February 1 -
Life
as a parent certainly has
its fair share of stress!
From fevers and teething, to
carpools and getting dinner
on the table, to the
frequent worry that you
might be doing something
wrong—many parents feel as
if their minds are endlessly
spinning. We read so many
books about how to best
parent our kids, but we so
rarely pay attention to
taking care of
ourselves—overlooking the
fact that how we are,
how we feel, has a
tremendous impact on how we
raise our children and who
they become. Dr.
Steve Silvestro,
a pediatrician in North
Bethesda, teaches parents
and children in the practice
of mindfulness—noticing what
is going on both inside and
outside oneself, and how the
two influence each other. He first trained in
mind-body medicine at
Georgetown University
Medical School and currently
teaches a Mindfulness for
Parents course, giving
parents the tools and space
to better care for
themselves so that they can
be more wholly present in
their parenthood,
relationships, and daily
lives. To learn more, visit
Dr. Silestro's
website.
February 8
-
She is a stiletto wearing,
money-saving, extreme
couponer! Jaime
Kirlew's
husband was forced to take a
substantial pay cut from his
prestigious position as the
VP of a local company, which
impacted her lifestyle as a
wife and mother who had
previously shopped without
censorship. A friend
alerted her to the concept
of using coupons by laying
out a supermarket sales
flyer on her coffee table, displaying her accompanying
coupons, and off to the store
they went. Jaime's passion
for shopping has morphed
into major workshops,
a successful blog and an
appearance on TLC's
Extreme Couponing
television show. By shopping
with coupons, not money, she
has consistently saved 80%
off her grocery
expenses. She has also
donated thousands of pounds
of purchases to food banks.
She says, "I am a go-getter
and the getting only gets
better!" To visit Jaime Kirlew's website, click
here.
February 15 -
Downbeat
Magazine
says, "Kevin
Whitehead's
concise responses deliver
the answers that reveal his
deep knowledge of the music
and sharp style. Even
readers who never touched a
piano will be able to follow
his summation of why bebop
was such a radical
departure." Kevin is the
longtime jazz critic for
National Public Radio’s
Fresh Air and has
written about jazz for many
publications, including the Chicago
Sun-Times, Down Beat,
and the Village Voice.
He is the author of New
Dutch Swing, and his
essays have appeared in such
collections as Da Capo
Best Music Writing 2006, Jazz:
The First Century, and The
Cartoon Music Book.
Book signing following
lecture.
February 22 -
Sheryl Brissett Chapman
serves as the Executive
Director of the National
Center for Children and
Families, overseeing an
average annual operating
budget of nearly $18 million
and a staff of 200. Still,
when a child comes to her
office with a problem,
Brissett Chapman drops
everything to help. “She’s a
leading child welfare expert
who understands the research
and academics,” says
executive director of the
Consortium for Child
Welfare, “but she’s also
accessible to kids and
families in a way that’s
really extraordinary.” When
Brissett Chapman came in
1991 to Bethesda-based NCCF,
then called the Baptist Home
for Children, “I promised
the board I wouldn’t change
much.” Instead, she “changed
everything.” She turned a
group home serving fewer
than 100 children annually
into a comprehensive center
with wide-ranging programs,
including housing, foster
care and parenting
education. Today, NCCF
serves roughly 3,000
children and families
annually. In her quest to
help kids, she’s “always
looking to be on the
cutting-edge of best
practices, and to push
everyone around her to be
better, too. She’s not
someone who’s OK with the
status quo.” Visit the
NCCF
website.
February 29 -
Eye Movement
Desensitization and
Reprocessing (EMDR) is a
comprehensive, integrative
psychotherapy approach.
Prime examples that can be
helped by EMDR are
intrusive thoughts,
emotional disturbances, and
negative self-referencing
beliefs of post traumatic
stress disorder (PTSD).
Psychotherapist
Janie
Scholom has been
practicing for 20 years and
serves as an EMDR trainer.
