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Our Staff

Our staff members are based at four different locations around the state:

• Cheney (Spokane Vicinity)
• Ellensburg (Central Washington University)
• Renton (Puget Sound Educational Service District)
• Wenatchee (North Central Educational Service District) 

We also employ consultants to address children’s and families’ needs and to conduct trainings.

To request consultation or technical assistance/training, call us at our toll-free number:  1-800-572-7000 or email us:  wsds@psesd.org  

Or, you can contact any of our staff.

Terri Thurston 

WSDS Executive Director 

North Central ESD
430 Olds Station Road
Wenatchee, WA 98801

509-665-2619 (phone)
509-662-9027 (fax)
territ@ncesd.org

Terri Thurston serves as executive director of WSDS, with North Central ESD the fiscal agent for the project. She acts as spokesperson for WSDS, facilitates project activities, develops contractual agreements with cooperating agencies, and seeks resources for future activities. Terri has more than 30 years experience as a special education teacher, speech/language pathologist, consultant and administrator in urban, suburban, and rural school districts and agencies.

 

Vision Impairment

In addition to directing WSDS, Terri Thurston coordinates statewide activities that enhance services for children and youths who are blind or visually impaired. She supervises a group of consulting teachers of the visually impaired who provide technical assistance to school districts and families and assist in the areas of child assessment, IEP development, program planning, and training school district personnel regarding the needs of children with visual impairment.

 

Deaf/Hard of Hearing

Carol Carrothers provides technical assistance to school districts and families with deaf and hard-of-hearing children throughout Washington.  She assists in the areas of child assessment, IEP development, program planning and training school district staff on the needs of children with hearing loss.  After earning a B.A. in Special Education and a M.S. in Deaf Education, Carol taught all ages from preschool to university level for over 25 years.  She also is a certified sign language interpreter. 

Carol serves on the State Educational Interpreters' Council, which works to support the educational interpreting needs of children with hearing loss.

Deaf-Blind

Nancy Hatfield has worked with WSDS since 1992 to enhance statewide capacity to meet the needs of children and young adults with sensory disabilities. She co-directs the deaf-blind project and coordinates early childhood activities, as well as functioning as administrative director of WSDS staff and grants based at Puget Sound ESD. Nancy holds a B.A. in Speech Pathology/ Audiology and a M.S. and Ph.D. in Education and Human Development.

Nancy's prior work experience includes early intervention services for families with infants and toddlers who are deaf, hard of hearing, and deaf-blind. She wrote grants for and directed Project SIT-UPS (Sensory Impairment Training to Upgrade Professionals' Skills) and the Shared Reading Video Outreach Project. Other training projects include VIISA (training in early childhood vision impairment) and ECHO (Early Childhood Hearing Outreach to Early Head Start programs), as well as early intervention training for the Washington State Department of Health and the Office of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Services.

 

Kathee Scoggin co-directs the federally-funded deaf-blind project.  In addition to providing child-specific technical assistance and consultation to families and school and agency teams herself, she coordinates and supervises our deaf-blind project partners in their work with families and educators around the state.  Kathee is a sought-after trainer on topics relating to children with multiple disabilities including deaf-blindness both in state and nationally.  She holds a B.A. in Deaf Education and M.Ed. in Special Education with an emphasis on sensory disabilities.  Kathee has 30+ years experience as a teacher, assessment specialist, principal, and educational consultant with children (birth to 21) with hearing loss and deaf-blindness.

 

Other WSDS Staff

Sandy coordinates functions for WSDS program activities and staff based at our multiple locations, and manages support for our WSDS consultants and project partners. She holds a B.A. degree with coursework in audiology and speech therapy. She has worked with WSDS for more than 15 years. Many families and educators are familiar with her work in connection with Washington State Services for Children with Deaf-Blindness. Sandy's previous experience includes working for the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory in Portland, Oregon.

