About / Meet the Experts

BIO: Sue Blaney

Sue Blaney is an award-winning author, speaker, and publisher dedicated to supporting parents in successfully raising teenagers. She is the author of Please Stop the Rollercoaster! How Parents of Teenagers Can Smooth Out the Ride, a parent discussion group program that has positively changed thousands of parents’ lives around the country since 2003. Her recent audiobook You’re Empowered! Parenting Teens with Conviction, Communication and Love won both a Mom’s Choice Awards and a Ben Franklin award. As a Certified Professional Behavior Analyst and communications expert, Sue has spent 30 years in training and publishing. Sue’s background in communications enhances her sensitivity to the content, approach and medium used to effectively share information with parents of teenagers. She speaks regularly to parents, educators and other professionals around the country about improving communication, increasing parent involvement, dealing with parenting issues, and creating parenting support groups. Sue has been interviewed on radio and television nationally, and publishes a weekly column and podcast titled 2 Minute Tips for Parenting Teens. Sue has two children who are recent college graduates.

BIO: Shelly D. Mahon M.S.

Shelly D. Mahon has a Master of Science in Human Development and Family Studies (HDFS), with an emphasis in adolescent development, experiential education, and program development and evaluation. Currently, she is working on her Ph.D. in HDFS, with a minor in Prevention Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her main area of research is integrating her interests in adolescents and parent-child relationships after divorce with online, web-based intervention programs. Shelly has been in a university setting since the year 2000, teaching undergraduate and graduate level courses in content areas such as Child and Adolescent Development, Program Development, Research, and Evaluation, and Motivational Theories in Counseling Practice. In addition, she is actively involved in her community through organizations such as Parent Engagement Network (PEN) and has over 15 years of experience working in human service positions in the experiential education and criminal justice fields. Shelly took her first Human Development and Family Studies course as an undergraduate at 18 years old. That first course was just the beginning of a lifetime love and commitment to this field.