When a traumatic or very
negative event occurs,
information processing can
be incomplete. For example,
a rape survivor may “know”
that rapists are responsible
for their crimes, but this
information does not connect
with her feeling that she is
to blame for the attack. The
memory is then
dysfunctionally stored
without appropriate
associative connections and
with many elements still
unprocessed. When the
individual thinks about the
trauma, or when the memory
is triggered by similar
situations, the person may
feel like she is reliving
it, or may experience strong
emotions and physical
sensations.Janie will share
the technique, successes and
strategies behind EMDR.
March 7
-
Leslie
Morgan Steiner's
memoir about surviving
domestic violence, Crazy Love, is a New
York Times bestseller,
People Pick, and Book of
the Week for The Week
magazine. She is the
editor of the
critically-acclaimed
anthology, Mommy
Wars: Stay-at-Home and
Career Moms Face Off on
Their Choices,
Their Lives, Their
Families,
a frank, surprising and
refreshing look at
American motherhood from
26 different
perspectives. She also
wrote over 500 columns
for the Washington
Post’s popular daily
on-line work/family
column, On Balance.
She currently writes the
weekly column, Two
Cents on Modern
Motherhood, and
Mommy Track’d: Managing
the Chaos of Modern
Motherhood. Leslie
has been a guest on the
Today Show, National
Public Radio, ABC, NBC,
CBS, Fox News, MSNBC,
and has been profiled by
Newsweek,
Business Week,
Elle, Parenting,
Parents, Self,
Glamour,
Vanity Fair, The
New York Times,
The Los Angeles Times
and The Washington
Post. Steiner holds a BA from
Harvard and an MBA from
the Wharton School of
Business.
Book signing following
lecture.
March 14
-
Pulitzer Prize-winning
journalist and mother of
two, Brigid Schulte,
didn’t believe it when
she read a noted time
researcher's conclusion
that working moms have
30 hours of leisure time
per week. So, she did a
study of her own time
and shared her findings
in the Sunday
Washington Post Magazine
article,
The Test
of Time: A Busy Working
Mother Tries To Figure
Out Where All Her Time
Is Going.
The controversial
article kicked up a
storm of discussion on
the subject of moms and
leisure time, how we
define it, and how we
spend it. Brigid will
share her experience in
reporting the piece and
the conversations that
ensued as the topic
exploded in print, on
the web and even lead to
an appearance on the Dr.
Phil Show! She
is currently on book
leave from the Post
to write Overwhelmed,
a book about frenetic
modern families in a
chaotic time and the
search for an elusive
moment of peace.
March 21
-
Senior Vice
President for Research at
the Environmental Working
Group (EWG), Jane Houlihan
directs research programs on
environmental health and the
hazards of chemicals in
food, water and everyday
consumer products. Under her
direction EWG has created
go-to resources for its one
million members and other
consumers seeking safer
choices, including the
Skin Deep Cosmetic Safety
Database, the national
tap water quality database
covering 40,000 communities,
and the body burden testing
programs detecting 500
industrial pollutants in
Americans.
March 28 -
Mary L. Tabor
is the author of The
Woman Who Never Cooked,
which won the Mid-List
Press’s First Series Award
and was published when she
was 60. Her short stories
have won numerous literary
awards. Her memoir (Re)Making
Love is a modern
real-life love story that
has been profiled in Real
Simple magazine. Her
experience spans the worlds
of journalism, business,
education, fiction and
memoir writing,
landing her in both
Marquis Who’s Who in America
and Marquis Who’s Who of
American Women. She
is also a Woodrow Wilson
Visiting Fellow. She
taught creative writing for
more than a decade at George
Washington University and
was a visiting writer and
professor at University of
Missouri - Columbia in their
graduate creative writing
program. The Smithsonian’s
Campus-on-the-Mall, where
she taught for many years,
has called her “one of our
most prized lecturers on the
subjects of getting
started as a writer and
starting late." She
has appeared on the XM
Satellite radio book-talk
show “This Is Audible” to
discuss James Joyce’s
Ulysses and
Shakespeare’s Romeo and
Juliet. Read more about
Mary L. Tabor by visiting
her
website.
April 11
-
Perhaps best
known as the PunditMom,
Joanne Bamberger
is also an attorney, political strategist and
author who writes about
politics and women's issues.
