Meet the team.

FOUNDER / CHAIRMAN

Nathan Mallipeddi graduated summa cum laude with honors from UCLA, where he received a B.S in Biology and B.A in Political Science. He is a Junior-elect to Phi Beta Kappa and a Fulbright Scholar. Nathan is founder and CEO of Myspeech, a non-profit organization that tackles a critical issue in the field of speech therapy regarding its lack of access to low income communities. He also serves on leadership teams for several international speech disability awareness organizations. Nathan has conducted both cell biology and public policy research at UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine and the Luskin School of Public Affairs, where he published his work in top journals. As the senior policy intern for the City of Los Angeles Department on Disability, Nathan developed transformative public policy initiatives that created jobs for the thousands of unemployed or homeless persons with disabilities in Los Angeles. Nathan aspires to a career as a physician-researcher-policymaker focusing on improving the quality of care and reducing the disparities for disabled persons in healthcare systems. He currently attends medical school at Harvard Medical School.

BOARD MEMBER

Hi. I’m Sharon, the founder of Communilogue. I believe that empathy is the cornerstone of effective communication and that solid communication is the foundation of optimal team collaboration. Through lectures and workshops, I teach individuals and teams empathy actions that they can take with them to the office to be better communicators, more focused collaborators, more thorough managers and creators of environments ripe for inclusion.

I am a life-long stutterer, and I use my speech impediment to teach what empathy is and how to use it as a foundation for positive and effective communication. Stuttering has informed my view of communication as a result of years of being both terrified to speak but also fascinated with the the intricacies of conversation. I've spoken about empathy and communication, vulnerability and my experience as a stutterer at conferences and companies globally.

BOARD MEMBER

Jesse Harris, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Linguistics at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he directs the UCLA Language Processing Lab. He teaches courses in psycholinguistics, experimental methods, and pragmatics, among others. His academic research investigates the cognitive processes that are recruited in decoding and producing speech in real time. He believes that his experience as a person who stutters has afforded him unique opportunities to help and advocate for others. He is committed to supporting students with disabilities, including those who stutter, and is dedicated to advancing programs that generate educational and research opportunities for students from diverse backgrounds. He is proud to assist the SCSS and its mission to provide resources and services to those in need.

BOARD MEMBER

Dr. William Gale is the Arjay and Frances Miller Chair in Federal Economic Policy and a senior fellow in the Economic Studies Program at the Brookings Institution. His research focuses on tax policy, fiscal policy, pensions, and saving behavior. He is co-director of the Tax Policy Center, a joint venture of the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute. He is also director of the Retirement Security Project.

Gale is the author of Fiscal Therapy: Curing America’s Debt Addiction and Investing in the Future (Oxford University Press, 2019).

He is also the co-editor of several books, including Automatic: Changing the Way America Saves (Brookings 2009); Aging Gracefully: Ideas to Improve Retirement Security in America (Century Foundation, 2006); The Evolving Pension System: Trends, Effects, and Proposals for Reform (Brookings, 2005); Private Pensions and Public Policy (Brookings, 2004); Rethinking Estate and Gift Taxation (Brookings, 2001), and Economic Effects of Fundamental Tax Reform (Brookings, 1996).

His research has been published in several scholarly journals, including the American Economic Review, Journal of Political Economy, and Quarterly Journal of Economics. In 2007, a paper he co-authored was awarded the TIAA-CREF Paul A. Samuelson Award Certificate of Excellence.

He has also written extensively in policy-related publications and newspapers, including op-eds in CNN, the Financial Times, Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post.

He served as President of the National Tax Association from 2019 to 2020 and as Vice President of Brookings and Director of the Economic Studies Program from 2006 to 2009. Prior to joining Brookings in 1992, he was an assistant professor in the Department of Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles, and a senior economist for the Council of Economic Advisers under President George H.W. Bush.

He is a member of the Macroeconomic Advisers Board of Advisors since 2016. Gale has consulted for the MSL Group and in 2017 was a panelist at the Center for Strategic Development’s Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Economic Reforms Workshop.

Gale attended Duke University and the London School of Economics and received his Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1987. He lives in Fairfax, Virginia, is an avid tennis player, and is a person who stutters. He is married to Diane Lim and is the father of two grown children.

