2022 Keynotes

2022 Day 1: Light in the well: A message of hope through music and creative storytelling

View the recording of the Day 1 Keynote on CEED’s YouTube channel.

Light in the Well is a multi-sensory event, weaving together symphony movements and the real-life stories of people with disabilities. Its purpose is to honor people with disabilities and their families by sharing their stories through music, and spreading hope to those who are on the same journey. The project uses storytelling through music as a way to build bridges and invite people into the conversation of hope. Instead of being the audience, people with disabilities are featured, telling their own stories and performing along with professional musicians.

The Light in the Well team envisions a future that embraces the diversity and inclusion of people with disabilities in society, whether they are in school, working, or simply living in the community. The mission of Light in the Well is to enrich lives and influence culture through creative music experiences and storytelling that connect people with and without developmental disabilities. 

In this keynote presentation, Wu provided an overview of how Light in the Well came about, what it is, and the impact it had on the audience and participants after the first show debuted on October 3rd, 2021. Through sharing these experiences, Wu offered insightful takeaways for anyone working with or on behalf of young children with disabilities and their families.

The next show is scheduled on October 16th, 2022, at the Landmark Center in St. Paul, MN. Please follow us on our social media and stay tuned!

To learn more about Light in the Well, please visit these sites:

Light in the Well

MacPhail Center for Music’s Light in the Well

Meet an IAS Collaborative: Fostering Understanding and Promoting Inclusion for Individuals with Disabilities

Telling Disability Stories Through Music

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Keynote Presenter

Yue Wu  Yue Wu, Music Therapist

Yue Wu is a music therapist at MacPhail Center for Music, and PhD candidate at the Rehabilitation Science program of the University of Minnesota Medical School. She is a board-certified music therapist and Neurologic Music Therapy fellow. Currently, Wu serves on the American Music Therapy Association International Relations Committee. She is a past Minnesota Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities (MNLEND) fellow, and a research assistant on a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) award. 

Wu is passionate about enriching the lives of individuals by building therapeutic relationships through music. Her music therapy work was featured in an upcoming documentary called Sing for You. Her piano performance was featured at the MacPhail Faculty Recitals and A Winter’s Toast in 2021. Wu has been invited to present at national and international conferences, as well as providing workshops in China on music therapy and rehabilitation related topics. 

To learn more about Wu, please check out the following links:

Transforming Healthcare and Empowering People with Disabilities–Portfolio

Small Moments, Big Accomplishments

2022 Day 2: Reconceptualizing “training” as “professional formation” in promoting social and emotional development

View the recording of the Day 2 keynote on CEED’s YouTube channel. 

The teaching and helping professions in infant and early childhood mental health, continually evolve in their discernment of effective models of pedagogy and epistemology, by attempting to answer two principal questions: 1) “How do we best teach about our discipline?”, and 2) “How do learners best come to know what they know.”  This presentation questions common methods of professional development which frequently rely on “training” that focuses on transmission of core knowledge and on the development of skills, viewed as derivatives of that core knowledge. Such an approach fails to adequately recognize and apply the science of interpersonal processes and the affective and interpersonal context of our work. The concept of “Formation” will be introduced and explained as a model that embodies notions of “integration”, “personal unfolding”, layered knowledge of “self”, and three interrelated “ways” of development: knowing, doing and being. 

Keynote Presenter

Gerard Costa Gerard Costa, PhD, IMH-E®

Gerard Costa served as the founding director of the Center for Autism and Early Childhood Mental Health, and a Professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning at Montclair State University. He is a member of the faculty of the Infant and Early Childhood Development (IECD) Ph.D. program at Fielding University (formerly the ICDL Graduate School). He serves as a trustee and President of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning, founded by Drs. Stanley Greenspan and Serena Wieder, and has served as a consultant to ZERO TO THREE for the past 20+ years. He is one of the first 16 “Expert Faculty” selected by ZERO TO THREE in the new DC: 0-5 (2016) Classification system. He sits on several state and non-profit boards and was appointed by two New Jersey Governors to serve on the New Jersey Council for Young Children, where he headed the Infancy and Early Childhood Mental Health committee.

He received his Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology from Temple University and was one of the first 16 recipients of the DIR certificate by Dr. Stanley Greenspan and Dr. Serena Wieder. He is a trained faculty member in the Brazelton Touchpoints Model and holds a “Self-Reg” Certificate from the MEHRIT Center in Canada, led by Dr. Stuart Shanker. He holds an endorsement as an Infant Mental Health Clinical Mentor, through the New Jersey Association for Infant Mental Health and Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health. He led a 4-year Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health systems development project in partnership with Child Development Services of Wyoming and the Wyoming Developmental Disabilities Division and is the principal author of a 15 module Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health training curriculum. He led a multi-year training and consultation project with 25 Infant Mental Health mentors with South Dakota Voices for Children, and he led a strategic planning initiative with the Missouri Association for Infant Mental Health-Early Childhood. He has presented keynotes, workshops and trainings at hundreds of events and programs. Since 2018, he serves as the Coordinator of the Northeast Regional Terrorism and Disaster Coalition. He served as the Principal Investigator of the New Jersey Inclusive Education Technical Assistance (NJIETA) project, an $8 Million, 5 ½ year project advancing full inclusion in New Jersey Public Schools. He is past president of the NJ Association for Infant Mental Health, and is President of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning (ICDL).

Dr. Costa has been honored with numerous awards including the Christian Kjeldsen Champion for Children Award by the NJ Child Care Advisory Council, the Lucille Weistuch Early Childhood Special Education Award, by the New Jersey Division for Early Childhood (NJDEC), and the Golden Bell Leadership Award, by the New Jersey Mental Health Association. He has conducted presentations and trainings in 31 states and 11 countries, and he is the recipient of numerous awards. He is a NJ licensed psychologist and is the author of articles and book chapters on autism, infant mental health and professional formation. He is the 2021 recipient of the Weatherston Leadership in Infant Mental Health Award, from the Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health.

Past Keynotes

Visit our YouTube channel to view keynotes from previous Summer Institutes.