Her first book, Mothers
of Intention: How Women &
Social Media are
Revolutionizing Politics in
America, asserts the
importance of the
"motherhood" voice in
political discourse and
commentary, and examines how
women, more than any other
demographic, have taken to
the internet in droves to
flex their political power.
An award-winning broadcast
journalist, former Deputy
Director of Public Affairs
at the US Securities and
Exchange Commission, and
regular contributor to AOL’s
Politics Daily,
Joanne is recognized as a
prominent online influencer
and connector and is a
sought after speaker on a
variety of topics related to
women and politics,
including engagement of the
new power demographic of
women online for political
success. Her political
commentary has been featured
on CNN, Fox News, Good
Morning, America, NPR,
XMRadio, and BBC Radio.
She was named by Working
Mother Magazine to its
2011 “Most Powerful Moms in
Social Media” list, as well
as one of the “must read
blogs written by women” by
BlogHer.com! Visit
Bamberger's
blog.
Book signing following
lecture.
April 18
-
Alexandra Robbins
is the author of several
New York Times
bestsellers, including and
The Geeks Shall Inherit
the Earth: Popularity, Quirk
Theory and Why Outsiders
Thrive After High School,
The Overachievers:
The Secret Lives of Driven
Kids and Pledged: The
Secret Life of Sororities.
In addition, her work has
appeared in The New
Yorker, Vanity Fair,
The Atlantic and
The Washington Post. She
graduated from Walt Whitman
High School (was
editor-in-chief of the
newspaper), the school
profiled in The
Overachievers; and summa
cum laude from Yale. Robbins
was a member of Scroll and
Key, one of Yale's esteemed
secret societies, and has
written a revealing book, Secrets of the Tomb: Skull
and Bones, the Ivy League
and the Hidden Paths of
Power, a social history
of societies at Yale. The
recipient of the Heartsongs
Award for contributions to
the mental health of
children and young adults,
Robbins has appeared on
60 Minutes, The Today
Show, Oprah,
The View, Anderson
Cooper 360, CNN, NPR,
BBC, MSNBC, The History
Channel and The
Colbert Report. Along
with author Jane Mayer, she
broke the story about
President Bush's
unimpressive college grades
and SAT scores in The
New Yorker.
Book signing following
lecture.
April 25
-
What
would it be like to be a
petite woman in charge of a
male-dominated
workforce? Just ask
Debra Evans Smith,
who has had an impressive
career at the FBI. She
started working in the FBI
as a professional support
employee and became an
Agent. She has worked on
civil rights, white-collar
crime, Russian
counter-intelligence and
Russian Organized Crime.
One of her most notable
cases was her role in the
complicated investigation of
the former FBI Agent -- and
spy -- Robert Hanssen. She
has risen through the ranks
as a Supervisor, Special Agent in Charge, and
Special Assistant to the
Director and is the
recipient of many awards,
including the Attorney
General's Award for
Excellence and the National
Intelligence Certificate of
Distinction, while being a
mom, too!
May 2
-
Angel Brown
is a native Washingtonian
who has been active in the
non-profit social justice,
social change arena for the
past fourteen years.
Currently, she is the
Director of Community
Outreach & Partnerships for
Metro TeenAIDS, a non-profit
community health
organization that is
dedicated to supporting
young people in the fight to
end HIV/AIDS. Over the years
Angel has served in the
capacity as a trainer,
organizer, educator,
artistic director, performer
and advocate in the fight
against HIV/AIDS and social
stigma. Her work began at
the age of fifteen as an HIV
prevention peer educator, and
she has been going full
steam ahead ever since. She
is actively involved in the
youth, people of color, gay,
lesbian, bisexual and
transgender communities. Visit
the
websitefor Metro
TeenAIDS.
May 9 -
About author
Dr.
Benjamin Ross'
book, a reviewer
says: "...a fascinating and
eye-opening history of the
companies, institutions, and
policies that have created
our chemically altered
environment over the last
century. If Earth Day or the
Love Canal tragedy were the
events that brought the
environmental crisis into
your consciousness, then you
owe it to yourself to read
The Polluters."
