Elizabeth Manley, LSW

Senior Advisor for Health and Behavioral Health Policy and Assistant Extension Professor

Innovations Institute

Elizabeth Manley, LSW, is faculty and senior advisor for Health and Behavioral Health Policy at Innovations Institute, University of Connecticut School of Social Work.

Her research interests include youth behavioral health systems design, customization of youth crisis systems, impacts of residential interventions, suicide prevention, and the impacts of policy and financing in public systems.

Ms. Manley is nationally recognized for her expertise in children’s behavioral health, intellectual/developmental disabilities, and substance use systems design. She has a specific focus on innovation in policy, financing, and practice implementation with states and communities. Her over 30 years of executive leadership at the national, state, and provider levels in both the public and private sectors have given her a unique understanding of the complexity of systems and the impact of innovation.

Ms. Manley is the former assistant commissioner for New Jersey’s Children’s System of Care, where she led transformation and implementation of system innovations including building a trauma informed, seamless public behavioral health system with expertise in addressing the special needs of youth engaged in other child serving systems such as child welfare and juvenile justice.

She holds a LSW and a certificate in nonprofit management from Rutgers University.