ZEINA ISMAIL- ALLOUCHE, Ph.D.
Senior Child Protection and Communications for Behavioral Results Expert
An advocate for social justice and children’s rights and an oral history/autoethnography storyteller and performer, I have worked for more than 20 years in the field of child
protection, especially with children forced to separate from their families. I have
contributed to international initiatives to promote family strengthening aiming
at preventing separation, participated in the drafting of the Guidelines for
the Alternative Care for Children (2009), and co-established
Badael-Alternatives ( http://badael-alternatives.org/), an NGO based in Lebanon
to advocate for the rights to origins for the survivors who were illegally
adopted out during the wartime.
I was appointed as apublic scholar (2019-2020) and I completed my Individualized Ph.D. in Artsand Social Science, at Concordia University in 2021.
My oral history performance was grounded in Indigenous methodologies and
was based on the life stories of individuals who have experienced transracial
or intercountry adoption through a collaborative research-creation using
headphones verbatim.
I have assumed leadership positions within many international organizations . I also served asa national director of an organization that specialized in alternative care.
With more than 7years of experience in university teaching, I am grounded in decolonized approaches to learning.
I contributed to many publications advocating for child protection with a special
focus on Gender-Based Violence, transracial/international adoption, and the
rights of children without parental care.
Expertise
• Child protection, Juvenile Justice, Gender Based Violence, and Child Welfare
• Social work methodologies and community development approaches
• Integrated communications models and behavioral change processes
• Social policies and legal reform with special focus on alternative care and its interconnections with alleviating poverty
• Decolanized appraoches to researching and teaching
• Post colonial adoption theories
EDUCATION
Individualized PHD (Arts and Social sciences)
Concordia University
2016 – 2021
Master of Public Health
American University of Beirut, Lebanon
1991 – 1993
Bachelor of Arts
Social Work, American Lebanese University
1988 -1991
Teach academically
Design and conduct oral history, arts-based and autoethnography research-creation grounded in Indigenous Methodologies
Lead Action Learning/participatory arts-based projects with youth
Design tailored research interventions including scoping, situation analysis, needs assessment, and strategic planning
Identify reform strategies, advocacy approaches and related communications campaigns
Design and lead training workshops in the fields of planning, monitoring and evaluation, advocacy, communications, behavioral change, leadership, team building, communications skills with special focus on family strengthening and alternative care
Assume programmatic/managerial leadership and high-level networking