Board of Directors

H. Melvin “Mel” Ming is a broadcast executive who has delivered enriching media and experiences to audiences for the past 35 years. Mel retired in 2014 from Sesame Workshop where he worked for 15 years, the last three years he was President and CEO overseeing the gold standard children’s program Sesame Street and its worldwide distribution. He previously held executive positions at the Museum of Television and Radio (now Paley Center for Media), WQED Media in Pittsburgh, WNET in New York City and NPR in Washington.

Mel was born in Bermuda and attended Temple University graduating with a B.A. in Accounting. He later served in the U. S. Army during the Vietnam War. Mel is a certified public accountant. Mel has served as an independent director of Westwood One radio and Dial Global. Mel believes that good media should inspire its users to have consistent benefits beyond mere entertainment. He is committed to the creation and distribution of media that teaches, images that inspire, and media experiences that build knowledge and skill that are life enhancing. Close.

Marilou Hyson is a national and international consultant on early child development and education.  She focuses on young children’s social and emotional development and has examined early childhood educational interventions and policies, emphasizing teacher professional development as a strategy for improving early learning environments and outcomes.

Internationally, Marilou has been a senior advisor to UNICEF, the World Bank, and Save the Children, supporting work in countries including Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Rwanda. She has advised on the development of teacher competency standards; the design and evaluation of professional development programs for teachers in low-income rural areas; and digital resources to support families with young children in Europe and Central Asia.

After serving as Professor and Chair of the University of Delaware’s Department of Individual and Family Studies, Marilou was Associate Executive Director for Professional Development at the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). Marilou previously served as editor-in-chief of Early Childhood Research Quarterly and co-chaired SRCD’s Policy and Communications Committee. She received a Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr College in child development and early childhood education and was an SRCD Fellow in the US Department of Education. Close.

Walter is a nationally recognized fiscal training and technical assistance consultant specializing in federally funded government and nonprofit organizations. Mr. Frye has extensive experience assisting clients with regulatory issues concerning governance, financial and administrative compliance with grants awarded by the Office of Head Start, Department of Health and Human Services. He has a wealth of knowledge in the application of grant regulations to both primary grantees and sub-contractors/ sub recipients. The Fiscal Institute, LLC conducts trainings for Head Start grantees n a nationwide  basis , and it is a frequent trainer at Regional and State Head Start Professional Development Conferences.

Since 2004 Frye has served some of the largest social service agencies providing Head Start services  in capacities as Interim Executive Director, Compliance Director, and Chief Financial Officer.

Earlier in his career Mr. Frye was the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Frye Williams & CO CPA, which became New Jersey’s largest minority-owned firm. He has been on the accounting faculty of Fairleigh Dickinson University and Essex County College and was Senior Auditor and Tax Accountant at Deloitte & Touche.

Frye received a B.S. from Morgan State University and an M.B.A. from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Frye is a life member of the Omega Psi Phi Fraternity. Close.

Dr. Cynthia García Coll is a Developmental Psychologist, who was a professor at Brown University for 30 years. Her research focuses on the interplay of sociocultural and biological influences on child development, with particular emphasis on at-risk and minority populations. She received her Ph.D. in Personality and Developmental Psychology from Harvard University. Dr. García Coll has served on the editorial boards of leading academic journals, including being the Senior Editor of Child Development and Developmental Psychology. She is a fellow of the American Psychological Association and the Association for Psychological Science and has received lifetime contributions awards from the Society of Behavioral and Developmental Pediatrics, Tufts University, Erikson  Institute, the Society for Research in Adolescence and the Society for Research in Child Development. She has been on the governing boards of the Rhode Island Foundation, the Society for Research in Child Development and the Foundation for Child Development, and served as member and chair of the Scholars Program at the W. T. Grant Foundation. Her research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the McArthur Foundation, the W. T. Grant Foundation, and Spencer Foundation. Close.

