Tara Kelly

Tara Kelly (Ireland)

Tara Kelly has worked with children and families for twenty five years with the statutory agency Tusla, the Child and Family Agency (formerly HSE). She holds a Diploma in Applied Social Studies from the Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT) and a Masters in Child Protection and Welfare (Trinity College, Dublin). Tara is currently a Doctoral Researcher in NUI Galway, where she is researching parental experiences of child to parent violence and abuse.
In 2001, Tara moved within the statutory child and family agency to set up a Family Support Service in South County Dublin where she continues to work on a part-time basis, managing a team of Social Workers and Social Care Workers in providing comprehensive supports to families experiencing a range of difficulties. Tara trained with Dr. Declan Coogan (NUI Galway) in Non Violent Resistance (NVR) and uses this model extensively in her work as a practitioner, supervisor and trainer. She is an accredited NVR trainer and has trained hundreds of practitioners from a range of disciplines.
With her colleague, Catrina Scanlan, Tara founded New Authority Parenting which provides NVR training for practitioners and services for parents. Tara is also a founding member of Child Protection and Welfare Ireland (CPWI) -the first multi-disciplinary child protection and welfare association in Ireland. In addition, she is a founding member of NVR Ireland which has been established to promote and develop NVR research, practice and training in Ireland.