Conference Speakers

CDR Heather Dimeris, M.S., R.D. 

Heather Dimeris serves as the Deputy Associate Director for the Federal Office of Rural Health Policy, Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) at U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and is a Commander in the United States Public Health Service.  She joined the Office in 2003 as a Public Health Analyst, managed FORHP operations as the Associate Director and Senior Advisor from 2007 to 2016.
 
Heather Dimeris is a registered dietitian and prior to working at HRSA, she was dietitian for Malden Hospital in Massachusetts.  She holds a Master of Science degree in public health nutrition from Case Western Reserve University and a Bachelor of Science degree in dietetics from Indiana University of Pennsylvania.

Stacey Carpenter, Psy. D., IMH-E® 

Stacey Carpenter, Psy.D., IMH-E®, is a Licensed Psychologist and the Director of Integrated Behavioral Health for Family Practice and Counseling Network (FPCN).  Dr. Carpenter oversees the Behavioral Health Consultants and Psychiatric Nurse Practitioners who provide brief therapeutic services within 4 Federally Qualified Health Care Community Centers. Dr. Carpenter obtained her doctoral degree from Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine and has experience working within medical settings providing brief therapy to adults and children with various diagnoses.  During her fellowship, she was a mental health consultant who conducted social-emotional groups with preschoolers, parent skills training for the parents, and provided therapy for parents and children.  Dr. Carpenter has a certificate in Infant Mental Health from Chatham University. Dr. Carpenter is a founding member and current President of the Pennsylvania Association for Infant Mental Health (PA-AIMH) which is a non-profit, state-wide organization that assists in educating and connecting providers who work with children (ages 0-5yo) and their families.  For the last eight years she has organized PA-AIMH’s annual conferences that has grown to about 300 participants and includes nationally recognized keynotes and local expert speakers.  Dr. Carpenter is dedicated to educating communities and providers on trauma informed care and improving the social-emotional development among children and families.

Dr. Howard Rabinowitz

Howard K. Rabinowitz MD is the Ellen M. and Dale W. Garber Professor of Family Medicine, and Professor of Pediatrics at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University.  Since 1976, he has served as Director of Jefferson's Physician Shortage Area Program, a special admissions and educational program that has been successful in increasing the supply and retention of family physicians in rural areas, as detailed in publications in the JAMA and NEJM.    
 
Dr. Rabinowitz is a past-President of the American Board of Family Practice (1992-93).  From 1992-2000, he was a member of the National Advisory Committee of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Generalist Physician Initiative.  From 1993-94, Dr. Rabinowitz was a Robert Wood Johnson Health Policy Fellow in the Office of US Senator John D (Jay) Rockefeller IV (D, W. Va.).  From 1997-2002, he was national Project Director and Co-Director of HRSA's $8 million "UME-21" project (Undergraduate Medical Education for the 21st Century), a program to develop curricular innovations to better prepare medical students to practice in the changing health care environment.  He served on the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Health Policy Fellowships Advisory Board from 2004-2010, and on the Editorial Board of the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine from 1988-2011.  Dr. Rabinowitz is the recipient of the 2008 Curtis G. Hames Research Award, honoring career contributions to family medicine research.  He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine (NAM, formerly known as the Institute of Medicine, IOM).

Robert Aronson

Robert Aronson is an immigration attorney working at Fredrikson and Byron, located in downtown Minneapolis. In over 30 years of immigration legal practice, he has established himself as one of the leading practitioners specifically in the area of immigration law for physicians and allied healthcare professionals. He speaks and writes widely on the subject and has a long list of achievements attesting to his prominence in the physician immigration space, including having been named as the inaugural recipient of the Roberta Friedman Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his contributions to the field of immigration law and policy for International Physicians. Robert holds his JD from the Indiana University School of Law and thereafter was a Fulbright fellow at the law schools of Harvard University and Moscow State University in Russia.

Rachel Bus

​Rachel Bus has been practicing exclusively in the area of immigration law since 2007. While working for boutique firms in Austin, Texas, Rachel handled a variety of immigration matters, including labor and employment based immigration, family based immigration, individual petitions for victims of crime, and deportation defense. Rachel returned to her roots in the Phoenix area in 2014 and joined Brelje and Associates in 2015. She is equipped to handle a wide range of immigration cases, with a particular focus on employment based immigration for physicians and allied health workers throughout the nation.
 
Prior to starting a career in law, Rachel served as a Volunteer with the United States Peace Corps in Ecuador, South America from 2001 to 2003. Rachel graduated cum laude from the University of Arizona in 2001 with a B.A. in Latin American Studies and earned her J.D. from the University of Arizona’s James E. Rogers College of Law in 2007.
 