BOARD MEMBER

Dr. Derek E. Daniels is a licensed and certified speech-language pathologist who specializes in stuttering therapy. He has presented locally, nationally, and internationally on stuttering. He also serves as an associate editor for the Journal of Fluency Disorders, and an assistant editor for the Teaching and Learning in Communication Sciences and Disorders journal. Dr. Daniels is a person who stutters, conducts research on psychosocial aspects of stuttering, and supervises graduate student training in stuttering through Wayne State University’s Speech and Language Clinic. He has participated in many self-help events, workshops, and clinical training programs for people who stutter. Dr. Daniels is a native of Houston, TX, and currently enjoys urban life in Detroit. He is currently the President of the Michigan Speech-Language-Hearing Association (MSHA).

BOARD MEMBER

Jamie Howell is a Financial services account executive at Tableau Software residing in Northern VA. Jamie works with large financial institutions to help them see & understand their data. He is a proud member of the stuttering community and has been an ongoing participant in the Sisskin Stuttering Center for over six years. Jamie’s personal stuttering story fuels his passion to share his story with underprivileged stutterers; specifically, the impact that Avoidance Reduction Therapy had on him, which resulted in greater confidence & comfort. Jamie stays active in his local Toastmasters Chapter and embraces speech improvement platforms to fine-tune his leadership and speaking skills. Jamie feels passionate that oral communication is one of the greatest gifts on Earth, and is very proud to contribute to SSA’s mission by bringing a diverse skill set and help launch a sustainable framework that will fundamentally change the life of stutters across the globe. Jamie enjoys staying active, playing basketball, golf, and enjoying everything the Mid-Atlantic has to offer.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Jenny McGuire is a person who stutters and a vociferous advocate for the stuttering community. Jenny earned a BA in Philosophy from Georgetown University and an MA in Art Therapy from George Washington University. Jenny worked as an art therapist with pediatric hematology and oncology patients and their families at Georgetown University Hospital’s Lombardi Cancer Center. She found deep gratification in this work for innumerable reasons, the main one being: Bringing patients and families together in the art studio–which doubled as the waiting room–and thus creating community in the most unlikely of settings. The magic of these connections reinforced her long held belief that community is a powerful agent of both comfort and transformation.

Jenny’s journey as a stutterer has been marked by many different speech therapy experiences. Most of these therapies taught her behaviors intended to mask her stutter–spoiler, these tricks never worked when she needed them most–but did little to address the spate of adverse cognitive and affective effects of stuttering. ARTs (avoidance reduction therapy for stuttering) with Vivian Sisskin changed the trajectory of Jenny’s life. Through ARTs group therapy Jenny learned that a distinction can be drawn between the problem of stuttering and the act of stuttering. Having some dysfluencies when she spoke was not ruining her life, but her avoidance of stuttering along with constant negative thoughts and feelings about stuttering sure were. Through hard work, doing the things she didn’t want to do, and leveraging the loving support of a wonderful group therapy community, Jenny climbed out of the darkness that is the problem of stuttering.

After becoming a mother, Jenny was privileged to make the choice to leave the workforce and spend a decade focusing on raising her children. Now that her children are both school aged and flying the coop for seven hours a day, she could not be more thrilled to join Myspeech as Executive Director and to play a part in driving Myspeech’s noble mission forward. Jenny can’t think of anything she feels more passionately about than removing barriers so that others–particularly individuals from underserved communities– may find a way out of the darkness and live full, joyful lives, stuttering and all. The “alliance” aspect of Myspeech touches the part of her that knows that everything is more tolerable and manageable within the context of a supportive community, and she looks forward to connecting stutterers with “their people” so that they may continue to thrive in the long term. Jenny is humbled by the steadfast dedication that Myspeech’s many volunteers bring to this work; the organization simply would not function without their drive, passion, and tireless effort.

Jenny serves on the Board of Directors for SAY: The Stuttering Association for the Young, and volunteers as a CASA, advocating for children navigating the dependency and neglect court system in Boulder County.

Jenny lives in Lafayette, CO, between Boulder and Denver. Unlike literally everyone around her, she is not an avid skier. She does really enjoy taking long walks while listening to podcasts which allows her to introvert–yes, that’s a verb–and recharge. When not working on Myspeech, studying, volunteering, or introverting, Jenny can be found hanging out with her wonderful husband Seth and two amazing daughters, Danby and Auden. She also enjoys playing with her dog Pancakes, getting together with extended family, and laughing her head off with dear friends.

DEPUTY EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR