JACSW Faculty Updates

Visiting Research Professor John Holton, Director of Strategic Initiatives at the Jane Addams Center for Social Policy and Research, has received a $250,000 contract with the Illinois Department on Aging. The project will evaluate IDoA’s existing approaches to identifying the special needs and problems of minority senior citizens, evaluate the adequacy and accessibility of existing programs and information for minority senior citizens, and develop a comprehensive outreach plan to address the anticipated changing demographics in Illinois’ older adult population.

Associate Professor Jennifer Geiger received a UIC Student Affairs Faculty Fellowship and grant to conduct research that addresses important questions concerning student affairs at UIC. Her project, Pathways from Community College to a 4-year University: Experiences of Students with a Foster Background, aims to increase our understanding of how youth with foster care experience make the transition from community college to a 4-year institution, and how programs and staff serve a role in supporting this transition.

Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra has received a 2-year $175,000 grant from the Joyce Foundation for her project Life After Death: A Survivor-Centered Examination of Homicide Investigations, which will examine challenges experienced in homicide investigations and opportunities to improve practice and outcome through the perspective of families of homicide victims, the communities they reside in, and violent crime investigators.

Assistant Professor Aaron Gottlieb has received a 3-year $300,000 grant from the Joyce Foundation for his project Public Safety Budgets, Community Investments, and Gun Violence in the Great Lakes Region, which will examine the extent to which the 50 largest counties in the Great Lakes Region allocate resources towards traditional forms of public safety rather than community investments, and how these allocation decisions impact gun violence.

PhD student Chlece Walker-Neal-Murray was selected to receive a fellowship through the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health Policy Research Scholars program. She was among only 40 scholars nationally to receive this honor. The program is for full-time doctoral students from nonclinical, research-focused disciplines who see policy as a key lever for change, and are committed to ensuring their research is aligned with the health needs of communities.

Leathers, S. J., Vande Voort, B. L., & Melka-Kaffer, C. (2021). Mental health services and psychotropic medications provided to children at risk for placement instability in foster care. Developmental Child Welfare, 3(3), 256–281. https://doi.org/10.1177/25161032211034255

McCoy, H. (2021). Book Review: Vanguard: How Black women broke barriers, won the vote, and insisted on equality for all, by M. S. Jones. Affilia. https://doi.org/10.1177/08861099211065112

Geiger, J. M. & Okpych, N. J. (2021). What Policies, Programs, and Individual Factors are Associated with Postsecondary Education Enrollment and Employment among Youth with Foster Care Histories? The Scholar-Practitioner: Oklahoma State University.

Johnson, A., Grumbach, G., & van de Water, M. (2022). Understanding Federal Law and State Regulations Relevant to School Social Work. In T. Cox, T. Fitgerald, & M. Alvarez (Eds.) The Art of Becoming Indispensable: What School Social Workers Need to Know in Their First Three Years of Practice (pp. 85-93). Oxford University Press.

Beeler-Stinn, S., Asher BlackDeer, A., & Patterson Silver Wolf, D. A. (2022). Substance Use Disorders: Overview, Special Populations, and Treatment Considerations. In L. Rapp-McCall, A. Roberts, & K. Corcoran (Eds.) Social Workers’ Desk Reference, 4th Edition. Oxford University Press.

Beeler-Stinn, S., Asher BlackDeer, A., & Patterson Silver Wolf, D. A. (2022). Reducing harmful alcohol use: Integrating a screening and brief interventions into routine social work practice. In L. Rapp-McCall, A. Roberts, & K. Corcoran (Eds.) Social Workers’ Desk Reference, 4th Edition. Oxford University Press.

Asher BlackDeer, A., Beeler-Stinn, S., Patterson Silver Wolf, D. A., & Van Schuyver, J. (2021). HBCUs Matter: A Review of Behavioral Health at Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Journal of Black Studies, 1-23. https://doi.org/10.1177/00219347211060540

Kohl, P. L., Krauss, M. J., King, C., Cheng, S.-Y., Fowler, P., Goodwin, D. N., Tillis, C. D., Sullivan, H., Sorg, A., & Mueller, N. B. (2022). The impact of responsible fatherhood programs on parenting, psychological well-being, and financial outcomes: A randomized controlled trial. Family Process, 00, 1-19. https://doi.org/10.1111/famp.12752

Diaz-Strong, D. X. (2021). “When did I stop being a child?” The subjective feeling of adulthood of Mexican and Central American 1.25 generation immigrants. Emerging Adulthood. https://doi.org/10.1177/2167696821992141

