2025 Housing Is Summit Breakout Sessions

This year's breakout sessions will share lessons learned from housing authorities, local partners, and national organizations and provide actionable insights and best practices for attendees to take home to their communities. As in previous years, the Summit will offer three breakout tracks focused on education, health, and partnerships.

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Education Track

Creating Impact with National Partners to Improve Children’s Educational Outcomes

Real change and scale require ways to extend our reach beyond what any one of us can achieve alone, and ensuring the impact of early school success for low-income children is predicated on having the right mix of organizations, networks and champions to advance the work. This session will feature two of the Campaign for Grade Level Reading's Resource Network partners (The Basics and ParentChild+) who are effectively stepping up in public housing communities to help assure better futures for children. With representatives from each, we will explore phases of development and discuss outcomes. Parent/participant voice will be included.

Erica Vaughan, Consultant, Campaign for Grade-Level Reading
Ron Ferguson PhD, Founder and Executive Director, The Basics, Inc.
Malkia Singleton Ofori-Agyekum, Mid-Atlantic Regional Director, ParentChild+

WISH: Highline College & King County Housing Authority's Partnership to Support Homeless Students

Supported by national and Washington state data, this session will explore the impact of housing insecurity and homelessness among college students. Panelists will focus on the importance of an equity-minded approach to program development, featuring support programs like While in School Housing (WISH). Participants will learn about an effective model for public housing authorities, sustainable partnerships with higher education, and an online toolkit for engaging partners.

Dr. Ted Dezember, Senior Manager for Educational Initiatives and Youth Programs, King County Housing Authority
Kerrie Rene, Senior Housing Program Manager, King County Housing Authority
Mariela Barriga Chavez, Assoicate Dean for Innovation, Transformation & Student Support, Highline College
Saido Alinur, Student Housing & Retention Program Manager, Highline College

The Power of Three: A Cross-Collaborative Approach to Removing Educational Barriers to Employment

This interactive session will highlight the collaboration between the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA), Women Employed (WE), and City Colleges of Chicago (CCC) to help CHA residents secure family-supporting jobs. Learn about the Career Foundations course developed by WE and CCC, which helps students assess skills, explore career paths, and create a plan for college certificate or degree programs. The session will also cover how CHA began offering this course in fall 2024 to participants in the LevelUp Family Self-Sufficiency program and the course’s current impact.

Gionna N. Branch, Director of LevelUP (FSS) Program, Chicago Housing Authority
Stephenie McLean, LevelUP (FSS) Coach, Chicago Housing Authority

The Power of Place: Helping Housing Mobility Programs Transform Educational Outcomes

This session explores how the Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program can be leveraged to advance educational equity for low-income families. Panelists will introduce a research-based toolkit being developed through collaboration between researchers, practitioners, and policy advocates that aims to equip housing mobility programs with strategies for school integration and supporting student success when voucher-holding families move to high-opportunity areas.

Philip Tegeler, Executive Director, Poverty & Race Research Action Council (PRRAC)
Anna Rhodes, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Rice University
Joanea Spencer, Director of Housing Search & Landlord Recruitment, Boston Housing Authority

Health Track

Storytelling as Healing

This presentation explores two pilot studies that introduced storytelling as a healing practice in professional development for nursing students and public housing staff. The session will highlight how integrating narrative competence— the ability to recognize, absorb, and interpret stories—enhances empathy and understanding of social determinants of health. These studies suggest that incorporating storytelling into community health and housing education leads to more personalized, effective interventions, ultimately improving the quality of care in these settings.

Kit Kuran, Director of Supportive Services, Vancouver Housing Authority
Joan Caley, Board Chair, VHA Nursing Instructor (Retired), Vancouver Housing Authority/University of Portland School of Nursing and Health Innovations

Accessing Affordable Assisted Living in Public Housing – The New Jersey ALP Model

New Jersey’s Assisted Living Program (ALP) allows residents in publicly subsidized housing to maintain affordable rent while receiving comprehensive assisted living services. This model relies on a partnership between housing providers and ALP providers. Panelists will explore the NJ ALP framework and discuss strategies to replicate it, aiming to expand access to equitable home and community-based services for public housing residents.

