Ms. Perkins retired as Director of Policy and Planning, Senior Associate of Early Childhood Initiatives from the New York State Council on Children and Families in 2018. Since its inception in 2006, she represented the Council as a founding member of the New York State Parenting Education Partnership (NYSPEP).  She continues to be active on various committees. Now living in Tompkins County, she is a member of the community’s Early Childhood Development Consortium and the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County’s Family and Community Program Committee.

Responsibilities at the Council included: the state project director for NY Project LAUNCH, a SAMHSA funded initiative to improve the systems that serve young children and address their physical, emotional, social, cognitive and behavioral growth. Also, she worked closely with the staff of the Head Start Collaboration Project, the Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems (ECCS) initiative, and the Early Childhood Advisory Council (ECAC) on many early childhood, parenting and family literacy issues across the state.

Prior to joining the Council, she was an Even Start Family Literacy coordinator for seven years and an adult educator, specializing in child and family development/parenting education, for Cornell Cooperative Extension for seven years.

Susan holds graduate and undergraduate degrees from the Pennsylvania State University, is a member of the National Parenting Education Network, serves on Cornell University’s Parenting Work Team and has been on New York’s Zero-to-Three Network Board of Directors since 2015. She has been named an honorary board member of Literacy Volunteers-Rensselaer County.