Leslie Ellis-Lang
Managing Director of Child and Youth Services | CARF International
Tucson, AZ, UNITED STATES
Leslie Ellis-Lang, MSEd, LMFT, is a leader in services for children and youth with emphasis in both child welfare and behavioral health.
Media
Publications:
Documents:
Videos:
Audio/Podcasts:
Biography
Leslie Ellis-Lang, MSEd, LMFT, managing director of child and youth services at CARF International has more than 30 years of professional experience in the behavioral health and child welfare fields specializing with children, youth, and families.
Prior to joining CARF in 2009, Leslie held leadership positions in not-for-profit and for-profit organizations. As a licensed marriage and family therapist trained in systems theory, she has focused on integrating clinical practice with administrative operations to improve both the outcomes for persons served and organizational performance. Her areas of expertise include quality management, program and policy development, training, clinical practice, and supervision.
Two unique highlights of Leslie’s career were participating in a pilot program as a treatment foster parent to deinstitutionalize youth from state institutions to specialized foster care homes and consulting with military families challenged in seeking treatment for their children while stationed out of country.
Additionally, in the realm of quality improvement prior to Leslie’s current position with CARF, she was a surveyor for both child and youth services and behavioral health programs for 12 years. Her experience with accreditation and application of standards expands beyond CARF as she has also led organizations through the accreditation process with other accrediting bodies and served as a consultant reviewer for the Children’s Bureau for the Federal Child and Family Services Review.
Leslie earned a Master’s degree in Counselor Education from Northern Illinois University after receiving her Bachelor’s Degree in Special Education.
Areas of Expertise (8)
Child Behavioral Health
Child Welfare
Cultural Competency
Family First Prevention Services Act
Gender diversity in children
Healthcare quality management
Qualified Residential Treatment Programs
Treatment foster care
Education (1)
Northern Illinois University: MSEd, Special Ed/Elementary Ed, Counseling
Links (1)
Media Appearances (3)
Family Focused Treatment Association joins CARF International’s IAC
CARF International online
2017-11-22
CARF’s Managing Director of Child and Youth Services, Leslie Ellis-Lang, offered the invitation earlier this fall. “FFTA really looks at how the family is involved in providing treatment to the children and youth in care,” says Ellis-Lang. “FFTA is not just about children’s voices. It recognizes they are part of families. If children are removed from their birth family, adopted family, or other current family placement, FFTA promotes placement into a family setting where they can learn the skills necessary to thrive within a family and their permanency plan can include family placement.”
Three leading children and youth advocacy organizations join CARF’s International Advisory Council
CARF International online
2016-02-26
CARF’s managing director of child and youth services, Leslie Ellis-Lang, said of the additions, “Adding ACRC, NACBH, and Youth M.O.V.E. National to the IAC will assist us in ensuring that the voice and interests of children, youth, and their families have a strong presence in all CARF activities. In particular, it strengthens CARF’s continued effort to unify behavioral health and child welfare needs and practices within the standards, and supplies direct input from youth themselves.”
NOSAC joins CARF's International Advisory Council
CARF International online
2014-12-01
"We are excited to increase our child and youth services representation on the IAC," said Leslie Ellis-Lang, managing director of Child and Youth Services for CARF. "We now have a better opportunity of ensuring that voices of children, youth, and families throughout the country are included in our standards."
Event Appearances (1)
Panel Discussion - The Value of Accreditation: Moving Your Agency toward Excellence and Meeting the Accreditation Requirement in the New FFPSA
CWLA 2018 National Conference Washington, DC
2018-04-28
Articles (2)
How accreditation supports child welfare’s shift to prevention
CARF International
This memory popped into my head as I spoke to Leslie Ellis-Lang, CARF’s managing director of Child and Youth Services, discussing the Family First Prevention Services Act (FFPSA). I realized the new legislation is a lot like having access to a new car door. Whether you believe it replaces something broken or provides an alternative, it will change how we fund child welfare and provide services to children and families.
The newest quality frontier: child and youth services
CARF International
The youngest (no pun intended) of CARF’s major accreditation areas is child and youth services. In 2005, the Child and Youth Services standards manual was first released in response to growing requests from advocacy organizations and programs that served children and adolescents, especially child welfare programs. Those first standards were originally developed using established standards from CARF’s various other accreditation areas serving persons under age 18. In many ways, CARF’s development and advancement of distinct child and youth standards parallel how society itself has viewed children and young persons over time.
Social