Amy Miller, M.A., CCC-SLP

Teach Social Silicon Valley Clinic Director

Amy Miller received her Bachelor and Master of Arts degree from the University of Kansas in Speech and Language Pathology. As a graduate student, she was selected as a participant for the Communication and Autism Project. Her masters thesis “The Double Interview Task: Assessing The Social Communication of Children with Asperger Syndrome” sparked her interest in working with individuals with social cognitive deficits and lead her to her current job at Michelle Garcia Winner’s Center for Social Thinking, where she has been since 2004. Her experience includes being a member of the assessment team, presenting poster sessions, speaking, and leading a round table discussion at both local and national conferences. Other fun facts include her love for the outdoors, but unfortunately the outdoors don't love her as evidenced by her many episodes of poison oak and a few broken bones. She considers the rest of the Teach SOCIAL! team her family even when they are giving her a hard time about the above mentioned afflictions as well as a long list of various other imperfections. She is currently serving as Teach SOCIAL! Clinic Director and will do her best to stay in one piece.

Randi Dodge, MS, CCC-SLP

Randi Dodge received her Bachelors and Masters Degree in Speech Pathology from California State University, Northridge. She has worked as part of the team at Michelle G. Winner’s Center For Social Thinking Inc., in San Jose, since 2003. The Center provides a range of services including social thinking groups, assessments, consultations and trainings for clients ranging from ages 3- adulthood.

Prior to working at this Center, she worked for 3 years for the San Leandro Unified School District. Her caseload at SLUSD included working with students on the autism spectrum, including those with Asperger Syndrome, students with speech and language and learning disabilities.

She is currently the senior therapist and her responsibilities include: leading many of the social thinking groups, staff training, school observations and consultations, school district trainings in the Northern CA area on various topics related to social thinking and co- trainer to other professionals that participate in the Mentorship Program at the Center. She is a passionate and dynamic therapist who has a real gift for breaking down and explaining complex concepts to students, parents, staff and professionals. She has also developed a 6 week long training class for parents whose children suffer with anxiety.

Deborah Hoffman, MA, CCC-SLP

Director of the Purposeful Play Program

Deborah Hoffman is delighted to be part of the team at the Center for Social Thinking. She gets to spend her day doing what she loves best, playing with great kids and their parents. Deborah began her journey to CST in the late 70's training with Dr. Ivar Lovaas in the autism project at UCLA. She enjoyed teaching language skills and social skills to children with autism so much, and found it so rewarding, that she asked Dr Lovaas how she could make this type of work her career path. Following her BA in Psychology from UCLA, he advised her to get her Masters Degree in Speech Language Pathology, from California State University at Northridge, and so she did! Now, more than 20 years later, Deborah still enjoys her work and brings tremendous knowledge and experience to the Clinic. Deborah has worked in private practice and the public school system. She has presented at workshops and has been a mentor to new speech language pathologists. Deborah's first love continues to be working with preschool aged children with social skill deficits. She loves engaging children in purposeful play and watching their faces light up with the fun of positive playful interaction with others; while at the same time, being an educator to their parents. She brings to the group her experience as a preschool teacher and parent, her warmth and enthusiasm, her knowledge of social skill development and experience working with children with autism spectrum disorders. Deborah makes therapy fun and engaging for the children and their parents.

Susan Day, MA, CCC-SLP

“It feels like home”, says Sue Day after having the privilege of working for Michelle at the Center for Social Thinking for the past 5 years. This tremendous staff of “dedicated, talented and wonderful professionals” creates an atmosphere which continues to provide services to children and adults having social – cognitive deficits which are “cutting edge”. Sue obtained her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Speech and Language Pathology in 1976 and 1978, respectively. The Bachelor’s was obtained in her “hometown” of New Orleans, Louisiana and Master’s at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, N.C. After working in the public school system for 2 ½ years, she entered private practice - and never left. She has worked in and with a variety of public and private schools in the Bay Area since moving to California in 1984. Sue’s professional strengths are her extensive experience with language problems of all types in children and adults as well as her ability to work with families and other professionals to incorporate methods and strategies into the “real life” environments of home, school and community. Immersion into the world of social – cognition at this clinic over the past 5 years is considered to be the apex of her career.

Ryan Hendrix, MS, CCC-SLP

Ryan received her bachelor's degree in psychology with a minor in art therapy and master's degree in speech-language pathology from the University of Arizona. While at the U of A, Ryan met Dr. Pam Crooke, who introduced her to the unpredictable, quirky world of social thinking. Having grown up with a close family friend with Asperger Syndrome, the lessons resonated strongly with her. Ryan led social cognitive groups throughout graduate school, and together with Pam, authored a published journal article discussing the results of a pilot study examining the efficacy of social thinking therapy. Following graduation, Ryan continued implementing social thinking principles with preschoolers through adolescents in the Tucson community. When opportunity knocked, she followed Pam west to the Center for Social Thinking in December of 2007. Ryan's artistic and creative talents allow her to present lessons in a visual, fun, and engaging manner. She spends her free time reading, thinking about practicing yoga, and exploring the bay area and has an unexplainable affinity for elephants, especially pink ones!

Kari (Zweber) Palmer, MA, CCC-SLP

Kari received her Bachelors in Communication Science and Disorders from the University of Missouri and Master of Arts in Speech Language Pathology from the University of Kansas. As a graduate student, she participated in the Communication and Autism Project, a training program offering specialized education in the area of autism spectrum disorders. Her master’s thesis “The Double Interview: Assessing the Social Communication of Adolescents with Asperger Syndrome” is based off of Michelle Garcia Winner’s social thinking assessment protocol. She has presented the findings at various professional conferences. Kari worked as a school-based speech language pathologist for several years in Minnetonka, Minnesota. In 2007, Kari joined the staff at the Center for Social Thinking to pursue her strong interest in working with students of all ages with social cognitive deficits. Kari thoroughly enjoys the warmer winters life in California brings and the amazing opportunity to be a part of this talented team!

Jenny Gorton, MA, CFY (New to TSSV)

Jenny's Biography will be added in the fall when she begins!

Cathy Hart

Office Manager

Cathy has worked at the Center for Social Thinking since the clinic began in 1999. She is Michelle's administrative assistant and the CST office manager. Prior to coming to CST, she worked for many years in corporate Silicon Valley as an executive secretary and department secretary before taking time to raise her family. Cathy is generally the first personal contact for families calling into the clinic. Her duties include the initial interview, maintenance of client files and information, overseeing the client billing, maintaining clinic schedules and a myriad of other tasks to help keep the clinic running as smoothly as possible. She has learned a great deal about social cognitive deficits since coming to the clinic and feels fortunate to be working with a team of professionals who are intelligent, inspiring, compassionate, a lot of fun to be around and who are making a positive difference in a tangible way. Cathy has been married to her husband Robert for 24 years and they have three wonderful daughters

Ruth Peery

Accounting Manager

During her high school years, Ruth worked at her father's electronics company where she learned the basics of accounting. After her father retired and sold his company in 1995, Ruth worked at a machine shop and a computer peripheral company in Silicon Valley. Inspired by the fact that Ruth's husband and her three adult children had their college degrees, Ruth decided to go back to school to get her degree. Within days after graduation, Ruth gladly accepted the job at the CST. Ruth considers it a privilege to be a part of the CST team as she has a tender heart that extends to the clients that are dealing with social cognitive deficiencies. Ruth has enjoyed working at the clinic for the past two years where top-notch therapists are helping people in our community. Her duties include accounts receivable, accounts payable, payroll, insurance, conferences and monthly account reconciliations.

Debbie La Croix
Office Manager in training

New to TSSV