Controversy
has followed his recent
report, Chromium, Cancer
& the CIA, that
details how drinking
water throughout the country
is contaminated with traces
of hexavalent chromium, the
cancer-causing chemical made
famous by Erin Brockovich
(who discovered industrial
poisoning in her California
town). Dr. Rossis
the president of
Disposal Safety Inc. and has
more than thirty years of
experience in the hydro-geological analysis of
waste disposal sites. He has
published twenty-eight
articles in peer-reviewed
scientific journal and has
testified as an expert for
the U.S. Department of
Justice and private
attorneys. He holds an A.B.
summa cum laude from Harvard
University and a Ph.D.
degree from Massachusetts
Institute of Technology.
Book signing following
lecture.
May 16 -
Salvatore Zambri
is a founding member and
senior partner at Regan Zambri & Long. He
has been listed as a "Trial
Lawyer of the Year"
(Trial Lawyers
Association of Metropolitan
Washington, D.C),
is among the top
1% of all Metro area
attorneys (Washingtonian
magazine) and has been recognized as one
of the "Best Lawyers in
America" (Best Lawyers,
2011). Mr. Zambri
dedicates his practice to
representing seriously
injured victims of medical
negligence, truck and
automobile collisions,
wrongful death, defective
products, work-related
injuries, and other
catastrophic injury matters. He will talk
about the dangers of driving
in today's society. Mr.
Zambri has written and
lectured extensively in the
field of personal injury
law and is regularly sought
after by local and national
attorneys to give seminars
on how to effectively
litigate serious personal
injury cases. He devotes a substantial
amount of time to pro bono
and charitable community
activities and shares his
firm's mission: obtain
justice for the injured and
safety improvements for all.
May 23 -
Indonesian
Ferry Sinks.
Peruvian Bus
Plunges Off Cliff.
African Train
Attacked by Mobs.
Whenever he picked up the
newspaper,
Carl Hoffman
noticed those short news
bulletins, which seemed
about as far from the idea
of tourism, travel as the
pursuit of pleasure, as it
was possible to get. So
off he went, spending six
months circumnavigating the
globe on the world's worst
conveyances: the
statistically most dangerous
airlines, the most crowded
and dangerous ferries, the
slowest buses, and the most
rickety trains. The
Lunatic Express: Discovering
the World . . . via Its Most
Dangerous Buses, Boats,
Trains, and Planes takes
us to some its most teeming
cities and remotest places:
from Havana to Bogotá on the
perilous Cuban Airways. This is the story of
traveling with seatmates and deck mates who have left home
without American Express
cards on conveyances that
don't take Visa and seldom
take you anywhere you'd want
to go. But it's also the
story of traveling as it
used to be -- a sometimes
harrowing trial, of finding
adventure in a modern,
rapidly urbanizing world and
the generosity of poor
strangers, from ear cleaners
to urban bus drivers to
itinerant roughnecks, who
make up most of the world's
population. Carl is an
award-winning contributing
editor at Wired,
National Geographic Traveler
and Popular Mechanics,
and his stories about
travel, adventure and
technology have also
appeared in Outside,
National Geographic
Adventure and Men's
Journal. Book signing following
lecture.
May 30 -
It's a spring
evening in Midtown Manhattan
and
Colin Goddard
is working a reception on
the top floor of the HBO
building. Waiters carry
trays of hors d'oeuvres
through the crowd while
Goddard, a 25-year-old who
could model for a J. Crew
catalog, chats amiably. He
doesn't have to move much
because people flutter
around him. The lights
flicker, and the crowd moves
to a screening room to watch
Gun Fight, a
documentary on the nation's
firearms debate. The film
prominently features
Goddard, a survivor of the
April 2007 massacre at
Virginia Tech: he and the
other 16 students in his
French class heard a
commotion in another part of
the building. Their
professor ordered everyone
under their desks and told
someone to call 911.
Goddard dialed his cell
phone, whispering as Cho
(the gunman) burst into the
room, killing eleven
students and the professor.
That chilling experience
prompted Goddard to become
the Assistant Director of
Victims and Youth Advocacy
and Federal Legislation for
the Brady Campaign to
Prevent Gun Violence. He
has turned the trauma of
being shot four times into
something productive.
