Presenters for Pathways to Success

Ellen Condon, M.Ed. is the Transition Projects Director, and the Montana Deaf-Blind Project Director at the University of Montana’s Rural Institute on Disabilities where she has worked since 1996 on Transition and Employment for youth with significant disabilities. She is also a consultant with Marc Gold & Associates (MG&A) and works part time for the National Center on Deaf-Blindness. Ellen has worked in the field of Developmental Disabilities since 1986. Prior to coming to Montana her experiences included hands-on service delivery, program development and program management in community residential and supported employment programs. She received her Master’s degree in Special Education from Boston College in 1990 after completing course work in Transition and Supported Employment. At the Rural Institute she has served as the Principal Investigator and Project Director for numerous Federal and state-funded grants. She provides technical assistance, training, and on-site support to schools, agencies, and individuals and families predominantly in the areas of customized employment, transition, and systematic instruction.

Abby Cooper has 40 years of experience implementing complex systems changes, from a Statewide Administrator for Vocational Rehabilitation to being a provider to consulting on Competitive Integrated Employment Nationally and Internationally. She has provided Technical Assistance (TA) and training in forty states. In 1981 her leadership resulted in a Day Activity Center transformation into the first Supported Employment (SE) agency in Washington State. In 2005 under a System Change contract, she provided TA to Washington State’s largest Mental Health provider, creating a path to competitive integrated employment (CIE). She spent from 2015 to 2019 providing TA to the State of New Mexico on transforming Day Activity Centers to provide Customized Employment. She provided TA to King County and Seattle School District on Transition and created parent training for transition students. Since 2014 she has worked as a subject matter expert on Community Integrated Employment with the Office of Disability Employment Policy. Subject Matter Expert for MT Pre-ETs TAC 2015-2017. In 2019 she provided training to IL Transition teachers on using group discovery as an age-appropriate assessment tool and created a multiple agency guide to assist in the process transition. Currently, she works on the National Expansion of Employment Opportunities Network (NEON), focusing on 14-(c) transformation employer outreach, and provides consulting for Marc Gold and Associates.

Michael Stoehr, M.S., is a Knowledge Development and Technical Assistance Specialist with the National Technical Assistance Center on Transition: the Collaborative (NTACT:C), the University of North Carolina Charlotte. He has worked in the special education field for the past 37 years and has extensive experience in the areas of secondary transition, assessment, job analysis, supported and customized employment, transition communities of practice, effective transition planning, inter-agency collaboration, transition practices for students with complex support needs, family engagement, and youth leadership and self-advocacy.

Robbin Keating Clark serves as the ECC Coordinator at the Utah School for the Deaf and Blind. She also worked as the vision rehabilitation therapist in the Children’s Services division at BESB. Robbin is the Executive Camp Director for Camp Abilities Connecticut, a one-week developmental sport camp for children with visual impairments.Professionally, Robbin has worked as a teacher for children who are deafblind and an early intervention therapist for children with vision impairments. Personally, Robbin has been active in the vision impairment community since her youth; working with her mother who has total vision loss. Robbin writes a blog for children with vision impairments and their families, www.adifferentkindofvision.blogspot.com. She completed her vision rehabilitation therapist graduate degree at the University of Arkansas, Little Rock.

Dr. Cheryl Godley is a psychologist in Casper, Wyoming. She has worked at her private practice, Windy Ridge Psychological Services, since 1996. While she practices as a generalist in psychology, she has particular interest in issues in psychology related to women’s issues and disabilities. Dr. Godley has served as adjunct faculty teaching the course, psychology of adjustment, at Casper College. She periodically teaches classes for the Ollie Program at Casper College. While in graduate school, Dr. Godley was the recipient of the Floyd Qualls Scholarship for outstanding blind graduate student in the United States from the American Council of the Blind.

Dr. Godley developed a protocol for assisting blind handlers following attacks on dog guides. This protocol was published in 2011 in the Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness. The protocol was presented in 2012 at the International Mobility Conference in New Zealand and the International Guide Dog Federation in Paris in 2012.

In 2006, Dr. Godley participated in a special project in international psychology between the American Psychological Association and People to People in Cambodia and Vietnam. She has enjoyed numerous opportunities to present at conferences on a variety of topics including coping with stress, effective communication, grief from sight loss, grief from physical challenges, issues facing partners of individuals with disabilities, recognizing choices in life, the art of self-nurturing, developing a positive relationship with oneself, recognizing choices in life, considerations in using guide dogs, women’s mental health issues, empowerment in the face of adversity, and the Four Principles for building life satisfaction. Her presentations have been given at state conferences in Wyoming and North Dakota as well as at regional conferences, public schools, colleges, public libraries, rehabilitation hospitals, senior centers, organizations such as the Daughters of the American Revolution, and other events.