More than 1,100 people from across the U.S. gathered in July at the 2025 Training Institutes: Building A World Where Young People Thrive conference organized by the UConn School of Social Work’s Innovations Institute. The conference attracted practitioners, policymakers, researchers and evaluators, administrators and managers, peer support partners, Medicaid specialists, managed care experts, family and youth leaders, and educators in health and human services—all working to improve outcomes for children, youth, young adults, and their families.
With over 160 innovative, in-depth workshops, conference presenters addressed workforce development, systems design and financing, data-driven strategic planning, effective system design, evidence-based services, and quality improvement for child/youth and family services including mental health, substance use, public health, juvenile justice, child welfare, education, early childhood, and transition age services. Plenary presentations included Belong & Thrive with Vivek Murthy, MD, 19th and 21st Surgeon General of the United States with Christine Crawford, MD, assistant medical director of NAMI, Isabel Ohakamma of NAMI NextGen and Kim Ford, CEO of Girl Scouts Greater Washington; Connect & Thrive with Jeanette Betancourt, Ph.D., senior vice president of U.S. Social Impact at Sesame Workshop; and Innovate & Thrive Kana Enomoto, director of Brain Health at the McKinsey Health Institute with Hafeezah Muhammad, CEO and Founder of Backpack Healthcare; Amy Nitza, Ph.D., d irector of the Global Center for AI in Mental Health, University of Albany; and Kamillah Wood, MD, MPH Clinical Specialist, Health Optimization, Google Health. Together, all the plenary speakers addressed the importance of innovating to support the workforce around belonging and wellbeing, fostering resilience, and artificial intelligence.
The conference builds on the School of Social Work’s mission to invest in robust research, innovative teaching methodologies, and community engagement, to empower the next generation of leaders and make a tangible difference in the lives of those we serve. This conference represents a vital opportunity to share knowledge, forge new partnerships, and collectively advance our understanding of how best to support youth and their families in an ever-evolving world.
First established in 1986 by the SAMHSA-funded National Technical Assistance Center for Children’s Mental Health at Georgetown University, the Training Institutes were born out of a growing national conversation among those working to advance children’s mental health and systems of care for children, youth, and young adults. The concept of a system of care was developed and first published in 1984; to then disseminate the concept, to familiarize the field with it, and to provide in-depth training on it, the Training Institutes was born. The conference was transitioned to Innovations Institute in 2018 and is now well-established as the nation’s leading conference on children’s systems.
While other conferences address mental health and effective public systems for the whole population, the UConn Training Institutes remains the nation’s only conference focused on the needs of children, youth, young adults, and their families.
