Speakers: Robert Childs, MPH, Kim Shuler, LCSW, Jenny Post, MA

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Kim Shuler, LCSW

Kim Shuler, LCSW contributes more than 20 years of experience as a clinician and administrator working in a variety of integrated behavioral health settings. She currently serves as Chief Executive Officer of ABHIN and as Project Director on three Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) projects. Ms. Shuler has extensive experience in training behavioral health providers and care teams, building coalitions, conducting needs assessments, and developing strategic and business operation plans. She is a certified behavioral health consultant trained through the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. Ms. Shuler has demonstrated success developing, implementing, and managing day-to-day operations of integrated behavioral health programs across multiple settings, including nearly a decade serving as Director of Behavioral Health in a large FQHC.

Robert Childs, MPH

Robert Childs, MPH is currently a Technical Expert Lead II at JBS International, focusing on providing technical assistance on rural polysubstance overdose prevention and response projects. Over the last couple years, he also has helped lead several drug checking and naloxone access efforts in lower Appalachia for people who use drugs in SE Tennessee and NW Georgia. He also helped co-found the Southeastern Nature School, a nature-based school for middle schoolers. Prior to working at JBS, Robert was an independent consultant working on multiple community and law enforcement overdose (OD) prevention and harm reduction consulting projects. He also worked as North Carolina Harm Reduction Coalition’s (NCHRC) Executive Director from 2009-2018 and Positive Health Project’s Public Health Operations Manager (2006-2009), where he oversaw the agency’s harm reduction operations, program implementation, and innovation. At NCHRC, Robert helped develop the largest syringe service program network and community and law enforcement-based naloxone distribution programs in the US South. In addition, he started one of the South’s initial drug-checking programs with fentanyl test strips. He has been invited to speak at the United Nations, the US Congress, US Attorney General’s State Offices, ONDCP, the FDA, and multiple state legislatures on his work. Robert worked with NCHRC in leading the campaigns that led to the passage of comprehensive overdose prevention bills in 2013, 2015 and 2017 and passage of syringe decriminalization, biohazard collection and syringe service program bills in 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017. Childs and his team also secured funding for naloxone purchasing (2015, 2017, 2018) and for LEAD programs (2016). Robert helped start the South’s first LEAD program in Fayetteville (2016) and helped in setting up multiple other programs around the state. Childs’ work has been featured in the New York Times, the Lancet, People, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Daily Beast, Kaiser Health News, Fox News, NBC News, ABC News, Human Rights Watch, Governing, MMWR & the Huffington Post.

Jenny Post, MA

Jenny works as a Project Manager for ABHIN, assisting with three grant-funded projects to advance integrated behavioral health and whole-person health care. Jenny has a Master’s degree in sociology from the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. She was a grant writer for the Department of Community Health and Research at UAMS for four years. During that time, Jenny led the development of grant applications that generated more than 16 million dollars to fund community-engaged health research and projects to address health disparities in the Pacific Islander and Hispanic communities. Prior to UAMS, Jenny worked as a grant writer for Northwest Arkansas Community College. Jenny lives in Fayetteville with her husband and three cats. She loves being outside in her garden, preserving food, and strolling her kitties around the block. She is a passionate advocate for people with mental health conditions.