Jennifer Gardner

Jennifer Gardner is an associate clinician at Thera+Kids Associates—she began her career working with children in 1999 as a therapeutic teacher in a school specifically created to help bright children who struggled to socially or emotionally function in mainstream settings. This career blossomed into teacher training on school and district levels to help professionals understand and support struggling children and their families. In 2007 Jennifer started her own agency that provided on-site and in-home services to children and families in crisis. Jennifer and her team serviced 15 schools and three districts in addition to numerous individuals in the Houston area providing behavior and special needs support, teacher and administration training, parent coaching, nanny education, parent support groups, and numerous workshop intensives. She also lead as a group facilitator at Bo’s Place supporting families through the loss of a child. Jennifer was then asked to join Head Start Houston to assist in building the Mental Health and Disabilities department. In this role she was responsible for the student behavior support and special needs for five schools. Jennifer facilitated the assessment and ARD processes, trained teachers on classroom social/emotional curriculum, provided parent support and worked side-by-side with diagnosticians, speech paths, and other support staff to create wrap-around services for the child and family. In 2013 Jennifer was accepted to a post-graduate Fellowship program at the Menninger Clinic where she broadened her experience to the treatment of adults. During her fellowship she was offered a faculty position working with adults and their families participating in the long term inpatient program. Jennifer now runs a private practice in the Upper Kirby area of Houston and sees adults, children, families, and couples. She continues to work from the perspective of supporting the development of the whole child and family system though team collaboration.