Owens, C. L., Johnson, A. H., & Thornton, A. (2021). Addressing Equity in Schools: Youth Participatory Action Research and Transformative Social and Emotional Learning during COVID-19. Children & Schools. https://doi.org/10.1093/cs/cdab029

The following JACSW faculty presented at the 26th Annual Conference of the Society for Social Work and Research in January:

• Associate Professor Otima Doyle was symposium organizer for Centering the Voices and Experiences of Black Fathers: Qualitative Explorations of the Contexts in Which Black Fathers Parent. As part of the symposium, she presented So Many Things You Can Get Trapped into: Structural, Family, and Individual Challenges Faced by African American Boys and Fathers.
• Assistant Professor Shih-Ying Cheng:
  • presented Patterns and Trends Among Intimate Partner Homicide Cases: An Analysis by Sex and Race/Ethnicity,
  • was co-author on Intersection of Intimate Partner Violence and Child Maltreatment: The Role of Poverty, and
  • was co-author on Delivering Cognitive Processing Therapy with Spanish-Speaking Survivors: Lessons Learned from Rape Crisis Counselors.
• Assistant Professor Walter Gomez:
  • presented Relational and Structural Factors Informing the Methamphetamine-Using Behaviors of Sexual Minority Men, and
  • was co-author on Developing an Implementation Facilitation Strategy for a Mental Health Screening and eHealth Positive Affect Intervention for People Living with HIV.

On December 6, 2021, Clinical Associate Professor Annette Johnson was a keynote presenter at the Kutztown University School of Social Work 6th Annual Clinical Updates Colloquium. The title of her presentation was Leveling the Playing Field: Empowering Youth Voices through the Lens of Race and Equity.

Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra participated in the panel discussion Building the Evidence Base, part of the December 8 symposium Advancing the Science and Practice of Street Outreach: Lessons Learned and The Future of Street Outreach in Illinois.

Assistant Professors Aaron Gottlieb and Michelle-Ann Rhoden Neita participated in the virtual town hall Looking Back/Moving Forward: Structural Violence and Health Equity in the COVID-19 Pandemic hosted by the Center for Health Research Chicago on December 3:

• Dr. Gottlieb presented The Effect of Police Contact on Hopelessness and Educational Outcomes of Urban Youth, and
• Dr. Rhoden Neita presented The Effects of Street Outreach on the Mental Health of African Americans at Risk of Violence.

On November 4, Associate Professor Jennifer Geiger, Assistant Professor Daysi Ximena Diaz-Strong, and JACSW alumna Carolina Cormack Orellana, MSW ’21 presented From Foster Care to College: Experiences of Immigrant-Origin Latinx Adults at the Society for the Study of Emerging Adulthood 10th Conference.

Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra conducted two presentations in November:

• On November 15, she presented to the National Press Club on her Joyce Foundation-funded project Life After Death: A Survivor-Centered Examination of Homicide Investigations and the importance of centering families and communities in efforts to improve homicide clearance rates in Chicago.
• At the Illinois Sentencing Policy Advisory Council Regular Meeting on November 19, she moderated the panel discussion Responding to Violent Crime: How Does Sentencing Fit In. The meeting featured opening remarks from Illinois Lt. Governor Juliana Stratton.

In October, as part of his Illinois Cannabis Regulation and Tax Act Evaluation (CRTA) Study, Professor James Swartz presented with doctoral student Lauren Cox the Cannabis Regulation and Tax Act 2021 Annual Report to the Illinois Adult Use Cannabis Health Advisory Committee, in Chicago, IL.

On October 22, Lecturer Chastity Owens and JACSW alumna Aubrey Thornton, MSW ’14 presented Meeting Them Where They Are: Engaging Youth through Technology at the 2021 National Association of Social Workers Multistate Virtual Conference.

On October 21, Assistant Professor Branden McLeod presented Examining How Social Policies and Systems Shape Black Men’s Well-being and Their Relationships with their Families to the Research Development Team for Maryland’s Office of the Public Defender. The team included social workers and assistant public defenders, and in his presentation Branden shared his own professional path and his research.

On October 18, Assistant Professor Daysi Ximena Diaz-Strong participated in the event Book Talk: Isabel Martinez, Becoming Transnational Youth Workers, discussing the experiences of unaccompanied Mexican teenage minors who emigrate to the Unites States.

On October 15, Assistant Professor Aaron Gottlieb participated in the panel discussion Police Reform in Troubling Times at the Northwestern University Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. The panelists explored what progress has been made in Chicago, issues that still need to be addressed, obstacles to police reform, and planning of police reform.

