Marlene Penn

Marlene Penn entered the world of children's mental health as an advocate for her own son in 1998.  She became aware of the challenges to families raising children with mental health needs while navigating her way through very complex systems. She is a former co-founder and Executive Director of the Family Support Organization of Burlington County of the Burlington Partnership, a 1999 SAMHSA funded system of care site. 

Marlene's particular expertise is in building meaningful family involvement at all levels of child serving systems.  She has provided consultation in this area throughout the State of New Jersey as well as the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School Of Social Work, the Innovations Institute of the University of Maryland, the Human Services Collaborative, the City of New York, and Columbia University's Parent Empowerment Project.

She serves as faculty on the Leadership Academy of the Georgetown University Medical Center National Technical Assistance Center for Child and Family Mental Health.    Marlene is an advisory board member of the University of South Florida Child and Family Research and Training Center.  She is currently an instructor for USF's Graduate Certificate in Children's Mental Health.

She serves as an advisory board member on the National Wraparound Initiative and is currently co-chairing the Family Task Force.  She was an instructor on the 2006 Technical Assistance Partnership Webinar "Using Practice Guidelines, Tools, and Resources to Build High-Quality Wraparound Practice".

Marlene was recently awarded the "Golden Bell Leadership award" by the Mental Health Association for "Excellence and Leadership of New Jersey's Family Movement" and the "Leadership and Advocacy Award" by Family Service of New Jersey.