Team Bios

Bart Schofield, LMFT

Bart Schofield ran a personal insurance brokerage firm in Connecticut for twenty-three years before returning to Connecticut State University to earn a Master of Science degree in Marriage and Family Therapy. He and Ruth, his wife, moved to New Mexico in 2011 with the intention of developing a center where they could help individuals, families, and children who had suffered various kinds of life traumas, especially childhood abuse. His intention was to develop a center where clinicians could share their growth and learning and become a source of good solid healing for clients. As a result, clinicians who join The Rio Rancho Family Counseling Center experience a great deal of personal and professional independence and guidance in a warm, positive and collegial environment. Clients who come to The Rio Rancho Family Counseling Center acknowledge the open caring and supportive atmosphere and the strong person-centered approach of the clinicians.

Bart offers clients the opportunity to discover their inner strengths and to come to feel better about themselves and their relationship:

“I empower the people who come to see me,” Bart says, “and they leave happier than when they arrived, with a better sense of themselves.”

His clients have high praise for Bart’s work:
“He’s easy to talk to,” said one young man.

A girl of fourteen reported,
“He’s the first one who listened to me.”

At the conclusion of their work together, another client, in her late forties said,
“You saved my life.”

Bart draws from a half dozen different methods of psychotherapy, blending them to fit the needs of each client. “And all of those methods treat the client as the main part of the relationship,” Bart explains, “whether their concerns are family, school, romance, or work.” Those methods also search out the base cause of a problem, and help the client to take a new look at that cause, from the viewpoint of today. “The way we dealt with those old problems may have worked, more or less, when we were younger. But we’ve learned a lot of new skills since then, right?” Bart feels that this approach works especially well with clients who are survivors of childhood abuse especially those who have been diagnosed as having Dissociative Identity Disorder.

In working with kids and teenagers, Bart says he teaches them respect by giving them respect. Bart always includes one or both parents in some part of every session. “I want to know how we’re doing at home,” he says. “I look for parental input and any new direction that the child and I ought to be taking in the therapy.”

Bart is in a number of insurance networks, and has a sliding fee scale for those who either don’t have insurance or prefer not to use it. For your information, Bart is in the following networks: Aetna, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, Cigna, Medicaid, Molina, Optum, Presbyterian, United Healthcare.

Rozanne Hurst, LPCC

Interacting with people without judgment is an important value that is a staple in my belief system. Life experiences have taught me empathy, patience, compromise, and how to seek a different perspective when faced with challenges.

My own life has been devoted to gathering and learning from my life experiences. First, by dedicating myself to my family and raising my children, whom I homeschooled. Then, for fourteen years I taught, choreographed and directed an award-winning dance troupe. I have also produced, several full-scale dance productions to benefit various charities. In this exciting and energizing field, I was able to interact with different cultures, genders, ages, sexual orientations, and abilities.

And at the age of 50, I began a career in Clinical Mental Health Counseling because I believe that the unifying elements for all of my pursuits has been to teach and foster individuals by cultivating self-confidence and helping them achieve their goals. Obtaining my Master’s degree and graduating with honors from New Mexico Highlands University has allowed me to continue my path to help people, this time assisting with their emotional needs.

My method focuses in helping each client learn to depend on himself/herself and those natural instincts we each have within us. I aim to effectively assist others gain new skills to create the changes they want by gaining insight, while relying and growing one’s own inner strengths, with the focus on those personal goals.

This philosophy of being there with you and your own talents is how I help you find your happier, smoother life path. It is my hope that you find me to be a good partner on your path to improved living and positive well-being.

Tele-heath by appointment.

Michelle Welch, LMFT

Michelle has been at The Rio Rancho Family Counseling Center since July of 2017. Her teaching gifts, education (she has a Masters in Early Childhood Education), and experience working with small children and their parents has been translated in to her psychotherapy work with parents, couples, and families.

While in her Marriage and Family Therapy Masters program she focused intensely on Internal Family Therapy, a core aspect of the therapy process at our center. As a result, when you work with Michelle, you will have the experience of someone who is highly skilled with working with one’s inner child parts and who understands the need for validation, acknowledgement, and support.

Clients find that Michelle’s warm sense of humor and ability to join them encourages deep inner resolve and inner cleansing. One reconnects with his own inner strengths of character and the willingness to provide a more stable and healthy life for self and his loved ones. Michelle recently completed the intensive training for EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) one of the more highly research techniques for working with trauma of various dimensions. It is not unusual for clients to find that they end therapy feeling as if they have grown up, and emerged more in keeping with the person they always dreamed they might become.

Rachel

Rachel graduated from Elon University in North Carolina in 2017, earning a bachelor’s degree in Human Services with a minor in Early Childhood Education. Following her undergraduate studies, Rachel has taken on numerous different roles, each allowing her to recognize a desire to enter the counseling field. She worked with kids and teens at a therapeutic boarding school in western North Carolina before moving on to become a first-grade teacher and a school counselor in North Carolina public schools. Rachel’s experience also includes working with older adults in an adult daycare facility as well as through a mental health partnership with the Durham Center for Senior Life in Durham, North Carolina. Most recently, Rachel graduated summa cum laude from North Carolina Central University with dual master’s degrees in Clinical Mental Health Counseling and School Counseling.

In her counseling work Rachel aims to be solution-focused and person-centered with individuals across the lifespan. She has experience offering support to those facing numerous challenges including trauma, divorce and family changes, life transitions, grief, and more. Rachel also has a passion for exploring alternative and unique forms of therapy to ensure her clients achieve the desired benefits from their therapeutic experience.

Rachel currently resides in North Carolina and is conducting therapy sessions via telehealth. This spring she will be relocating to New Mexico and is looking forward to engaging clients in the therapeutic process both online and in person.

Wayne Ross, LPCC

Hello! I am a husband, and father of two little ones.

I believe we live in a traumatizing world, resulting in pervasive disconnection, self-loathing, and loneliness. If you are experiencing some of this, you have come to the right place.

Ultimately, my goal is for you to feel seen and heard.

My expertise and gifts lie in guiding you toward acceptance and compassion with all parts of yourself. Using a trauma informed approach, including a strong focus on mindfulness, we will gently, yet fiercely explore the aspects of your thoughts and behaviors that no longer serve your vision of life. This Self-discovery will take some time, and is challenging, for sure, but we will also have some fun along the way. Best of all, this process presents you with the experience of feeling increasingly more safe within yourself and with the world, allowing you the freedom to make different choices. I look forward to getting to know you.

Ruth M Schofield, MFT – Co-owner

Ruth M Schofield is the co-founder of The Rio Rancho Family Counseling Center with her husband, Bart. After 25+ years of private practice in Connecticut, she and Bart moved to New Mexico where they reestablished themselves in Rio Rancho.

As co-owner, Ruth has now entered into the role of mentor, supervisor, and administrator. Additionally in this role Ruth acts as a resource, with over 40 years of experience regarding the work with family systems, trauma and especially Dissociative Identity Disorder. However, after adding several clinicians, Ruth has become more involved in the role of mentor, supervisor, and administrator. In this capacity she shares and advises newer clinicians on some of the hows and whys of therapy as she supports and encourages each clinician to evolve her/his own style. In this role Ruth acts as a resource regarding the work with trauma, especially those who have developed Dissociative Identity Disorders.