Meet Modern Family team leader and creative founder Vanessa Linsey. Vanessa’s mantra is “peace begins at home.” As a divorce mediator, she supports brave families as they dissolve their marriages and rebuild their lives. As a marital mediator, she helps couples transition from chaos to clarity through productive, future-positive conversation. As a trainer, she delivers new and modern, feminine-infused conflict management skills. As a blended mom of seven, she practices love and determination to support a stable home.

Meet Naja Hall, founding trainer at Modern Family and leader of the largest blended family community for millennials: Blended and Black. She passionately provides families and individuals the tools by which they can learn to form a more cohesive unit, free of the drama that usually surrounds divorce, separation and remarriage. This blended mom and media darling brings extensive training and over 10,000 hours of family coaching to the Modern Family team. A born entrepreneur and gifted public speaker, Naja lights up the screen while delivering powerful, effective, downright life changing messages to couples.

Meet Patricia Papernow, founding trainer at Modern Family and global leader on stepfamily research. For 40 years, this blended mom has taught workshops all over the world and consulted with folks who want to learn more about supporting thriving stepfamily relationships. Her research-packed books on stepfamilies are must-reads for anyone thinking about blending. Patricia is a true expert in the field of blended families and the team at Modern Family is honored to have her as a co-founder and thrilled to feature her as a trainer.

Meet Alnoor Maherali. He is a founding Modern Family trainer and a highly skilled diplomat and SIMI accredited mediator. A ‘student of the world,’ Alnoor’s personal and professional travel has taken him to almost 50 different countries, making him especially adept at navigating cultural, ethnic, and racial differences. Alnoor landed stateside as a student at Harvard where he earned his MPA and discovered a passion for mediation. He views mediation as a safe and collaborative process that enables people to resolve their conflicts amicably with an outcome all can be happy with while maintaining or even enhancing their relationships.

Meet Judge Linda Prestley, founding board member of Modern Family and master of family agreement making. Judge Linda is a former Superior Court Judge of the State of Connecticut Judicial Branch where she served as a presiding Judge in the Family Court. Judge Linda's expertise covers all aspects of family matters including but not limited to divorce, post-judgment disputes, custody issues, blended family and parenting conflicts and other related family matters. Judge Linda brings the experience of a parent of a large blended family, a teacher, a lawyer, and a widely respected judge to her mediation practice.

Meet founding trainer and mediation superstar Nnena Odim. Nnena has mediated the full range of family/domestic relations since 1997. She has taught mediation at Suffolk and Boston College Law Schools, MIT, and New England School of Law. She continues to serve as a wise teacher, trainer and mentor to many. Nnena is recently retired from Harvard Law School, where she was the Director and Senior Clinical Instructor of the Family/Domestic Violence Law Clinic at Harvard’s Legal Services Center.

Meet big-hearted Ben Stich, founding trainer at Modern Family, experienced family mediation practitioner and trainer, and sought-after expert in high conflict family relations. Ben is a long time Collaborative Law divorce coach as well as an Instructor for William James College’s High Conflict Co-Parenting Program. He also trains Collaborative Problem Solving for MGH Psychiatry’s Think:Kids’ program.

Meet the unstoppable Sarrah Samraoui, founding advisor at Modern Family and passionate financial planner with Ameriprise Financial. As a visionary and compassionate financial advisor, Sarrah is dedicated to helping people make informed financial decisions. She teaches financial literacy workshops for high school students, immigrants, and underserved communities, helping clients and students create a strategic financial roadmap tailored to their unique values and circumstances.

Meet founding board member Diana Chiang. Diana serves New England’s top mediation firm MWI as Director of Corporate and Court Programs. She both practices and teaches mediation nationwide. Diana teaches negotiation at Suffolk University Law School and provides coaching and mentoring services to mediators seeking to grow their skills. In addition to Diana’s many achievements and gifts, she is a passionate Positive Psychology coach.

Meet Modern Family’s founding tech guru Mike Goldsmith. This veteran, navel gazer, and blended dad brings our peace mission to life through automation and technology. A present and positive leader, Mike loves to help clients build and implement software, applying a creative approach to configuring solutions that scale and optimize workflows.