After scrambling to find three credits to fill his first semester schedule, David Schless convinced a professor to allow him to enroll in an upper-level sociology of aging class and was ultimately introduced to an undergraduate program he would have never otherwise contemplated. At a certain point, he was introduced to Dr. Nancy Sheehan, who agreed to become his undergraduate advisor and ultimately played a significant role helping him create a unique, robust undergraduate program that was heavy on gerontology and policy with exposure to many of the outstanding HDFR faculty at UConn in the mid-1980s. It was in a policy-oriented class with Dr. Steven Wisensale his junior year that he met Susan Martino, who he subsequently dated (post-UConn) and married in 1991. With much encouragement from Dr. Sheehan and adjunct professor Dr. Rikke Wassenberg, David become the first HDFR student to go through the relatively new UConn Honors program.  

 After graduating from UConn, David attended the University of North Texas, which at the time had the nation’s premier graduate program for professionals working in long-term care. The program, created by the Administration on Aging in 1968, had a significant business focus (accounting, finance, management) and both a thesis and an extensive internship requirement for graduation. With his older brother working in the Pentagon for the Department of Defense, David accepted a research-oriented internship in nearby Annapolis, MD with the National Association for Senior Living Industries (NASLI), a 501c3 trade association comprised of executives from a wide variety of businesses serving older adults. After receiving his MS from North Texas in 1989, David accepted a research position with NASLI, where he met several professionals involved in the fledgling seniors housing business. 

 In 1991, when David was 25, the Washington, DC-based National Multifamily Housing Council (NMHC) offered him an opportunity to launch a Seniors Housing Committee, which in 1995 became the American Seniors Housing Association (ASHA). ASHA was a 501c6 which lobbied on Capitol Hill on behalf of owners and operators of seniors housing (including both for-profit and not-for-profit entities involved in independent living, assisted living, memory care, and life plan/continuing care retirement communities). The Association also began conducting a variety of research studies to better understand the needs and desires of older adults and their families, and to better understand the underlying business and investment case for senior living. In 2001, ASHA spun-off from NMHC and has continued to represent owners and operators, conduct and/or sponsor a multitude of research projects, and help older adults and their families navigate the complexities of senior living on the Association’s www.WhereYouLiveMatters.org website. David has served as the American Seniors Housing Association’s president & CEO since its inception 33 years ago. 

 David and Susan have lived in Rockville, MD since the early 1990s where they raised two grown children and numerous cats. David has been actively involved with the Alzheimer’s Association for much of his professional career and has helped raise more than $60 million to fund research for a cure. He has also served on the Advisory Board of the Cornell Institute for Healthy Futures and the Granger Cobb Institute for Senior Living at Washington State University. 

Congratulations to Tracy Walters (PhD ’23) who recently accepted a new position as Teaching Assistant Professor and Director of the Applied Psychology Data Analytics Master’s program at Marquette University to start this Fall!

Jennifer Dealy (PhD ’19) was recently promoted and tenured as associate professor of Psychology at Albertus Magnus College. Congratulations Jen!

Sebastian Perumbilly (PhD ’11) was recently promoted to full professor of Marriage and Family Therapy at Southern Connecticut State University. Congratulations Seb!

Alexander Reid (PhD ’18) was recently promoted and tenured as associate professor of Child, Adolescent, and Family Studies at Cal State Bakersfield. Congratulations Alex!

HDFS Alum Ciara Collins (PhD ’23) is now a research scientist at the Institute for Policy and Governance at Virginia Tech. Congratulations Ciara!

Qianxia Jiang (PhD ’22) was recently highlighted in an article by her university, University of Central Florida, about her work on healthy lifestyles. https://www.ucf.edu/news/ucf-health-sciences-researcher-embraces-florida-as-her-living-lab/ 

Lauren Lafferty graduated with a BS in HDFS in 2005. During her time at UConn she led the HDFS student government, was named a New England Scholar, presented a thesis as an undergraduate and was later awarded an outstanding women’s award from the UConn Alumni Foundation. Lauren credits her HDFS degree as the bedrock for a nearly 20-year career focused on keeping families and children at the center of her equity focused work.

 

After graduating from UConn, Lauren worked for the Village for Families and Children in Hartford in out-of-school-time programming. Her work at the Village, combined with her HDFS background, fueled a desire to pursue her master’s degree. She moved to Boston and completed a master’s in education with a concentration in Risk and Prevention at Harvard University’s School of Education in 2008. At Harvard, Lauren was energized by her work as a Prevention Intern at the Gardner Pilot Academy (GPA), a community school in Boston. At this school she developed an ambition for high quality urban public education, led by a principal who excelled in this incredible work, allowing her to see the best practices in the field come to life.

