Board Members
Tyrone Cabral
Term ends 2027
Tyrone Cabral, LCSW, is a licensed clinical social worker with 8+ years of experience in mental health and specializing in CBT and trauma-focused interventions to support young adults and adults young at heart in navigating anxiety, trauma, grief, and self-doubt. He is passionate about helping individuals break free from self-blame, process emotional overwhelm, and build resilience through structured, evidence-based therapy.
Tyrone has a diverse clinical background, including crisis response, outpatient therapy, and clinical supervision, with a strong focus on trauma recovery, emotional regulation, and cognitive restructuring. In addition to his clinical practice, he serves as an Adjunct Professor at Bristol Community College, where he mentors and educates future mental health professionals.
Beyond his direct work with clients, Tyrone is a strong advocate for accessible mental health treatment and systemic improvements in social work licensing. As a dedicated member of NASW, Tyrone is committed to advancing ethical, client-centered care, expanding access to mental health services, and advocating for policies that strengthen the social work profession.
Cristina Costa
Term ends 2026
Cristina Costa, LICSW has been a NASW member since 2012 and serves on the NASW Program Planning Committee for our annual NASW Symposium. She obtained her Masters in Social Worker from Boston College, in addition to her two Bachelor's Degrees, a B.A. in Psychology and B.S. in Human Development and Family Studies from the University of Rhode Island. Cristina is an alum of URI’s Talent Development, as well as a Ronald E. McNair Scholar. In 2004, Cristina became the first Providence Law Enforcement Advocate with the Providence Police Department, Day One and Sojourner House, where she worked alongside the Special Victims Unit in assisting victims of sexual assault, child molestation, domestic violence and hate crimes. In total, Cristina has over 20 years of experience working in the field of social work with many different populations including youth in residential care, victims of crime, foster care, adoption, LGBTQ+, first generation families, elementary/middle school students and families, emergency room and inpatient medical services and operations for afterschool programs.
Cristina was born and raised in Providence, RI, growing up in a bi-lingual household, she is fluent in Portuguese and English, as well as speaking Spanish as her third language. She currently works as a Clinician with Rhode Island College’s Counseling Center, after spending 8 years as a School Social Worker in both charter and public schools. She also has a private practice in East Providence, RI, where she enjoys working with children and young adults who are first generation and/or identify with the LGBTQ+ community. Cristina’s passion is to promote diversity in the social work field and to provide professional development opportunities to increase the field’s awareness of privilege, bias, and oppression as part of her commitment to building inclusive and culturally appropriate services for clients and communities.
Heidi Ross
Term ends 2025
Heidi Ross, BSW, MA has been an NASW member since 2011. She received her BSW from Washington State University and MA in Counseling from Saint Mary's College. She started out as a Candy Striper and quickly found a field of work and passion. Originally from the West Coast, she has found her way to Rhode Island with work and volunteer experience in senior centers, nursing homes, retirement and assisted living communities, hospital geriatric services, Medicare/SHIP and extensive personal family caregiving.
Advocacy has become a natural path to take, because once we see and experience holes in "the system," it becomes a mission to find others with like-minded solutions. She is currently doing advocacy and outreach work with AARP RI, the Alzheimer's Association, and other long-term care and disability entities. With a background in Montessori education, Heidi believes that with resource-sharing, reaching out to elected officials and overall networking, it is important to realize where the person "is at" before we can expect and effect change.
Michelle Baptista, LCSW
Term ends 2026
Michelle Baptista, LCSW has been a NASW member since 2018 and has been working with children and adolescents as a social worker for the past five years. Michelle obtained her bachelor of social work from Salve Regina University in 2018 and her masters of social work from Rhode Island College in 2021. Since 2018, she has been working in child welfare providing services to children and adolescents with trauma, youth in foster care and adoptive homes, and children with sexual abuse histories and families. Michelle is now working with youth in her current position as a school social worker at an elementary school in Providence, RI and has the opportunity to provide counseling to students, support families with community resources and assist with crisis management, among other duties. Although Michelle is still early on in her career, she has an abundance of passion, ambition and commitment to this career that is very evident in her work ethic. Michelle has had a long-term passion and joy for community service. She spent many hours of her time in high school and college doing community service work and it was through this network that she discovered her interest in the social work field. In 2016, she received the Campus Compact award for outstanding community service work in a higher education setting and the 2016 Big Sister of the Year award from Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Ocean state. Michelle has a strong commitment to honoring the values of social work and especially the value of service. She looks forward to advocating for social workers across Rhode Island and empowering disadvantaged populations that we serve.
Kristin Stelter
Term ends 2027
Kristin “Kris” Stelter (they/them/theirs) has been a member of NASW since 2020. They earned their MSW from Metropolitan State University of Denver in 2022 and their Master of Fine Arts in Contemporary Performance: Theater from Naropa University in Boulder, CO in 2018. Prior to moving to RI in July 2023 to be closer to family, Kris worked at TRU PACE and Envision Hospice. They have extensive experience in de-escalation techniques and crisis management from their prior career in retail and banking and have participated in over 30 theatrical productions in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Colorado.
Kris hopes to bring their lived experiences to an organization that has helped them gain footing in a world that is constantly shifting. They have learned enough to know how much they have yet to learn, and hold a particular affinity to conversations around accessibility, grief, death and dying, and the LGBTQIA2S+ community. They are interested in formulating a new committee centered around supporting the LGBTQIA2S+ population. Kris approaches their work through a trauma-informed lens, and challenges NASW RI to acknowledge and address the ongoing impacts of the pandemic on its members and our clients, as we have yet to collectively grieve the experience, and are still bearing witness to its effects to this day.
MSW Student Representative
Edward Carter
Term ends 2025
Edward earned his BA in Psychology from the University of Tennessee in 2009. He has a rich history of volunteer and work experiences, ranging from administering psychological tests as a psychometrist to advocating for children and supervising factory workers. He also possesses valuable entrepreneurial experience, having assisted a local businessman in opening and operating a cafe in Providence, RI. While in each of these positions, his guiding principle has been to be a servant leader and to honor and respect the dignity of each individual he encounters no matter their circumstances.
After reflecting on his experience meeting with and observing clinical social workers, he realized that social work embodies his values of helping to support & empower others, especially those who are disadvantaged or marginalized. He believes that one of his gifts is being able to observe a system, gather information from a variety of resources and to then see the possibility of how the system could work better for everyone involved.
Edward is now pursuing his MSW through the SSW program at Boston College.
BSW Student Representative
Margaret Fallon
Term ends 2025
Margaret Fallon is a freshman at Providence College. She recently completed her first semester as a Social Work major and received Dean’s List recognition. As a student and future social worker, Margaret sees a desperate need for social workers and believes in their ability to create large, systemic change. She sees social media and education to be valuable means of spreading awareness to pressing social justice issues, and wants to bring fresh eyes and perspectives to solutions to difficult challenges facing the social work profession.