TRAINER BIOS

Current Child Welfare Landscape: National and Federal Priorities, Requirements, and Trends

Alicia Groh, independent consultant and national child welfare policy and program expert

MPP, Executive MSc in Change Leadership, is an independent consultant based in Minnesota and working across the United States, with more than 24 years of experience in the child welfare field. 

She has worked for 15 years as an independent consultant partnering with states, counties, tribes, non-profit organizations, foundations, and federal agencies to help them refine their vision, strengthen their work, and achieve improved outcomes. She has extensive knowledge of foster, adoptive, and kinship family recruitment, development, and support; diligent recruitment planning and program design; child welfare laws, policies, and funding streams as well as experience leading organizations and strategic change efforts. She brings a passion for permanency and well-being for children and youth to all of her work. As an independent consultant, she has assisted organizations with many areas including: leadership development, system change and change leadership, program design, capacity building, strategic planning, peer-to-peer connections, and executive coaching. She works with several projects and centers assisting child welfare systems with effective diligent recruitment, adoption and family support efforts, data-driven work, customer service in child welfare, and other areas to improve outcomes for children and families.

Prior to becoming an independent consultant, Alicia was the executive director of Voice for Adoption, a national advocacy organization that speaks out on behalf of waiting children and adoptive families. She has also worked as a child welfare policy analyst at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Children’s Bureau, developing policy guidance for States on federal child welfare programs. 

 Jill May, WACF Executive Director

Jill May, M.S.W., is the Executive Director of the Washington Association for Children & Families (WACF). Through collaborative advocacy efforts, WACF supports critical services for families so they can lead healthy, happy lives.

As WACF’s Executive Director since 2018, Jill is responsible for leadership, strategic planning, fundraising, Executive Board relations, and partner and community relations. Among multiple key responsibilities, she provides statewide child welfare private agency advocacy and leadership,  including year-round, full-time state budget and policy advocacy and lobbying. Jill works for the consistent achievement of WACF's mission, advocacy agenda, and membership growth goals, and is an active, knowledgeable, and visible champion for WACF's members, and thereby, for Washington's children and families. 

Before joining WACF, Jill was the Director of the National Resource Center for Diligent Recruitment at AdoptUSKids. Prior to that role, she served as New Mexico’s Foster Care and Adoption Bureau Chief. She has extensive experience with foster care and adoption, comprehensive diligent recruitment, collaboration, using implementation science to create and sustain system change, and implementing a customer service approach to child welfare.

Jill has deep expertise in engaging stakeholders to improve systems and developing practice models to lead change within a child welfare system. She is a passionate leader of systems change who aims to improve outcomes for children and families.