*FREE* Retain Session 2: Implications for Healthcare: Return to Work and Stay at Work Strategies in the COVID-19 Era Series.

Shirley Kron is the Director of Outreach and Engagement at the University of Kentucky Human Development Institute and serves as the healthcare lead for RETAIN KY developing and expanding healthcare partnerships across the Commonwealth. Prior to her role at HDI, Shirley served as the Regional Director for Occupational and Corporate Health at CHI responsible for the KentuckyOne Workplace Care program for over 20 years and certified as an Occupational health nurse (COHN-S). She managed the Occupational Physician services (OPS) practice which provided occupational medicine services for over 800 employers and their employees in the Louisville market. She was also responsible for management of onsite physicians at the Kentucky Ford Plant (KTP), Louisville Assembly Plant (LAP) and GE Haier. She has over 40 years of experience in nursing, including occupational, rehabilitation and care management.

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Phillip Rumrill, Ph.D., CRC, is a Professor in the Department of Early Childhood, Special Education, and Counselor Education at the University of Kentucky (UK) in Lexington. He also serves as Director of Research in the UK Human Development Institute, which is Kentucky’s University Center on Disability. Dr. Rumrill is well known as one of the leading disability and employment researchers in the United States. He has authored or co-authored more than 450 professional publications including 16 commercially published books (e.g., Foundations of the Vocational Rehabilitation Process, Emerging Disabilities and Rehabilitation Counseling, Case management and Rehabilitation Counseling, Research in Rehabilitation Counseling) Dr. Rumrill has extensive experience administering funded research projects. He has had leadership roles on 44 grants with total budgets of more than $53 million. Dr. Rumrill has received numerous awards and honors for his work, including distinguished career awards from the American Rehabilitation Counseling Association and the National Council on Rehabilitation Education. Dr. Rumrill has lived experience with a significant disability (blindness), is a former state Vocational Rehabilitation consumer, and was diagnosed with Long-COVID syndrome in 2021.

Christina Espinosa, MRC, CRC, is the Division Director of Community Education with the Human Development Institute and a nationally Certified Rehabilitation Counselor. Since 2007, she has been working in Universal Design (UD), assistive technology (AT), home modification, and training and technical assistance across topics of disability. Ms. Espinosa is also the PI and Project Director for the UK-HDI Center for Assistive Technology Services (CATS), funded through the Assistive Technology Act. She served on the AUCD Project Advisory Committee from 2013-2015, and has Chaired HDI’s Disability, Equity, and Inclusion Committee since 2014. Ms. Espinosa worked with UK administration in implementing Unconscious Bias training to all UK faculty, staff, and students, on a UK Smart House workgroup collaborating with faculty and directors across the University, and on a Community of Practice in UD. In 2016, she was appointed to the board of Independence Place, Lexington’s Center for Independent Living, and served as Vice-Chair 2017-2021. She was also appointed in 2016 to the Lexington Fayette Urban County Government Mayor’s Commission for People with Disabilities and voted as Vice-President of the Commission since 2018. She also served as the Chair of the Housing Committee for the Lexington Livable Cities initiative. In 2018, she was invited to participate on the Kentucky Housing Authority’s Weatherization Advisory Council, and in 2019 she was invited to be a member of the Center for Knowledge Translation for Disability and Rehabilitation Research Expert Review Panel.