We’re passionate about helping home visiting programs and professionals grow and make an impact!

The Institute for Family Support Professionals helps to strengthen home visiting and human service programs across the country.  

We partner with organizations and individuals to offer professional development trainings, workforce recruitment and capacity building. Our core focus areas include: 

  • The Institute’s online training program offers Family Support Professionals everywhere the opportunity to learn new skills and grow their careers. Through a personalized professional development plan, teams can take charge of their own growth and advancement. 

  • Knock is our new mobile-friendly application used to explore the field, make connections and learn more. Interested in a rewarding career in home visiting? Knock is your new best friend. 

  • Rapid Response Home Visiting shares best practices for connecting with families virtually.  

  • Customized Solutions to help programs and states train and grow their home visiting workforce. We bring experience from multiple states and home visiting models to help your team succeed.   

The Institute was developed through a Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) Innovation Award by building upon previous work of project partners to enhance professional development across the field. 

What is the Institute?

Meet the Institute Team

  • Janet Nickell Horras

    EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

    Janet believes in the power of home visiting to transform and empower families. She is a national leader in the home visiting field and co-founder of the Institute. 

    Janet began her career in home visiting in 1989 as a home visitor. The families she was honored to serve taught her many life lessons that she still uses today. Janet has worked in many different evidence-based home visiting models including Parents as Teachers, Healthy Families America and Early Head Start.  

    She has held many different positions within home visiting programs at both a state and community level. Janet earned her Bachelor’s degree in Human Services from Buena Vista University and has completed additional graduate level coursework.  

    Most recently, Janet worked for the state of Iowa where she served as the family support program administrator for 25 years. She was the Iowa MIECHV state lead from 2010-2024.  

  • Shannon Reaves

    DIRECTOR OF EDUCATION

    Shannon has been supporting The Institute for the Advancement of Family Support Professionals as a subject matter expert and content developer for the past 5 years and was instrumental in developing the Virtual Home Visiting e-learning series. With a background in teaching and extensive home visiting experience that ranges from providing services as a home visitor to managing multiple home visiting programs, she really understands the needs of the home visiting workforce and always brings a steadfast commitment to ensuring equitable representation and access in all that she does.

  • Ciera Edmonds

    FIELD ENGAGEMENT SPECIALIST

    Ciera is a nationally-certified family support professional with over ten years of experience in home visiting, early intervention, and family engagement. She contributes to the Institute for the Advancement of Family Support Professionals, where she develops innovative e-learning and professional development initiatives to strengthen the workforce and elevate the quality of family support services. Passionate about amplifying authentic voices in Virginia, Ciera leads the state’s Home Visitor and Parent Expert Panels, drawing on their lived experiences and expertise to improve services and outcomes for families. Ciera holds a master’s degree in social work from Virginia Commonwealth University. Her extensive background includes roles as an Infant Mental Health Specialist, Lactation Specialist, and Doula, reflecting her holistic and family-centered approach to supporting families and communities.

  • Joey Coakley Beck

    MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS

    Joey brings a vast background of marketing, publishing and creative design talent that spans over three decades to the Institute! For 15 of those years, Joey published monthly magazines for women and families in the state of Virginia and has extensive volunteer work for community non-profits, as well as organizations on the national level.

    Joey has been in the family support professional field, specifically, for the past three years.

Meet the Partners

Iowa Department of Public Health and Virginia Department of Health partnered to develop the Institute. They leveraged two MIECHV Innovation Awards, which funded the development of the Institute. They continue to have dedicated seats on the board of directors. 

Early Impact Virginia supports the work by providing fiscal sponsorship of the Institute as a new entity and supporting educational content development. 

James Madison University’s Health Education Design Group (HEDG) designs learning modules that adhere to best practices in adult learning and include interactive elements such as gamification and 360-degree video. 

The University of Kansas’s Center for Public Partnerships & Research designed software that allows professionals to identify pathways to achieve desired skills or competencies. They also provide maintenance and help desk support. 

The Institute Board of Directors

Our Board of Directors is a group of individuals who govern and oversee the organization's operations. They are responsible for setting the organization's mission, strategy, and goals, and ensuring that the organization operates in compliance with legal and ethical standards. We are proud of our inaugural Board of Directors comprising of strong leaders from the field.

  • Laurel is the founding Director of Early Impact Virginia, where she leverages over 20 years of experience in child welfare and prevention programming to advocate for Virginia’s young children and their families.

    Laurel is dedicated to advancing systemic solutions, strategic quality improvement, and meaningful change for the most vulnerable families by working across sectors. She holds a Master of Public Administration and a Bachelor of Social Work, both from Virginia Commonwealth University. Outside of work, Laurel enjoys spending time with her family, riding her Peloton, and curling up with a good book.

Laurel Aparicio headshot

  • Catriona is the Founder and President of Linchpin Strategies, LLC, a Washington, DC strategic consulting and public affairs firm.  In 2015, Ms. Macdonald assisted in founding the Association of State and Tribal Home Visiting Initiatives, an independent, non-lobbying organization of state, Tribal and territorial administrators of voluntary home visiting programs, and continues to serve as the ASTHVI Executive Director.

    Ms. Macdonald is recognized nationally as a policy expert across a range of child and family programs including child care and Head Start. Her professional background includes work in the United States Senate, House of Representatives, and Department of Health and Human Services. Ms. Macdonald is a member of the Board of Directors of Sepsis Alliance and the Bright Beginnings Head Start program, and is an Elder in the Falls Church Presbyterian Church. She lives in Virginia with her husband and daughter.

  • P.J. is currently serving as the interim Director of Iowa’s Health and Human Services Maternal Infant Early Childhood Home Visitation (MIECHV) program. Ms. West has worked within the family support arena for over 25 years, having started her career at a local community action agency in southwest Iowa as the Family Development and Self Sufficiency (FaDSS) Coordinator, where she was lucky enough to provide home visits to families.  

    In P.J.’s current role at the department at the Iowa Health and Human Services is as the interim Director of the Maternal, Infant, Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) program. In that role, she provides program management at the federal and state level as well as to to local MIECHV contractors. P.J. oversees many projects and training family support professionals is one of her favorites. She has a true passion for helping professionals understand their own “stuff” before they can successfully help others with theirs. She never wants anyone to forget what it’s like to walk up to family’s door, knock, and to have families let you in, where you become a part of their lives.  

    P.J. serves on several councils specific to family support programming in Iowa, on a multitude of committees representing Iowa family support and continues to serve on her local school board and childcare board. P.J. has an incredible passion for family support programming, and simply helping people. She lives in a small town in southwest Iowa with her two daughters and all of their pets.

The ASTHVI Expert Panel

The Association of State and Tribal Home Visiting Initiatives (ASTHVI) Expert Panel was created through funding from the Heising Simons Foundation with the goal of acting as steering committee of subject-matter experts in the field of home visiting and family support for the Institute for the Advancement of Family Support Professionals. The Expert Panel provided recommendations and guidance for the development of the Institute.

The Expert Panel was comprised of the following members: