Clymer Bardsley
Clymer Bardsley has more than 25 years of experience as a lawyer, mediator, trainer and coach. Throughout his career he has helped thousands of individuals to increase their conflict management and resolution skills for the benefit of both their personal and professional lives.
Clymer learned conflict resolution, mediation, and the underlying theories from some of the leading scholars and practitioners in the United States from the Good Shepherd Mediation Program in Philadelphia, The Kukin Program for Dispute Resolution at Cardozo School of Law in New York City, and The Moritz College of Law’s Program on Dispute Resolution at The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. During this time, he taught hundreds of people how to skillfully mediate conflicts, and he mediated over 500 disputes for organizations, the courts, communities, and families. Additionally, he has trained organizational heads and employees to become better problem solvers and negotiators, thereby empowering them and those around them to achieve better outcomes. Inspired by assisting people through difficult situations and training them to prevent conflicts from escalating, Clymer established the Bardsley Group in 2016.
Clymer is on the faculty at Drexel University’s Kline School of Law, Temple University’s School of Education and Human Development, and the Morton Deutsch International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution at Columbia University’s Teacher’s College.
Additionally, Clymer has conducted trainings, courses, and presentations for the United States Army, the Philadelphia Police Department, and school leaders from around the country. He has presented at University of Pennsylvania’s Law School and School of Education, as well as schools throughout the Philadelphia School District. He has worked with the Philadelphia’s Police Athletic League, Parks Department, Department of Human Services, and has worked in Philadelphia Family Court with hundreds of parents in managing custody and related parenting matters. He has also served as both a mediator and a settlement official for the Federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and facilitates abuse and neglect matters in Philadelphia Family Court.
Clymer earned his law degree from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York and his B.A. in History from Middlebury College.
Jean M. Biesecker, J.D., MSW
Jean’s family law and dispute resolution practice serves clients in the greater Philadelphia community. Her dual degree in law and social work from T.C. Williams School of Law and Virginia Commonwealth University opened the door to a family law career that spans over 30 years. The focus of her practice is non-traditional, problem-solving approaches, providing clients with support and compassion to understand legal issues and to determine solutions that will meet current needs and those of their family and children into the future. Her services include Collaborative Law, mediation and unbundled legal services. Jean has been a Mediator and Facilitator in Special Education matters for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s Office of Dispute Resolution since 2011.
Jean is passionate about her continuing work with kids and families as they adjust to the inevitable transitions of separation and divorce as well as transitions in educational settings. Through non-court processes, she has helped hundreds of families navigate the emotional course of restructuring their parenting relationships, and countless educators and parents achieve positive results despite polarizing positions, moving from seemingly intractable positions to mutual understandings and agreements.
In addition to her private practice and as a Mediator/Facilitator in Special Education matters, she is a member of the Mainline Outreach Task Force to improve domestic violence outreach; former Leader of Second Saturday Divorce Workshop for Women and Men; a Parent Coordinator; past Vice-Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association Collaborative Law Committee and past Co-Chair of the Montgomery County Bar Association Collaborative Law Committee; member of the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals, Association for Conflict Resolution, Pennsylvania Council of Mediators and Association of Family and Conciliation Courts; former Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Mediation Clinic and James Beasley School of Law’s Clinical Custody Mediation Program.
Millicent Carvalho-Grevious
Since 2016, Millicent Carvalho-Grevious, Ph.D., LSW, has served as an Equal Employment Manager and EEO Director for a DoD agency. She specializes in EEO complaint resolution and diversity and inclusion training. Previously, she served as a special education contract mediator for the Office of Dispute Resolution for almost 15 years and as a department chair and associate professor in academia. Dr. Carvalho-Grevious founded the Pennsylvania Conflict Resolution and Mediation Services, Inc. in 2002. Dr. Carvalho-Grevious earned her doctorate in Social Work, Master of Social Science (MSW), and Master of Law and Social Policy degrees from Bryn Mawr College. In addition, she received her Master of Education degree from Boston University and her B.A. degree (in Psychology) from La Salle University.
