Cristen Brown

Senior Program Manager of VCPA
Cristen@VOCEL.org

“Parents are the experts of their child, their household and their culture!”

Cristen is the Senior Program Manager of the VOCEL Child Parent Academy (VCPA). She has worked in and around education for more time than she’d like to admit, spending years working to bring high quality educational resources to children in underserved communities throughout Illinois and the Midwest. Since joining VOCEL in 2018, Cristen has worked with small groups and individual families, leading discussions on topics in parenting, and helping connect families with needed resources and support.

Cristen’s educational background is firmly rooted in the social sciences, and she holds a MA in Child Development, with a specialization in working with children and families with disabilities. This formal education has helped connect the dots and learn the brain science, but Cristen feels that her greatest education has come from being a parent herself. This is why she feels so strongly that parents should be regarded as the experts of their children, and why she always seeks to learn from the expertise of the parents she works with. Cristen is especially passionate about amplifying the voices of children and families with diverse needs and abilities in a world that too often ignores or speaks over them.

Cristen is a creative, and in her free time can be found making music, sewing, embroidering or writing. She is a huge fan of classic film, little known Chicago history and gets oddly passionate about a great pair of shoes.