Gisella Curioso-Vilchez is a bilingual Spanish/English SLP with twenty years of experience in the field of speech and language therapy. She is a model for Latino professionals who immigrate to the United States as she contributes and creates a positive impact in our community and country. Since the beginning of the pandemic because of COVID-19, many things have changed for everyone. Gisella not also supported her clients’ families with her empathy and mentoring skills but she went above and beyond and achieved more than the therapy sessions. Gisella has the ability to write powerful and inspiring children’s books in Spanish and English with educational activities at the end of her stories so parents can have activities to do after reading a book. It is well known that shared reading from an early age changes the dopaminergic and serotonergic systems. Therefore, reading mitigates the risk of learning difficulties in vulnerable population, including most of the Latino community. In this sense, Gisella tries to promote the importance of shared reading in libraries, early intervention groups and any place where she can speak and share her books in open and public presentations, including online activities. During her interaction with her clients and client’s parents from the Latino Community, she realized that most of them don’t know about the library programs or the benefit of reading to their children because in their countries of origin is not something that is encouraged. As she considers herself as a first generation of immigrant and is aware of the Latino culture and language, her message and empathy is usually very well taken. Gisella’s personal mission is to promote literature and encouraging reading activities in the Latino community, and to foster better parent-child interaction. Gisella continues working in Early Intervention and CPSE program, where she coaches her clients and parents about the importance of shared reading from an early age. During the last year, Gisella has organized several online activities, open to the public, via Facebook and Zoom, promoting bilingual book readings for children. As stated in my previous paragraphs, Gisella is an inspiring professional who works in Early Intervention and CPSE and who wants to make a positive impact on children, especially for the Latino community. 

Nominated by Fabiola Romo