In a legal precedent case before the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, Dr. Carvalho-Grevious made it easier for plaintiffs, at the prima facia stage of a Title VII retaliation claim, to survive summary judgment in discrimination lawsuits. On March 21, 2017, the Third District unanimously reversed a lower court decision that the “likely reason” legal standard and not “but for cause” should be applied during summary judgment as previously set forth by the Supreme Court, making complainants’ voices important in EEO cases.
Cheryl Cutrona
Cheryl Cutrona is the CEO of Resolutionary Services. She has been an ADR professional since 1986 providing mediation, arbitration, training, conflict coaching, group facilitation, facilitated dialogues, and consulting. Her subject areas of expertise are employment, family law, special education, and discrimination. Her training areas of expertise include conflict resolution, conflict coaching, mediation, and restorative processes.
Cutrona teaches Conflict Management in the Workplace as an adjunct for Temple University Klein College of Media and Communication (2018-present). She taught Mediation Advocacy and Practice at Temple University Beasley School of Law from 2004-1016. She has also offered mediation and mediation-related training for a variety of clients including the Bucks County Bar Association, Chester County Bar Association, Philadelphia Bar Association, Michigan Bar Association, and the Pennsylvania Bar Institute. Internationally, she has trained in South Africa, Guam, France, and Israel.
Cutrona mediates for a variety of clients and serves on the rosters of the U.S. Postal Service REDRESS and the EEOC Philadelphia Region (for both private and federal sectors). She arbitrates consumer disputes for the Better Business Bureau and DeMars Associates. Cutrona has contracted with the Pennsylvania Department of Education Office for Dispute Resolution (ODR) since 1988 where she has served as a special education mediator, IEP Facilitator, Resolution Meeting Facilitator, and Special Education Hearing Officer. Between 1991 and 2019, Cutrona was the Executive Director of Good Shepherd Mediation Program in Philadelphia, where she served as the lead curriculum developer and trainer. She is a writer and former Editor in Chief of Labor Relations Press. She has published numerous articles on mediation and related subjects.
Cutrona is a member of the Pennsylvania Council of Mediators, the Pennsylvania Bar Association ADR Committee (formerly co-chair), the Greater Delaware Valley Chapter of the Association for Conflict Resolution, and the National Association of Hearing Officials. In 2019, she retired from the Editorial Board of Conflict Resolution Quarterly after serving as a volunteer editor from 2001 to 2020. In 2015, she retired from the Pennsylvania Council of Mediators Board of Directors after 20 years of service.
Her honors include receiving the 2008 “Sir Francis Bacon Dispute Resolution Award” from Pennsylvania Bar Association Alternative Dispute Resolution Committee, the 2010 “Most Valuable Peacemaker” award from the Pennsylvania Council of Mediators, and a 2019 “Shepherd of Peace” award from the Good Shepherd Mediation Program.
Cutrona holds a BA from Michigan State University, a Masters in Library Science from Wayne State University, and a JD from Temple University, Beasley School of Law.
Ellen J. DeBenedetti, M.Ed.
Ellen has been a mediator since 1990. She began her career in mediation at a community mediation center and is now a mediator in private practice. She also has mediated for Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, United States Postal Service, PA Department of Education (special education mediations), Key Bridge Foundation (Department of Justice ADA mediations), Transportation Security Administration and U.S. District Court Western Division and the UPMC Intermediation Program. From 1997-2010, she was the training coordinator/senior mediator at Dialogue and Resolution Center of CVVC (formerly Pittsburgh Mediation Center), where her primary responsibilities included training in conflict management, mediation, team building and diversity issues, conflict coaching, and mediating some of the more complex and multi-party mediations.
Ellen has been training mediators since 1992. Ellen has taught mediation courses at Duquesne University and California University of PA. She designed and taught the original “Methods of Resolving Conflict Course” for the Duquesne University sociology department’s certificate program in conflict resolution and peacemaking. She participated in the Pittsburgh Public Schools mediation training, co-authored the “Keys to Peaceful Conflict Resolution” curriculum and taught that curriculum as a volunteer at East Hills Elementary School. Ellen has been on the boards of the Pennsylvania Council of Mediators, The Mediation Council of Western PA and Just Meditation Pittsburgh. She is certified by the Institute for the Study of Conflict Transformation to be a mediator.