 

Irene Fournier has been right-hand woman in WSDS since 1994, with a special focus on supporting infant/toddler activities including regional and statewide training projects. She was instrumental in establishing and managing our specialized birth-to-three lending library. Irene spends much of her time responding to the many requests we receive for information and assistance via our toll-free line and email.



Mikaela O'Brien
WSDS Program Support
Puget Sound ESD
800 Oakesdale Ave. S.W.
Renton, WA 98057

800-572-7000 V/TTY
425-917-7830 V/TTY
425-917-7838 (fax)
mobrien@psesd.org

Mikaela O’Brien joined WSDS in December of 2008 to provide program support for Kathee Scoggin, Co-Director of the Deaf-Blind Project, in Cheney, and the WSDS group at Puget Sound ESD.  She has her Bachelor’s Degree in Project Management from DeVry University and 8 years of experience in program support, customer service, computer support, and technical management.

Jackie Messer provides program support for WSDS from her base in Wenatchee. She has been with North Central ESD in the media department since 1996, and joined WSDS in September 2004.

Meet Our WSDS Project Partners 

Our corps of “project partners” includes 12 part-time consulting professionals with varied backgrounds. This allows us to better match a consultant to the needs of school teams and families around the state. We’re fortunate to have such talented people working with our project and are pleased to make their services available to people around the state of Washington.  Here are just four of them:

Katie Humes, a resident of Bellingham, started out as an ASL interpreter and has experience interpreting within the Deaf-Blind Community. She has an extensive background with young children with hearing loss, including children with multiple disabilities. In addition to her 15 years as a parent-infant specialist with families of young children, Katie was executive director of Whatcom Center for Early Learning, a birth-to-three program for children with a variety of disabilities. A woman of many talents, Katie will consult with families and teams around the needs of young children who are deaf,  hard of hearing, and deaf-blind and also help us with video production, web course development, and other writing work. Katie has a Master’s degree in Curriculum Development and recently completed a second Master’s degree in writing from Pacific Lutheran University.

Kelly Kerr has worked as a teacher of the visually impaired (TVI) for 15+ years, many of them with the Central Kitsap School District. She has taught daily living skills to students with multiple disabilities, and prior to becoming a TVI worked as a job coach and care provider for adults with disabilities. She was inspired to enter the field as a result of her personal experience as a parent of a child with special needs including blindness, communication and motor difficulties, and behavioral challenges. Kelly’s areas of interest include communication issues for students with deafblindness, motor impairment in individuals who are multiply disabled, and technology and its ability to create access. She especially enjoys matching Assistive Technology, including various software applications, to students with a wide range of abilities. We appreciate Kelly’s talent for brainstorming with teams on effective routines for students in the areas of communication, self-care, socialization, and functional academics. . .and we love her big smile. 

Diane McCutchen began her educational career as a speech/language therapist. She received her master’s degree from the University of Washington in the area of early childhood special education with a focus on infant development. Diane then returned to school in her native Texas to earn certification and endorsement as a teacher of the visually impaired (TVI). She has worked as a teacher in the Arlington School District’s birth-to-three special education program for more than 20 years.

WSDS recruited Diane as an infant/toddler consultant in 1993, and in that role she has conducted trainings on early childhood topics all over the state of Washington. She is a certified VIISA trainer and has led two VIISA trainings in the last ten years. Diane co-authored the document: Guidelines for Early Intervention Services for Infants and Toddlers with Visual Impairment and was instrumental in developing the Three-Pronged Approach to Hearing and Vision Concerns in Infants and Toddlers, a screening tool used by many developmental centers and Early Head Start Programs in Washington State. We’re pleased to be able to share her early childhood expertise and Texan charm with others in the state.

Robin Taylor has training in the area of vision and hearing loss as well as Orientation & Mobility and Assistive Technology.  

Robin has been a classroom teacher as well as an educational consultant with a variety of children who are deaf/hard of hearing, blind/visually impaired, deaf-blind, autistic, or who have multiple disabilities.