 

In 2008 Lauren began her 16-year tenure at GPA. During this time, she designed, led and fundraised successfully for interventions, programs and partnerships that met the highest quality standards and supported families to thrive. She was tasked with funding the gap to ensure access to opportunity and quality learning for students beyond the public-school budget allocation. As a result of this work, Lauren raised and managed an average of $700,000 per year through grant writing and fundraising initiatives. Her work also required partnering with over 15 funders and 30 partners annually. Due to these efforts, GPA’s chronic absenteeism rate was lower than both the state and district averages, the family teacher conference rate of 100% was met annually and over 300 students and family members received basic needs in the form of clothing and food annually. As Senior Director of Extended Services, Lauren consulted, mentored and presented to many individuals from the field of community schools, early education, and prevention, all built off the foundation of HDFS.

 

Lauren is currently the Chief Program Officer at YWCA New Britain. In this role, she uses her collective experiences working in diverse urban communities for the past 20 years to support innovative programs and partnerships at the YWCA. She continues to work with an empowerment-focused and anti-racist lens, central to the YWCA mission, closing opportunity gaps through financial development.

 

Lauren currently resides in West Hartford, CT with her husband Gary and is the proud mom to Julia (4th grade) and Ava (1st grade). As someone raised in a large, loud and loving extended family, Lauren enjoys spending time with her many family members, friends and neighbors.

Samantha Collins earned her Bachelor of Arts in HDFS with a minor in Spanish in 2012. She has built a career in public education after receiving her Master of Arts in Educational Psychology with a concentration in School Counseling at UConn. She also received a certificate in College Counseling from UCLA Extension in 2019.

After obtaining her master’s degree, Samantha worked as a traditional high school counselor in Litchfield County before becoming the college & career counselor at Trumbull High School in 2016. Samantha has just begun her ninth year in this position at Trumbull High School. She is looking forward to taking students to both the UConn Stamford and Storrs campuses this fall! Samantha has also been an active member of the Connecticut School Counselor Association for over a decade engaging in various leadership roles such as public relations chair and director.

In 2022, Samantha and her husband welcomed twin boys to their family. Samantha is grateful for her time working in the infant room at the UConn Child Development Laboratories as an undergraduate and graduate student. She sings songs and uses Sign Language that she learned as a Child Care Trainee which has assisted in her boys’ development and communication skills. She is looking forward to taking them to UConn basketball games in the future. Luckily they have already seen two national championships in their nearly two years of life. Go Huskies!

After her freshman year at UConn, Christine changed her major and transferred into what was then the School of Family Studies to pursue a degree working with young children. Her concentration was Child Development and Early Childhood Education. This decision came after she took the course Programs for Young Children with Dr. Jane Goldman. Jane also became Christine’s academic advisor. Christine began a field placement at the Child Development Laboratories (CDL) in what was then the Infant/Toddler Room. She fell in love with the Program and completed student teaching experiences in both the Infant/Toddler Room and the Preschool Room.

After graduation, Christine accepted a teacher position in the Infant/Toddler Room at Packachoag Early Childhood Program in Auburn, Massachusetts. During her four years at the school, she taught children in both the Infant/Toddler and Preschool rooms. She developed and wrote the school’s first curriculum for Infants and Toddlers. Christine also wrote the Early Childhood newsletter for the school providing information about the Program and early childhood development news for families.

When Christine married her husband in 1993, she moved back to Connecticut and began teaching at the Creative Child Center at UConn Health. She was a Lead Teacher with toddlers in her 4 years there. Christine loved working in a team-teaching environment and the UConn position was her first experience preparing a program for accreditation with the National Association of Education for Young Children.

Upon returning from maternity leave after the birth of her son in 1998, Christine accepted a position as a Master Teacher here at UConn at the CDL. She has been teaching toddlers and mentoring UConn students for the past 26 years. Christine considers it a career achievement to come full circle and return to the model school that sparked her love of early childhood and supported her when most people did not recognize her as a “real” teacher. Two decades later, educators of young children are still not universally recognized or compensated for the very important work that they do. Many students and families come through the UConn Early Childhood Specializations programs each year and Christine considers it an honor and privilege to educate them about child development and the very important first three years of life for growth and learning.

Christine and her husband are proud to be UConn alumni, and both of their children are also UConn grads. They love to attend UConn sporting events and enjoy walks around the beautiful UConn campus. Christine is an avid reader and enjoys hiking with her husband and their dog Bennie.