In addition to her career in mediation, Ellen was a special education teacher for 20 years. She views mediation as an opportunity for the people involved to have a constructive conversation and to make decisions about the issues that they face.
Barry P. Fell
Barry’s career in special education spans more than 35 years and has been primarily focused upon educational services to the deaf and hard-of-hearing population, infants through adults, and to students who are blind with other severe disabilities. Barry began his career at the Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf, where he first worked as a dormitory supervisor and later as a vocational counselor, parent/infant administrator, and assistant superintendent. At the Western Pennsylvania School for Blind Children, he served in administrative capacities involving personnel, operations, and supervision of student transportation and other related services. From the University of Pittsburgh, Barry holds a bachelor’s degree, certification in deaf education, and a master’s degree in public administration with a certificate in personnel and labor relations. From Cornell University, Barry holds a certificate in collective bargaining. Barry received his mediation training from the Good Shepard Mediation Center in Philadelphia.
Constance Fox Lyttle PhD, JD
Attorney Lyttle has devoted her career to advancing inclusive education and advocating for the legal rights of exceptional children. She began her academic journey at The Ohio State University, where she majored in secondary education (speech communication and theatre) and teaching children with visual impairments (K-12). She later earned a Master of Arts in Teaching, specializing in visual impairments and learning disabilities, from Peabody College at Vanderbilt University. Following this, she taught at a Florida elementary magnet school as a Special Education Consultant Resource Teacher and directed the ‘Brevard County Program for Blind and Visually Impaired Adults.’
Her career path led her to Duquesne University, where she spent a decade teaching both general and special education courses as a tenured special education faculty member. In addition, as a Mainstreaming higher education curriculum specialist, Constance consulted with numerous universities, school districts, and state Departments of Education and Vocational Rehabilitation. During this time, she completed her PhD at the University of Pittsburgh, and earned her JD, with distinction, from Duquesne University, where she served on Law Review.
Transitioning from her academic career, Constance joined the Pittsburgh-based law firm, Kirkpatrick and Lockhart (now K&L Gates), to practice general law and represent school districts in special education matters. After marriage and relocating to the New York City area, and northeastern Pennsylvania, she served for seven years as a Pennsylvania Special Education Hearing Officer and over 13 years as a Special Education Appeals Review Panel Hearing Officer.
Following the dissolution of the PA Special Education Appeals Panels in 2010, Dr. Lyttle returned to academia, taking on the role of Clinical Professor of Special Education at Drexel University. In this capacity, she developed the Collaborative Special Education Law and Process Master’s Concentration and Post-Baccalaureate Certificate, both of which focus on early dispute resolution and special education advocacy. She simultaneously holds roles as a Pennsylvania IEP/IFSP Facilitator, Resolution Meeting Facilitator, and PA’s Evaluative Mediator, while also leading Special Education Law Solutions, a freelance alternative dispute resolution consulting firm that helps families and Local Education Agencies (LEAs) resolve special education disputes collaboratively.
Barbara Foxman, M.S.W.
Barbara Foxman is a licensed clinical social worker, psychotherapist and mediator. She specializes in the treatment of children and adolescents with special needs including learning differences, issues of bereavement and loss, and the impact of divorce on children and adults. She has worked with schools for educational planning of the children that she sees. Ms. Foxman has also worked as a therapist with children and their families at Southern Home for Children in Philadelphia, the Devereux Foundation, Bryn Mawr Hospital (youth and family psychotherapy program), and in private practice. Ms. Foxman mediates in school settings for special education, elder mediation, family, divorce, EEOC matters including ADA issues, and community mediation. Ms. Foxman has presented workshops on values and ethics for social workers, ethics in health care, and ethical standards for mediators. She has been a trainer for elder mediation, conflict resolution in various settings including hospitals, peer mediation in schools, and in community settings. She has also made presentations on areas of loss, bereavement, and health care issues for court-mandated custody programs, and in other health care settings. Ms. Foxman has a master’s degree in social work from Wayne State University and has been a mediator and therapist for over 25 years.
