.png)
Allison Davis Maxon
Executive Director
Allison Davis Maxon, M.S., LMFT is the Executive Director of the National Center on Adoption and Permanency. She is a nationally recognized expert, trainer, consultant and presenter in the fields of child welfare and children’s mental health, specializing in Attachment, Developmental Trauma and Permanency/Adoption. She and was the foster care consultant for the Paramount Pictures movie Instant Family. Allison was honored in 2017 with the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute ‘Angels in Adoption’ award and is the co-author of Seven Core Issues in Adoption and Permanency: A Guide to Promoting Understanding and Healing in Adoption, Foster Care, Kinship Families and Third Party Reproduction, Jessica Kingsley Publishers 2019.
For more than 25 years, Allison has dedicated her clinical work as a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist to expert programs and practices in children’s mental health, attachment family systems, adoption/permanency and developmental trauma. She is a clinical member of ATTACh, The Association for Training on Trauma and Attachment in Children. Allison is an educator, clinician and advocate who is passionate about helping children and families heal and thrive. She is the co-author and a master trainer of Kinship Center’s ACT: An Adoption and Permanency Curriculum for Child Welfare and Mental Health Professionals and co-author and a master trainer of Pathways to Permanence: Parenting the Child of Loss and Trauma.
Consulting Areas
Allison provides training, speaking and consultation services on a wide range of topics including strengthening Systems of Care, children’s mental health issues, trauma-informed care, adoption clinical competence, family assessment, adoption/permanency, developmental trauma, attachment, family attachment therapy, kinship care, transitional age youth and others. She has presented at national, state and local mental health and child welfare conferences including the Child Welfare League of America, the North American Council on Adoptable Children, San Diego County Children’s System of Care Training Academy and the prestigious Georgetown University National Symposium on Children’s Mental Health Systems of Care.