TREATI Trauma Research, Education, and Training Institute, Inc.

TREATI Board of Directors

Kay-Saakvitne_smallKaren W. Saakvitne, Ph.D. President, Director 

Dr. Saakvitne is a clinical psychologist in private practice in Northampton, Massachusetts.  She is co-author of Trauma and the Therapist, Transforming the Pain, Risking Connection® , and Relational Teaching, Experiential Learning.  She has extensive clinical experience with adult survivors of childhood abuse and offers clinical consultation to clinicians across the country. She has presented and published widely on the subject of the treatment of psychological trauma.  She is the former clinical director and Director of Post-doctoral Training at TSI/CAAP.

LaurieLaurie Anne Pearlman, Ph.D. Past President, Director

Dr. Pearlman is a clinical psychologist with an independent trauma-focused consulting practice based in Holyoke, Massachusetts. She is senior psychological consultant to the Headington Institute, as well as former co-director of the Traumatic Stress Institute/Center for Adult & Adolescent Psychotherapy, LLC.  She is the co-author of four books: Trauma and the Therapist, Psychological Trauma and the Adult Survivor, Transforming the Pain, and Risking Connection® , and author of the Trauma and Attachment Belief Scale Manual.  Dr. Pearlman served on the Board of Directors of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies for seven years, and she publishes and presents extensively on the subjects of psychological trauma and vicarious trauma.  She has been doing healing and reconciliation work in Rwanda with Ervin Staub, Ph.D., since 1999.

Chris Christine Farber, Ph.D. Secretary, Treasurer, Director 

Chris brings relevant board experience to this position, having served on the boards of the Connecticut Psychological Association and Volunteers in Psychotherapy. She has also been involved in various TREATI projects, including administering TREATI’s single largest grant to date, the grant from USAID that supported our work in Rwanda from 2002 through 2004. 

DanDaniel J. Abrahamson, Ph.D. Director 

Dan Abrahamson is the Assistant Executive Director for State Advocacy with the Practice Directorate of the American Psychological Association (APA). He currently serves on the board of the Trauma Research, Education, and Training Institute, Inc (TREATI) and is a former board member of Klingberg Family Centers in New Britain, CT.  Prior to moving to Washington, DC to work for APA, Dr. Abrahamson spent two decades as a practicing clinical psychologist and the Administrative Director of a large group practice in Connecticut.  The practice, the Traumatic Stress Institute or TSI, served as a platform from which he taught as an adjunct faculty at the University of Connecticut, served numerous roles in APA and the Connecticut Psychological Association, and co-founded TREATI, a nonprofit organization to complement the work of TSI.  He received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the State University of New York at Albany.

BetsyElizabeth A. Brett, Ph.D. Director 

Dr. Brett is an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Yale University School of Medicine and a faculty member of the Connecticut Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy Center.  She has a private practice of psychotherapy in New Haven, Connecticut.  She has extensive experience working with Vietnam War veterans and has published on this subject.  In addition, Dr. Brett has published on the subject of the classification of posttraumatic stress disorder.  She is a past president of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies. 

RosemarieRosemarie Burton Director 

Rosemarie Burton was appointed President of Klingberg Family Centers in June of 1993 after 27 years of teaching and serving individuals with special needs as an administrator and a Regional Director of the Connecticut Department of Mental Retardation.  Klingberg Family Centers has grown in countless ways under Ms. Burton’s leadership.  She has extensive experience in fund development and has helped to raise millions of dollars for Klingberg Family Centers, Special Olympics CT, and the Soroptimists. Ms. Burton serves on various boards and committees for a number of national and state organizations: Board of the National Association for Children’s Behavioral Health, NCASES Commissioner (National Commission on Accreditation for Special Education Services), Behavioral Health Partnership Oversight Council. In the past, Ms. Burton served on the Governor’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Mental Health, the Children’s Behavioral Health Network, the Connecticut Association of Nonprofit Agencies, the New England Network of Child, Youth and Family Services, and the Chair of Special Olympics Connecticut Board. She has been the recipient of many awards recognizing her skill, professionalism and service to the community.  These honors include the 2009 Hartford Business Journal, 8 Remarkable Women in Business Award, 2008 President’s Award – National Association of Psychiatric Treatment Centers for Children, and the Executive of the Year for 2004 from NAPSEC (National Association of Private Special Education Centers. 

EGPicEarl Giller, Jr., M.D., Ph.D. Director

Dr. Giller is Executive Director, CNS, of Clinical Research at Pfizer, Inc., and an Associate Professor Adjunct of Psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine.  He has published and presented extensively in the area of psychopharmacology and biological assessment and treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder.  

HowardTennenHoward Tennen, Ph.D. Director 

Dr. Tennen is Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor at the University of Connecticut School of Medicine.  He is editor of Journal of Personality, and he serves on several editorial review boards.  Dr. Tennen is co-author of Infants in Crisis: How parents cope with newborn intensive care and its aftermath, and he has published extensively on adaptation to threatening events.

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