Thomas Frost
Mr. Frost is a special education mediator for the Office for Dispute Resolution. He has been active in the field of special education for over 35 years. He served as a special education mediator in the State of New Jersey for 15 years. He is certified as a special education mediator by the Atlanta Justice Center. He has served as a director of special education in both Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Mr. Frost holds degrees from St. Joseph’s University in Philadelphia, Southern Connecticut University and Rowan University. Mr. Frost recently retired from an intermediate unit where he served as a professional development specialist working with parents and school staff. Mr. Frost facilitated a local task force on the right to education for four years. He also served as a county interagency coordinator bringing together mental health agencies and school districts to support individual student’s education as appropriate and necessary.
Ruth Furman
Ms. Furman has dedicated her career to serving students with disabilities for over 45 years. She received both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in speech and hearing sciences from the University of Maryland. Ms. Furman began her career dually certified as a speech-language pathologist and teacher of the deaf and hard-of-hearing. Ms. Furman has worked in various school districts throughout southeastern Pennsylvania as a speech-language pathologist, special education teacher, and Director of Special Education. She spent the last 12 years of her career working for the Pennsylvania Department of Education’s Bureau of Special Education (BSE) as a Special Education Advisor. Ms. Furman was responsible for investigating special education complaints and ensuring local education agencies (LEA) compliance with state and federal special education regulations. During her tenure at the BSE, Ms. Furman investigated over 600 complaints and facilitated over 250 resolutions between complainants and LEAs.
In addition, Ms. Furman volunteers on her local community’s Youth Aide Panel, where she works with first-time youth offenders to facilitate a restorative justice resolution.
Ms. Furman received her mediation training from the Good Shepard Mediation Center in Philadelphia and from the Center of Resolution in Media, PA.
Nancy Geist Giacomini, Ed.D.
Nancy Geist Giacomini, EdD (she/her pronouns) has been a contract mediator and facilitator with the PA Office for Dispute Resolution for over 10 years. Prior to this she mediated special education disputes and facilitated dialogue in Delaware with the Conflict Resolution Program, part of the University of Delaware’s Institute for Public Administration. Nancy teaches online graduate conflict and human resource management curriculum and provides subject matter expertise as a published author, editor, and thought leader in the field. In 2020 Nancy volunteered to mediate for the City of Philadelphia Eviction Diversion Program to ease landlord/tenant COVID hardship under the direction of CORA Good Shepherd Mediation. Today she provides administrative leadership as the full-time CGSM senior program manager and landlord liaison maintaining a weekly mediation calendar of 70+ remote sessions. The Eviction Diversion Program is credited with reducing eviction filing rates in the City by nearly half and continues to serve as a national model.
Nancy earned her terminal degree in educational leadership at the University of Delaware. Doctoral research, “Enhancing the Collaborative Capacity of Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) in Delaware Schools”, helped shape sustained state-wide IEP facilitation and training. Nancy holds degrees in counseling and psychology and training certificates across conflict resolution process options including IEP and group facilitation, conflict coaching, mediation, restorative victim/offender conferences and higher education due process hearings. She is certified to administer the Conflict Dynamics Profile (CDP) and teach Becoming Conflict Competent curriculum developed by Eckerd College.
Dr. Giacomini’s conflict practice is grounded in educational, restorative and social justice values. Her allyship and advocacy journey began at the University of Delaware while assistant dean of students responsible for student conduct administration. Over a decade of campus leadership included chairing and advising the inaugural student mediation committee, appellate judicial board, council for student judicial affairs and sexual assault awareness weeks. She provided direct support to students, families and faculty related to conflict, crisis, and disability. Nancy’s leadership beyond campus included careerlong service in the Association for Student Conduct Administration (ASCA) where she provided leadership as elected president, conference and training institute chair, foundation board member, conflict resolution and diversity task force strategic planning, and community of practice for women founder/chair. Nancy was awarded the institutional award for women’s equity for campus advocacy related to diversity, access and inclusion and the ASCA Gehring award for sustained leadership.
Catherine Greenstein
Catherine Greenstein became an educator after an initial career in architectural design and city planning. Watching her own children grow and develop, she became fascinated with how differently each of them learned. This led her to pursue her master’s of science degree in education, with an emphasis in special education from St. Joseph’s University, and eventually to a certificate in the supervision of special education from the University of Pittsburgh, while working and raising a family.