Dr. Elena Fuentes-Afflick obtained her undergraduate and medical degrees at the University of Michigan and a master’s degree in Public Health (Epidemiology) from the University of California, Berkeley. She completed her residency and chief residency at UCSF, followed by a research fellowship at the Phillip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies. Dr. Fuentes-Afflick’s scholarly work has focused on the broad themes of acculturation, immigrant health, health disparities, faculty misconduct, and faculty development. She has served in leadership roles in the Society for Pediatric Research (Council and President), the American Pediatric Society (Council and President), was elected to membership in the National Academy of Medicine in 2010 and has served on the Membership Committee, Diversity Committee, and was elected to the Governing Council and Executive Committee. Close.

Lynn A. Karoly is a RAND senior economist whose research has focused on the well-being of children, youth, and families; human capital investments from birth to adulthood; economic disparities; social welfare policy; and labor market behavior. Much of her recent research has focused on early care and education (ECE) programs, with studies on the use and quality of ECE programs, the system of publicly subsidized ECE programs, professional development for the ECE workforce, ECE quality rating and improvement systems, and ECE program cost and financing. Another area of her expertise is the application of benefit-cost analysis (BCA) and related tools such as cost analysis and cost-effectiveness analysis to social programs, with recent analyses of the economic returns to early childhood interventions and youth development programs. Other research has examined issues pertaining to poverty, inequality, immigration, welfare reform, self-employment, and retirement.

In addition to her research, Karoly served as director of RAND’s Office of Research Quality Assurance from 2004 to 2014 and director of RAND Labor and Population from 1995 to 2003. Her professional service includes roles as the 2017 president of the Society for Benefit-Cost Analysis and editorial positions for the Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis and The Journal of Human Resources. She was as a member of the National Academies of Sciences (NAS) Committee on Financing Early Care and Education with a Highly Qualified Workforce and previously served on the NAS committee that produced Advancing the Power of Economic Evidence to Inform Investments in Children, Youth, and Families (2016). Karoly received her Ph.D. in economics from Yale University. Close.

Tammy Mann currently has been involved in work at the national, state and local levels for the past 25 years focused on addressing the needs of children and families, especially those living in economic and socially challenged environments. For the past five years, Tammy has served as President and CEO of The Campagna Center, a nonprofit that provides cradle to career programs to over 2,000 children, teens and adults across the city of Alexandria. Prior to her work at The Campagna Center, she served Executive Director of the Frederick Patterson Research Institute and Deputy Executive Director at ZERO TO THREE.

In addition to serving on the board for the Foundation for Child Development, she was recently appointed to serve as the President of the Governing Board of the National Association for the Education of Young Children. She is also a member of the Board of Directors for the Alexandria Chamber of Commerce and the Buffet Early Childhood Institute. Tammy has addressed national and international audiences and authored books and articles on a wide variety of issues in the field of early childhood education and development. She is a former Public Policy Fellow with the American Psychological Association. Tammy earned her bachelor’s degree from Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia and completed her master’s and doctorate in clinical psychology, with an interdisciplinary specialization in infant studies, at Michigan State University. Currently she resides in Fairfax, Virginia. Close.

Professor McBride Murry has conducted research on African-American parents and youth for over a decade and identified proximal, malleable protective factors that deter emotional problems and risk engagement in youth. Using this information, she designed and implemented two randomized control trial, family-based preventive interventions programs, the Strong African American Families (SAAF) Program and the Pathways for African American Success (PAAS), and both have demonstrated efficacy in the enhancement of parenting and family processes as well as youths’ intrapersonal protective processes that, in turn, dissuaded youth from engaging in health compromising behaviors. A unique aspect of the PAAS program was the testing of technology as an alternative delivery modality for disseminating evidence-based programs in rural communities. Similar to SAAF, PAAS intervention effects were effective in delaying/deterring substance use and other risky behaviors by influencing parenting practices and youth protective factors (i.e. cognitive and emotional self-regulation), with greater programmatic effects demonstrated among families receiving the program via technology delivery format.  Her most research work focuses on merging neuroscience and prevention science to examine effects of PAAS on risk-taking/cognitive-control neural circuits and assess whether changes in these circuits correlate with changes in youth protective factors (i.e. improving self-regulation). Professor McBride Murry’s overarching goal is to disseminate her evidence-based preventive intervention programs for uptake in community-based organizations, as well as schools and primary health care settings and in faith-based organizations, and examine their efficacy and effectiveness in real-world settings.

