CAGS, Ph.D. Cand.

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Gina A. Alfonso is doing her doctoral studies in Expressive Arts in Therapy, Education, Consulting and Conflict transformation and Peacebuilding at the European Graduate School. She was born and raised in the Philippines where she managed a family owned pre-school and elementary school with an inclusion program for children with special needs. She attended Fordham and Lesley Universities, and is a licensed and Board Certified Art Therapist. In 1999, Gina started a small non-profit to help facilitate access to quality, relevant education for ethnic minorities (www.cartwheelfoundation.org). Currently, she is on-call as a clinician at a private practice in Virginia, USA, where she resides. She spends most of her time engaged in program development bridging the divide between education and mental health through the Expressive Arts in various contexts internationally, and is the Director of MAGIS Creative Spaces, the first Center dedicated to the Expressive Arts in Healing and Education in the Philippines. She is also a consultant to Save the Children International and recently co-founded Cartwheel Foundation International, which focuses on investing in people, knowledge and technology to build creative, resilient and sustainable communities