She developed a passion for mediating from her early days in education, where she has worked with families and schools in thousands of IEP meetings. This passion continued during her years of teaching and supervising special education. She taught in the School District of Philadelphia, YouthBuild Philadelphia Charter School, the Wallingford-Swarthmore School District, and the former Southern Homes Residential Treatment Facility. She has had 17 combined years of experience supervising special education at Einstein Academy Charter School, Pennsylvania Virtual Charter School, and the William Penn School District, from which she retired in the fall of 2020. She has also navigated the waters of special education as a parent of a child with an IEP.
Catherine’s formal mediation training is through CORA Good Shepherd Mediation and the Center for Resolution (based in Delaware and Montgomery Counties). Retirement has freed her to pursue her passion for mediation work. She volunteers with CORA and has worked for Pennsylvania’s Office for Dispute Resolution since 2022. In 2024 she was tapped to provide IDEA mediations for Guam’s Department of Education.
Catherine believes in the healing powers of mediation and restorative justice. She looks forward to working with families and LEAs to help restore relationships and create agreements between disputing parties.
Jean Lupariello, Esquire
Jean M. Lupariello is an Attorney/Mediator with a private practice in mediation and collaborative law. She has been a court –appointed mediator in the custody department of the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas for the past 19 years and has been appointed as a Parenting Coordinator and a Guardian Ad Litem by the Family Court judges on many cases. She is also a contract mediator for the Housing Authority of the City of Pittsburgh. Attorney Lupariello has spent many years representing families in Juvenile Court where she is involved with the agencies and resources ordered for children with special needs. She also attends and provides input at IEP meetings as an Educational Guardian for dependent children. As a Special Education Mediator with the Office for Dispute Resolution, Attorney Lupariello participates in ongoing training to expand her knowledge about special education and the regulations that ensure a child’s right to a free and appropriate public education. She has been a special education mediator with the Office for Dispute Resolution since 2007.
Dr. Vicki McGinley
Dr. McGinley was trained in the early 1990s in Conflict Resolution, specifically Mediation through the Atlanta Justice Center and as a Due Process Hearing Officer through the Office for Dispute Resolution in Pennsylvania. She has practiced in both capacities since, specifically Mediation in Pennsylvania and Due Process in the State of Delaware. Added to that work is her ongoing past work as a Due Process Hearing officer for both special education and gifted cases, a University Fact Finder for discrimination and harassment cases brought forth at the university level, and her more recent present work as an IEP Facilitator through the Office for Dispute Resolution and Ombudsperson and Mediator for West Chester University.
She received her BA from the University of Pittsburgh in Secondary Education/English, and her M.Ed. and Ph.D. from Temple University in Special Education. She has added much professional development for her work, such as in legal issues in special education, restorative justice, technology, and communication disorders to name a few. Past professional work includes teaching in the K-12 classroom, in-home, and school therapeutic work and supervision. When not involved in Conflict Resolution, Dr. McGinley can be found training future teachers at West Chester University. She teaches courses in Legal Issues in Special Education, Family Systems, and Behavior Management among others.
Volunteer work has included Mediation, as well as serving as a Court Appointed Special Advocate. She is a member of numerous professional organizations, including the PA Council of Mediators.
She is passionate about supporting settlement agreements in Mediation as she believes this is the best outcome for Dispute Resolution.
Gerald Powers, Ed., D., Professor Emeritus
Dr. Powers has over 55 years’ experience in special education (1964 to present). This experience included elementary and secondary classroom teaching, program supervision, administration, undergraduate and graduate teaching, grant reviews, LEA program evaluations, grant mentorships, mediations, IEP facilitations, and resolution conferences. Dr. Powers served two terms on the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Speech and Hearing Licensure Board (chairman twice) and 13 years on the Bloomsburg Area District School Board (president twice).
Dr. Powers served as the primary advisor/mentor of over 200 graduate degree research projects in special education. He has reviewed over 400 personnel preparation grants for OSEP funding and he has mentored over 60 OSEP grant applications for the Monarch Project. Dr. Powers has also performed compliance reviews/ monitoring of over 170 LEA programs in special education for the Pennsylvania Bureau of Special Education.
