My work began in juvenile justice, not classrooms. With a Ph.D. in criminology, I researched how to prevent young people from entering cycles of incarceration—and that path led me to trauma.

In 2007, after becoming a parent, I read Why Love Matters by Sue Gerhardt, which introduced me to the neuroscience of attachment and how trauma affects brain development. I began to see a clear connection: children who experience trauma often show behaviors like impulsivity and defiance—not because they’re “bad,” but because they’re in survival mode. This insight reshaped my work and linked early adversity to learning, behavior, and long-term outcomes.

While working at UC Berkeley’s Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Law and Social Policy, I began exploring how trauma science could inform practice through developing trauma training for juvenile probation officers, partnering with UC Berkeley’s Neurobiology department, studying epigenetics and intergenerational trauma. Much of that work culminated in The Neuroscience Behind Misbehavior, urging trauma-aware school discipline.

In 2015 I switched gears and took a job with Contra Costa County coordinating a state grant with two pilot programs - one of which was to bring trauma-informed practices to a middle school. In this work, I found my passion: disrupting the school-to-prison ‘pipeline’ through teaching educators about how trauma affects student learning and behavior. I’ve been doing this work ever since.