Rachel is a member of the Texas bar, the International Medical Graduate Taskforce and the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA). She is fluent in English and Spanish.

​Wendy Castor Hess, Esq. ​

Ms. Hess is a partner in the Immigration law firm of Landau, Hess, Simon & Choi, located in Philadelphia, PA and has been practicing immigration law for over 37 years. Ms. Hess currently serves as a member of the Board of Governors of the Philadelphia Bar Association, as Co-Chair of the Philadelphia Bar Association’s Immigration Committee, as Co-Chair of the Pennsylvania Bar Association’s Immigration Committee, as the Co-Chair of the AILA Philadelphia Chapter’s U.S. Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection Liaison Committee, and as a Board member of HIAS PA. She previously served as President of HIAS, as Chair of the Philadelphia Chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) and as a member of AILA’s national U.S. Department of Labor Liaison and VSC Liaison Committees. Her practice focuses on representing entrepreneurs, employers and their employees, particularly in the medical, pharmaceutical, IT and university communities. Ms. Hess, who is fluent in Spanish, also represents individuals in family-based cases and serves as counsel to the Mexican Consulate in Philadelphia. She has continually been listed in Best (Immigration) Lawyers in America (Best Lawyer of the Year 2014 and 2018), Super Lawyers (Pennsylvania) and in The International Who’s Who of Corporate (Immigration) Lawyers. In 2015 and 2016 Super Lawyers recognized her as one of the top 50 women lawyers in Pennsylvania.  

Mike Berry

Mike Berry started his adventure in Federal health care when he enlisted as a Navy Hospital Corpsman more than 50 years ago.  He then served as a Navy Nurse Corps Officer, then became a PHS Commissioned Corps Officer working in the IHS, Immigration, and since 1993, with the NHSC.  Prior to his retirement from the Commissioned Corps in 2000 he was deployed to the Philippines on the Hospital Ship Mercy in 1987, to Kuwait at the tail end of the First Gulf War, and with FEMA to St. Thomas after the hurricane of 1995.  Since retirement out of uniform he has continued  to serve as a civil servant in a policy position with the NHSC, and has set up and run the HHS J-1 Visa Waiver for Clinical Care process since its inception in 2003, having made more than 450 requests in that time.

John Gale

John Gale, M.S. is a Senior Research Associate with the Maine Rural Health Research Center at the University of Southern Maine. He has conducted extensive research on rural substance use and behavioral health services, the role of hospitals in addressing population and community health issues, and the development of substance use treatment, prevention, and recovery programs. He serves on the Board of Trustees for the National Rural Health Association and is the chair of its Policy Congress. He also serves as the chair of the New England Rural Health Roundtable’s policy committee. He recently developed a rural substance use prevention and treatment toolkit for the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime that is distributed to policymakers internationally. His work focuses on leveraging local health and community resources to improve the functioning of the rural healthcare infrastructure. Prior to joining the Maine Rural Health Research Center, John managed large primary care and multi-disciplinary behavioral health group practices.

Dr. David Schmitz

Dr. David Schmitz is the chair of the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences. He is an internationally known and respected clinician who has extensive research expertise in training and retaining physicians in rural and underserved areas, the development of rural communities’ healthcare resources, and quality improvement in rural healthcare. He has published and presented extensively on his research. He practices as a family physician and teaches at the UND SMHS.
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Schmitz earned his medical doctorate from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He completed his residency training at the Family Medicine Residency of Idaho in Boise. He has served as the president of the National Rural Health Association and was founding chair of the American Academy of Family Physician Member Interest Group on Rural Health. He also serves the academy through its Commission on Quality and Practice, and is an executive committee member of the Global Association of Family Doctors (WONCA) Working Party on Rural Health.

Craig Kennedy

Craig joined ACU in 2013 after many years in leadership positions on Capitol Hill and in non-profit association management. He has management responsibility for all aspects of the Association and reports directly to the Board of Directors. ACU’s mission is to improve the health of America’s underserved populations and to enhance the development and support of the health care clinicians serving these populations.  ACU was founded by alumni of the National Health Service Corps and ACU’s commitment to that program continues today.

Craig previously served as the top lobbyist for the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) during the 2009 Stimulus and 2010 Affordable Care Act negotiations. He also led the negotiations on the 2008 reauthorization of the National Health Service Corps and the Health Centers’ programs. He began his tenure at NACHC working to double the Health Centers program (the REACH Initiative) and subsequently drafted the current growth plan, ACCESS for All America. During the 13 years Craig worked at NACHC, the program grew from $875 million in annual funding to $5.1 billion today.
 
