ARSJ General Membership
Bob Conover is a Vice President with a Fortune 100 financial services firm and has been involved in anti-racist and diversity work for more than 15 years at his workplace, church, and in his community. Since 2004, he has worked in ARSJ to promote justice, reparations, and equity and advance the organization's mission. He brings from the corporate world leadership, management, presentation, analytical, and technical skills and lends his white privilege to the efforts of this group to fight every form of oppression in all areas of life. He lives with his wife and two young sons in New Jersey. Mr. Conover has a M.A. in Economics from Rutgers University (New Jersey) and a B.A. in Honors Economics from Georgetown University in Washington, DC. He previously served as ARSJ's secretary and member of its CLC and has played an integral role in facilitating and organizing many of ARSJ's presentations and workshops as well as the organization's data analysis and reporting.
Patrick Kelley, L.Ac., MSTOM, M.A., is a Licensed Acupuncturist (L.Ac.) who brings more than 19 years of experience in proposal and grant-writing in health to ARSJ. He has been a member of ARSJ since 2006 supporting the social justice aims of ARSJ through participation in ARSJ projects such as Watch NJ, Voter Registration, and the annual White Privilege Conference, and grant/proposal development. His expertise spans proposal development and management, grant writing, project management, data analysis, and research ethics. He has an interest in providing acupuncture in community-based models such as the National Acupuncture Detoxification Association (NADA) protocol. He has a Certificate in Public Health from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, an M.A. in English from Virginia Tech, and a Master of Science in Traditional Oriental Medicine (MSTOM) at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine.
Iris Rubinstein, is Vice President/Chair of ARSJ, one of the organization's founders, and has played an integral role in facilitating critical consciousness raising in community-based organizations as well as facilitating ARSJ's community-based Participatory Action Research (PAR). As an Officer for ARSJ, she currently has assisted in the efforts of training new volunteers for WATCH NJ - both for court room observation procedures and for socio-education training within ARSJ and to outside organizations. She provides critical input on the data collection tools for the PAR, ensuring that they capture data elements that the collective has determined as descriptors / measures of the institutional oppression present in the family court system. Ms. Rubinstein has created and facilitated many ARSJ's presentations and workshops and previously served on ARSJ's CLC.
Janet MacDonnell is a founding member of ARSJ and serves on the organization's CLC. Ms. MacDonnell's social justice work focuses on creating effective training programs for volunteers and building community advocacy. She has organized and participated in numerous outreach efforts to spread awareness and inspire collective action among community stakeholders in domestic violence advocacy and racial justice, including collaborations between ARSJ and youth involved with FOR TROY and voter registration drives. Ms. MacDonnell was instrumental in designing and implementing its Watch NJ court monitoring effort and is currently active in training and data entry. A certified ultrasound and X-ray technologist, she has provided care to patients in the Veterans Administration (VA) NJ Healthcare System (Lyons and East Orange Campuses) for over 20 years. She began her professional education and employment as a Registered Radiologic Technologist at Muhlenberg Hospital before advancing her education and profession as a Registered Diagnostic Medical Sonographer in the Radiology Service for the VA NJ Healthcare System. She currently works in the Non Invasive Vascular Lab performing vascular sonography on pre- and post-operative and chronic care patients at the only testing site for veterans in the state. Ms. MacDonnell brings a unique perspective to ARSJ having served and cared for this marginalized veteran population and their families for over thirty years. She also provides direct clinical training for Rutgers Vascular Technology students.
Susan Zelt, Dr.PH., is a co-founder of ARSJ who brings more than 20 years of research experience in health policy and pharmaceuticals research and development to her work at ARSJ. Her research passion lies in translation of research into practice, and diffusion of innovation, all as they relate to improving population health and reducing health, public health disparities and addressing unmet medical needs. Dr. Zelt has a Dr.P.H. from the School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, an M.P.H. in Socio medical Sciences from Columbia University, and a B.S. in Biochemistry from the Pennsylvania State University. She supports ARSJ in their mission by working on grant funding and the Watch NJ Participatory Action Research program as a research assistant.
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