On October 14, Associate Professor Henrika McCoy, Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra, and JACSW alumnus Camille Quinn, PhD ’14 were panelists for The Cycle of Violence, Victimization, and Trauma: Exploring Mechanisms for Thriving and Healing for BIPOC People and Providers. They gave “lightning talk” style presentations on Black males’ experiences with trauma, Latinx providers’ vicarious trauma, and healing centered interventions with Black girls.

Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra was a presenter for the October 5 event Diversion as an Alternative to Incarceration, organized by the Joyce Foundation and the Smart Decarceration Project at the University of Chicago, convening prosecutors’ offices across the Great Lakes regions and researchers on prosecutor-led diversion programs.

On September 30, Assistant Professor Aaron Gottlieb presented Women and Incarceration: The Need for an Intersectional Lens in Criminal Legal Reform for the Harvard Kennedy School Women and Public Policy Research Seminar.

On September 23, Associate Professor Charles Hounmenou presented Private Investigators’ Knowledge of Human Trafficking and Ability to Identify Trafficking Victims at the University of Toledo’s 18th Annual International Human Trafficking & Social Justice Conference.

On September 22, Assistant Professors Kalen Flynn and Branden McLeod presented preliminary results of their study Child Support Arrears: Understanding the Scope, Magnitude, and Opportunities for Reform in Cook County to the National Institute of Minority Health and Disparities.

Dean Creasie Finney Hairston has been elected Vice President of the Board of the National Association for the Empowerment of the Formerly Incarcerated (NAEFI) and appointed to the Illinois Alliance for Reentry & Justice. NAEFI advocates and provides positive alternatives for formerly incarcerated persons through mentoring, legal support and recidivism prevention training.

Associate Professor Christopher Mitchell has been appointed to a three-year term as a Commissioner on the Council on Social Work Education Commission on Accreditation (COA). The COA confers accreditation status on schools of social work and baccalaureate social work programs and is responsible for both formulating accreditation standards and policies, and determining the criteria and process for evaluating these standards.

Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra has joined Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s new Gender-Based Violence Advisory Group which is tasked with building a whole-of-government approach to addressing and preventing gender-based violence and human trafficking.

Associate Professor Henrika McCoy co-authored Yes, Your University Perpetuates Racism Against BAME Academics: What Can You Do?, published by Times Higher Education. The article provides a checklist for identifying inequities against BAME academics, and actions that universities can take to promote equity.

Assistant Professor Daysi Ximena Diaz-Strong penned the essay My Journey to Academia as a Formerly Undocumented Scholar, published at the website My Undocumented Life.

Assistant Professors Aaron Gottlieb and Kalen Flynn were honored with Social Service Review’s 2022 Frank R. Breul Memorial Prize for their article The Legacy of Slavery and Mass Incarceration: Evidence from Felony Case Outcomes. The prize is awarded annually for what is judged to be the best article published in Social Service Review in the preceding year.

Adjunct faculty member Renee Garbe, PhD was honored by the Society for Social Work and Research with the 2022 Outstanding Social Work Doctoral Dissertation Award, Honorable Mention for her dissertation Trajectories of Intimate Partner Violence and Help-Seeking Among Older Adult Women in the Southwest United States: A Life Course Perspective.

On October 11, Joseph Strickland, PhD, Senior Researcher at the Jane Addams Center for Social Policy and Research, was honored by the Girls Like Me Project, Inc. as a Girls Like Me Authentic Ally for demonstrating true allyship that empowers the organization’s leadership and expands their vision through counsel, advocacy, and opportunity.

Associate Professor Henrika McCoy will serve as a Program Co-Chair for the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences (ACJS) Conference to be held March 19-23, 2024 in Chicago. The ACJS Vice-President will be Anthony Peguero, Arizona State University, and her fellow co-chairs are Bitna Kim, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and Patricia Campie, American Institutes of Research. The conference theme will be Represent: Pursuing Equitable Justice for Families, Schools, Communities, and Marginalized Populations.

Visiting Research Professor John Holton, Director of Strategic Initiatives at the Jane Addams Center for Social Policy and Research, provided consultation for a research project at Northeastern University (Boston) which will rigorously evaluate prevention approaches (i.e., programs, policies, or practices) for their impact on the primary prevention of child sexual abuse perpetrated by youth or adults. The three-year study is funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.

Assistant Professor Kathryn Bocanegra released an Executive Summary and a website with critical resources for street intervention workers and their experiences of trauma. The information is the result of her study Between a Bullet and Its Target. The website is www.streetsupport.org and the Executive Summary can be downloaded there.