Prior to working at NACHC, Craig worked on Capitol Hill and in the Oregon State Legislature. His work on Capitol Hill included a stint in the Senate Finance Committee, which has jurisdiction over all health, tax and trade issues. He also served as the Senior Legislative Assistant for a member of the House Appropriations Committee, and later as the Legislative Director for a member of the House Rules Committee.
 
He received his Masters in Public Health from the George Washington University School of Public Health in Washington, DC, and has a Bachelor’s of Science from Willamette University in Salem, Oregon.
 
Craig currently serves on the governing boards for First Focus Campaign for Children, the National Nurse Practitioner Residency Training Consortium and the Coalition for Health Funding.
 
He lives with his wife Linda and three daughters in northern Virginia.

Melissa Ryan

Melissa Ryan, MPH is the Operations Director of the Division of Policy and Shortage Designation, in the Bureau of Health Workforce (BHW).  BHW is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). Melissa joined HRSA in 2006 as part of a one year rotational program, working rotations in the HIV/AIDS Bureau, the Bureau of Health Professions, the Bureau of Primary Health Care, and the Federal Office of Rural Health Policy. Since then, she has worked as a Public Health Analyst in the Office of Performance Review (now the Office of Regional Operations), as the Special Assistant to the Associate Administrator of the Bureau of Health Professions, and as a Branch Chief in the Bureau of Clinician Recruitment and Service, where she supported National Health Service Corps (NHSC) participants in maintaining their compliance with NHSC requirements. Prior to joining HRSA, she served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in South Africa, evaluated a fellowship program for the Division of HIV/AIDS Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, and worked for the State of Maine’s HIV Program. Melissa earned her B.S. in Foreign Service from Georgetown University and her Master of Public Health from Tulane University. But no matter where she goes, Melissa remains fiercely proud of her Iowa roots.

Lisa Mouscher

Lisa Mouscher is CEO and Lead Consultant at Sogence Training and Consulting.  As a popular and dynamic facilitator, trainer and consultant, Lisa works primarily with leaders, managers and staff from Community Health Centers and other community health focused organizations across the country.  She brings her extensive background in management, training and human resources to her work and is a graduate of Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts.  Lisa specializes in two areas, providing intensive management skills training to health care organizations, and assisting them to create a culture of customer service.  She is known for facilitating immediately applicable results as well as lasting impact to strengthen these organizations for the long-term.

Mike Shimmens

Mike Shimmens joined the 3RNet (National Rural Recruitment and Retention Network) as Executive Director on August 1, 2012.  In this role he works with a nine member Board of Directors to assist 53 non-profit member organizations in the recruitment and retention of quality health care professionals in rural and underserved areas of our country. 

​Prior to coming to this position, he worked for 6 years at the Missouri Primary Care Association as Director of Recruitment and Workforce Development and nine years as Director of Medical Staff Development at St. Mary's Health Center in Jefferson City, MO.  Mike has a Bachelor’s degree from Missouri State University, a Master’s degree from Western Illinois University and he continues to live in Jefferson City, Missouri with his wife Mary Ellen and daughter Maura.

Michelle Varcho

Michelle Varcho is the Director of Education Outreach for the National Rural Recruitment and Retention Network (3RNet). In this role, Michelle coordinates education-related activities for 3RNet members and rural facilities across the country including trainings using 3RNet’s educational tools such as the Recruiting for Retention manual, a rural-focused plan and guidebook focused on finding and keeping providers in rural areas.
 
Prior to joining 3RNet, Michelle was a Human Resources Director for a Federally Qualified Health Center in Jefferson City, Missouri, where she help them grow from five employees in one location to one hundred and ten employees in four locations, serving over 13 counties. The services provided included Family Medicine, Pediatrics, Obstetrics, Pain Management, Behavioral Health, Dental and Nutrition counseling.  In this role she created and implemented strategies and best practices to overcome the unique barriers to recruiting and retaining providers in the rural health care arena.

Michelle has over twenty years of experience in health-care related human resources both at the local and national level. She has an MBA from Williams Woods University and a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Columbia College. She holds a Sr. Professional Human Resources certification since 2003.

Mark Barclay

Mark Barclay is the Director of Member Services for 3RNet, the National Rural Recruitment and Retention Network. In this role, Mark serves as the primary support contact for 53 3RNet members, and the over 5,000 rural and underserved facilities across the country that utilize 3RNet. Prior to working for 3RNet, Barclay recruited for 36 Critical Access Hospitals and 4 FQHCs as the Workforce Specialist at the Center for Rural Health at the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Barclay also helped establish TruServe, a web-based tracking system used by State Offices of Rural Health and Primary Care Offices nationwide. In 2013, Barclay gained certification as a Fellow of the Association of Staff Physician Recruiters, their highest recognition. Mark has a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree from the University of North Dakota.