Adoption Disruptions/Dissolutions

Kristen Wolfs

Biography

Child protection through CHIPS, child welfare to support family preservation, permanency and post permanency, adoption and transfer of custody as well as extended foster care services.

Address:
Mower County Health and Human Services
201 1st Street NE Suite 18
Austin, MN 55912

Kristen Wolfs

Kelsey Bonkoski

Biography

I greatly enjoy my current role working as a mental health professional. I practice in the outpatient setting both in person and virtually. I work with children, youth, and families with a variety of diagnoses. I have the most experience working with individuals impacted by trauma, and I am trained in EMDR. I have experience professionally working with individuals and families who have experienced adoption and foster care, and I also have personal connections to adoption as my sister is an adult adoptee. 

Kelsey Bonkoski

Deirdre Otis, MA, MSW, LGSW

Biography

Deirdre Otis is a licensed social worker with broad experience across child welfare, school-based, and healthcare settings. She earned her undergraduate degree from the College of Saint Benedict and her Master of Social Work from Saint Catherine University, where her academic focus included grief counseling and child welfare. She also completed a clinical internship utilizing the Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics (NMT), strengthening her trauma-informed practice.

Deirdre Otis

Krista Skaalen, BSW

Biography

I am a child welfare/Permanency social worker in a county human services setting, with a primary focus on achieving permanency for children involved in the child welfare system. My work includes supporting foster care and kinship placements, coordinating services, and guiding families through the permanency process, including reunification and adoption.

Krista Skaalen

Teresa Bina Zaffiro, MSW, LICSW

Biography

Hi! I am Teresa, a clinical social worker who is passionate about supporting adoptees, first/birth families and adoptive families. I am an adoptive parent with extensive experience supporting my child through relational trauma, transitions, neurodevelopment differences and sensory. I also have a long professional history of supporting family reunification, birth parent rights, open permanency set ups and culturally appropriate permanency outcomes.

Teresa Zaffiro

Lauren Lowe, MSW, LICSW

Biography

I am an outpatient therapist who is also a transracial adoptee. I work with populations ages 9-35 at this moment. I apply multi approaches and modalities such as ACT, DBT Skills, IFS, Interpersonal therapy, CBT/TF-CBT. I will be certified in PCIT fairly soon. I strive to be culturally competent and incorporate faiths of all backgrounds to support my clients. I also incorporate parents into my sessions with working with kids. I work with a lot of children and adults who have been been adopted or part of the child welfare system. I also will be trained in EMDR in the next few years.

Lauren Lowe

Wei "Rhouth" Zhou, MA, LPCC

She/Her/Hers
Biography

My vocational calling is to support the psychological and spiritual well-being of children, adolescents, and adults within adoptive, foster, and kinship family systems. My specialties involve working with individuals navigating adoption- and foster-related transitions, grief and loss, identity development, early and complex trauma, and attachment disruptions, as well as developmental differences and relational challenges. I approach this work with an understanding of how these experiences unfold across the lifespan and within the context of family and relational systems.

Wei Zhou

Katherine Wald, MSW, LGSW

She/Her/Hers
Biography

Katherine (she/her) is Licensed Graduate Social Worker and holds a Master's degree in social work from Augsburg University and a Bachelor's degree in social work from St. Olaf College. Katherine has the joy and privilege of working with children, adolescents, their caregivers, and multi-disciplinary teams of diverse identities and backgrounds who have been impacted by abuse and trauma. She provides trauma informed and culturally responsive individual and group therapy services to children and adolescents ages 3-17 at CornerHouse in Minneapolis.

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Laura Lee Voldah, MSW, LICSW

Biography

I have been a social worker for almost 20 years. I enjoy a varied caseload of young children (up to 10 years old), adults, and geriatric clients. Most of my adult clients meet the criteria of serious and persistent mentally ill. I am also a Certified Play Therapist and utilize a variety of approaches that are individualized to the child. I completed the Infant and Toddler Mental Health Certificate Program in 2009 and will complete the Adoption Competency Certificate Program in 2013.

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