Anna Valdez is the Program Director at Chosen and came on board in January of 2022. She holds MA in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from the University of the Cumberlands.

After teaching high school for 2 years, Anna Valdez lived in Monterrey, Mexico for 5 years as a Program Coordinator for the international organization, Back2Back Ministries. Along with being a Program Coordinator, Anna was the primary caregiver for 17 teenage girls in a span of 5 years with whom she successfully applied the Trust-Based Relational Intervention strategies. She is a Trust-Based Relational Intervention Practitioner from Texas Christian University, a Trauma Free World affiliate trainer, and a Making Sense of Your Worth facilitator. She’s had the opportunity to train on trauma-informed care to organizations internationally and around the United States.

Her background includes providing therapeutic interventions, building educational programs for families, other caregivers, and professional staff in trauma-informed care and strategies, developing audience-specific curriculum, and coordinating trauma-informed efforts for organizations as they move through the continuum of trauma-informed care. She has served vulnerable children and their caregivers for over 10 years and she is passionate about helping anyone who works with children gain skills to understand them and love them well.

Anna lives in Austin, Texas and you can find her visiting coffee shops, biking, and hiking on her free time.

Clinical Supervisor: Megan Zellner, LPC-S