Professor McBride Murry’s teaching has included, Diverse Populations, a graduate course to promote awareness of ways  which social injustice imposed on subpopulations of individuals, families, and communities perpetuates disadvantage and disparities, and Human Development and Prevention Science, designed to provide an interdisciplinary overview of prevention theories, research, and practice, as well as expand students’ understanding of the interconnectedness of context and human development to the design, development, and implementation of preventive intervention programs.

Professor McBride Murry is co-chair of Vanderbilt University Chancellor’s Appointed Mental Health and Well-Being Strategic Planning Committee, Peabody Faculty Council, and serves on several advisory boards and governing councils, including National Academy of Science, Society for Research on Child Development.  She is also on numerous editorial boards, including Journal of Child Development, Journal of Developmental Psychology, Journal of Applied Developmental Science, Journal of Family Psychology, Journal of Prevention Science

Professor McBride Murry is the Associate Director, Clinical Translational Science Award Community Engagement Core Close.

Deann Morgan

Deann is responsible for product governance, including approvals, pricing, and deployment of seed capital at Nuveen. She collaborates with partners across Nuveen and TIAA and leads a global team overseeing product strategy, analytics, development and management. Deann is a senior contact for Nuveen and TIAA Fund Boards and is a member of the Management Committee.

Prior to joining the firm, Deann led her own consultancy, advising investment firms on FinTech, alternatives and wealth management. She was Head of Product Structuring in the Private Wealth Management business of The Blackstone Group as well as the Chief Operating Officer of that firm’s Multi-Asset Investing unit. Prior to that, she spent seven years in senior alternatives roles at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, including CEO of Merrill Lynch Alternative Investments and Head of Alternatives Investments Origination and Product Management. Additionally, Deann led Merrill Lynch’s Thailand investment banking business after working throughout the Asian region in the Financial Institutions Group and provided strategic advice to financial institutions throughout Asia as a Booz Allen & Hamilton consultant.

Deann graduated with an undergraduate business degree from the University of Michigan (High Dist) and an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago (High Hons) and she holds the CFA designation. Close.

Joseph Tobin is the Elizabeth Garrard Hall Professor of Early Childhood Education at the University of Georgia. He has previously taught at Arizona State University, University of Hawaii, and the University of New Hampshire and is an AERA Fellow. His research interests include cross-cultural studies of early childhood education, immigration and education, children and the media, preschool teaching expertise, and qualitative research methods and especially video-based methods for studying young children, preschool teachers, and preschools. He has led four multinational research projects on preschools, with significant funding from the Spencer Foundation and the Bernard van Leer Foundation and supervised 30 doctoral students, some of whom are now professors of early childhood education at research universities. Tobin’s books include Preschool in Three Cultures (Yale University Press, 1989); Making a Place for Pleasure in Early Childhood Education (Yale University Press, 1993); Pikachu’s Global Adventure: The Rise and Fall of Pokemon (Duke University Press, 2000); Good Guys Don’t Wear Hats: Children’s Talk about the Media (Teachers College Press, 2003); Preschool in Three Cultures Revisited (University of Chicago Press, 2009); Children Crossing Borders: Immigrant Parents and Teacher Perspectives on Preschool for Children of Immigrants (2013); Teaching Embodied: Japanese Preschool Teaching as Cultural Practice (University of Chicago Press, 2015) and Preschool and Im/migrants in Five Countries (Peter Lang, 2016). His current research projects include “Deaf Kindergarten’s in Three Countries: France, Japan, and the United States” and “The Development of Expertise in Preschool Teachers in Three Cultures: Japan, China, and the United States.” Close.