Kristin Hoffman, Ph.D., joins All Star Children’s Foundation as chief program officer and Sharon Ghazarian, Ph.D., joins as All Star’s chief research officer.
Meet Dr. Kristin Hoffman, All Star’s Chief Program Officer
When you think of the exact right person whose background brilliantly aligns with All Star’s mission, Dr. Hoffman’s resume is a perfect fit. Her expertise includes working with children and families with child welfare involvement and most recently served as the director of trauma psychology at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital. She is certified as Level II (statewide /regional) Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT) trainer by PCIT, International. If that’s not enough, in her early career she had the privilege to have worked for an agency that received funding from the National Child Traumatic Stress Network – an organization dedicated to child trauma.
While at Johns Hopkins, All Star had the pleasure of collaborating with her to develop All Star’s programs and define our approach for research and outcome measurements. In her new role Dr. Hoffman will lead the way in creating a welcoming and safe environment for biological family engagement, overseeing trauma-informed clinical services, training foster parents in trauma-informed parenting practices, and coordinating care with the entire child-welfare system— all designed to create a new path for kids in the foster care system.
“I’m passionate about providing practical tools to effectively help children and their families lead more healthy, valued lives,” says Dr. Hoffman. “All Star’s mission and goals are primed to let us create positive change for so many people in this community and I’m thrilled to be part of it.”
Say “Hello!” to Dr. Sharon Ghazarian, Chief Research Officer
Graci loves to introduce Dr. Ghazarian as a “research nerd with a heart.” We are 100 percent sure she has a passion for kids and if nerd is defined as a serious researcher, then Graci is right on the money. Dr. Ghazarian is a research methodologist and an expert in complex statistical analysis and research methodology for medical, behavioral and social sciences. She comes to All Star uniquely qualified having built data and analytic teams for more than 10 years, including teams of biostatisticians, database designers, data scientists and clinical analytic specialists. Because her arrival to All Star coincides with the organization’s early program development and implementation phase, Dr. Ghazarian will ensure programs are constructed with proper protocols to allow for clean data. “Building programs with the intention of reporting outcomes for wide review creates the need for implementing and monitoring them with rigor. To be on the ground floor of this transformational work is a dream come true for me,” she says. Dr. Ghazarian will measure the impact of trauma-informed treatment and programs, interpret the findings and follow children long-term. It is through this research that All Star will advocate for change in national policy and ultimately change how foster care is practiced today.
Dr. Ghazarian was most recently the senior director for Health Informatics at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital and is a published author of more than 50 publications, many of them having to do with the impact of stress and trauma in the youth population.
These two positions have been partially funded through the generous donation of the Charles and Margery Barancik Foundation. “We are so grateful to the Barancik Foundation for supporting us in the early years of our vision to transform foster care, here is Sarasota, and beyond,” said Dennis McGillicuddy, All Star’s CEO.