent preliminary research findings related to the importance of child-initiations for producing favorable intervention outcomes; and a method for improving school-home coordination will be described.

Lynn Kern Koegel, PhD, is the Clinical Director of the Koegel Autism Center at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She has been active in the development of programs to improve communication in children with autism, including the development of first words, development of grammatical structures, and pragmatics.  Dr. Koegel is co-author and co-editor of major textbooks on autism and positive behavioral support and is co-author of the bestselling book Overcoming Autism: Finding the Answers, Strategies, and Hope That Can Transform a Child’s Life (Penguin, 2004). In addition to her published books and articles in the area of communication and language development, she has developed and published procedures and field manuals in the area of self-management and functional analysis that are used in school districts throughout the United States and have been translated in most major languages used throughout the world.

Robert Koegel, PhD, is an international authority in the area of autism, specializing in language intervention, family support, and school integration.  He has published well over two hundred articles and papers relating to the treatment of autism.  He also has authored 6  books on the treatment of autism and positive behavioral support.  He has been the recipient of numerous multimillion dollar research and training grants from the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. Department of Education, and the National Institute of Mental Health. Models of his procedures have been used in public schools and in parent education programs throughout California, the United States, and other countries. Dr. Robert Koegel is presently the Director of the Koegel Autism Center at the University of California at Santa Barbara, where he is also a Professor of Clinical Psychology and a Professor of Special Education.  He has trained many health care and special education leaders in the United States.

For more information, the complete schedule and to register online, please click Here