Dr. Powers was trained in mediation by the Justice Center of Atlanta. Following this training, Dr. Powers conducted over 300 special education mediations, 35 IEP facilitations, and five resolution meeting facilitations.
Dr. Powers has an undergraduate degree in history/pre-law from the University of Massachusetts (1962), a master’s degree in special education from the University of New Hampshire (1965), and an earned doctorate in special education administration from the University of Northern Colorado (1971).
Dr. Powers completed over 28 years as a professor in special education at Bloomsburg University. Dr. Powers was awarded professor emeritus status from Bloomsburg University in 1999.
Jane Rigler, Esquire
Jane Rigler was a law school faculty member, for 27 years, with a professional interest in labor negotiation, mediation, and civil rights. She has been an arbitrator, mediator, facilitator, and fact-finder, in a wide variety of cases, for more than 35 years and joined the ODR’s roster of mediators early in 2015. Her residence is in Carlisle.
Janice G. Seidenfeld
Janice G. Seidenfeld has been a mediator since 1993. Janice has contracted with the Office for Dispute Resolution since 2000, for whom she is a special education mediator and facilitator. In her private practice, she mediates family, divorce, custody, elder, business, community, and victim offender (adult and juvenile) issues. Janice serves as a mediator for the Key Bridge Foundation (Department of Justice ADA mediations), U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania and the Office of Victim Advocates for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Janice is on the board of the Mediation Council of Western PA and volunteers at the Center for Victims. She received a master’s degree in special education from Teacher’s College, Columbia University in New York after which she taught neurologically and emotionally-impaired elementary students in New York City.
Marty Thomas-Brummé
Marty Thomas-Brummé has a Bachelor of Science degree in Special Education from Mansfield University, a Master’s of Education in Counseling from Millersville University, and has completed the coursework for a Ph.D. in Psychoeducational Processes at Temple University. He has extensive mediation training through the Justice Center of Atlanta (Special Education Mediation Training, IEP Facilitation), Good Shepherd Mediation Center (Basic Mediation Training), U.S. Postal Service (USPS REDRESS Mediation Training), the Municipal Court of Philadelphia (Landlord/Tenant Mediation Training), Zena Zumeta (Divorce and Custody Mediation Training) and the Mennonite Central Committee (Victim Offender Mediation Training). He continues his education through participation in ongoing trainings in Special Education Mediation and IEP facilitation. He also started and directed a community mediation center and has taught training sessions on basic mediation and conflict resolution skills throughout the state. Mr. Thomas-Brumme has a variety of life experiences including managing a homeless shelter, running a training center for a national school dropout prevention organization, working in higher education, and living and traveling in Europe, Australia, New Zealand and Southeast Asia. He has been a mediator with the Pennsylvania Office for Dispute Resolution since1987.
Judy Tobe, M.A.
Judy Tobe is a mediator, facilitator, conflict coach and speech pathologist. Judy became a mediator in 2000 and has since mediated over 1,000 cases involving educational, employment, workplace, and discrimination disputes. In addition to mediating and facilitating cases for the Office for Dispute Resolution since 2008, she has served as a mediator for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania. In addition to her career as a mediator, Judy holds a master’s degree from the State University of New York at Buffalo. Judy has attended and participated in numerous advanced mediation trainings in the past 16 years including all special education training offered by the Office for Dispute Resolution.
Max Wald, Ed.D.
Max Wald, Ed.D. has served as a teacher, school principal at both the elementary and secondary school level, director of special education, college professor, hearing officer, and mediator. Dr. Wald earned all of his degrees at Temple University where he also taught and supervised student teachers. He served as a principal in the School District of Philadelphia, Colonial School District and the Cherry Hill School District. He was a director at the Woods Schools and the Pathway School. He has taught at Temple University, Arcadia University, and at the University of Leicester in England. Dr. Wald received a research fellowship in rehabilitation psychology at the Moss Rehabilitation Hospital and is certified as a teacher and supervisor of special education. He served as a hearing officer with the Office for Dispute Resolution for nine years and is currently a trained mediator. He is certified by the Florida Supreme Court as a family mediator.