Candace Robinson, Director of Healthy Communities, Capital Impact Partners
EJ Vizzi, Director of Senior Programs,The Bright Side Family
Ayse Akincigil, Associate Professor, Rutgers University, Hub for Aging Collaboration

Exploring Evidence-Based Health Interventions to Address Hoarding

This session explores how coordinated interventions can improve the lives and health of residents dealing with excessive clutter, which affects their safety and well-being. Panelists will go beyond inspections and sanitation issues, focusing on evidence-based health interventions and staff support to address high clutter and promote personal and community health and safety.

Rachael Steward, Deputy Director, Housing Operations, Seattle Housing Authority
Jesscia Chow, Health and Housing Program Manager, Seattle Housing Authority
Ashley Kraft, Housing Operations, Seattle Housing Authority
Cricket Farr, Clinical Director at Full Life Care, Co-Chair at Northwest Hoarding Coalition

Catalyzing Change: Using Community-Level Collaborations to Address Health Inequities among PHA Residents

Collaboration between PHAs, community-based organizations, health care providers and payers can reduce health inequities and enable community-centered solutions that address resident needs. In 2020, CLPHA entered into an innovative partnership with a health care partner that uses localized data in combination with community-level collaborations to improve health and social outcomes and drive meaningful change. These partnership models have been implemented at eight PHA sites across the country, where community partners have co-created multi-year, data-driven interventions with a path to sustainability. During this session, panelists will highlight learnings from three interventions to address diabetes prevention, food insecurity, and health and digital literacy through community-based education, coaching, and other activities.

Partnerships Track

Creating Safe and Affirming Housing for LGBTQ+ Elders

This session will address the unique housing challenges faced by LGBTQ+ older adults, highlighting the compounded difficulties they encounter in finding safe and affordable housing. It will explore the importance of LGBTQ+ affirming housing and discuss strategies for developing and sustaining safe, inclusive, and affordable housing for individuals of all sexual orientations and gender identities.

Josh Dubensky, Housing Policy Advocate, SAGE
Rozanne Look, Vice President, Mary’s House For Older Adults
Ed Miller, Elder Initiative Program Manager, Anderson Apartments

Addressing Homelessness for Pregnant People, Infants, and Children 3 and Younger: Convening Partners to Build and Communicate a Policy Agenda and Messaging Campaign

Homelessness during pregnancy or in the first three years of a child’s life has lifelong consequences on physical health and mental well-being. . With support from the Pritzker Children’s Initiative, Housing Is is working with a coalition of organizations to build a policy agenda addressing homelessness for families with children prenatal-3 years old and promoting strong early childhood development and economic security. In this session, hear from coalition members about our policy agenda for decisionmakers at the federal and state levels and our communications strategies for elevating the message that homelessness is preventable, and that stakeholders must take action to address it.

Strategies for Community-Building: Nurturing Social Connectivity through Partnerships in the Built Environment

This interactive session will explore strategies for community building and peacebuilding through a collaboration between university, community-based organization (CBO), and housing authority personnel in multi-family affordable and public housing. Focused on fostering social cohesion and resident organization development, the session highlights how disconnected neighbors can become a supportive community. Drawing on over 30 years of partnership, the Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM), and UWM’s Institute for Systems Change and Peacebuilding will share their cross-sector solutions and project curricula.

Paul Williams, Choice Neighborhood Initiative Coordinator, Housing Authority of the City of Milwaukee (HACM)
Sandy Short, Food Justice & Community Wellness Coordinator, HACM
Silvia Patricia Gelvez Delgado, Graduate Project Assistant, University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee (UWM) Institute of Systems Change and Peacebuilding
Segun Daniel Okeowo, Graduate Project Assistant, UWM Institute of Systems Change and Peacebuilding
Marie Sandy, UWM Institute of Systems Change and Peacebuilding

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2025 Housing Is Summit Breakout Sessions

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