Faculty News

Professor Trina Shanks has been appointed board president of the Black Administrators, Researchers, and Scholars (BARS) group.  BARS was founded by the late Larry Davis, MSW '73 and  PhD '77, to aid in the development and advancement of Black social work scholars, researchers and administrators within the Social Work academic discipline.

Professors Andy Grogan-Kaylor and Shawna Lee’s research on the relationship between gender inequity and child abuse is featured in Michigan News. Garret Pace, PhD ‘22, and Kaitlin Paxton Ward, PhD ‘22 are also co-authors on the study, which found that gender inequality at the adult level perpetuates women’s economic insecurity that contributes to higher levels of child abuse.

“Ann Arbor and the university welcomed us with open arms, and we fell in love with this diverse, inclusive community.” Lecturer and ENGAGE: DETROIT Program Manager Ayesha Ghazi Edwin’s family history is chronicled in a story on U-M’s Center for South Asian Studies website. The story describes how the progressive values of their grandparents have shaped Ghazi Edwin, who is also an Ann Arbor Council member, and her sister, Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, who is Michigan’s Chief Medical Executive.

Assistant Professor Rebeccah Sokol is part of the inaugural cohort of six new faculty members hired for U-M Institute of Firearm Injury Prevention to advance knowledge and identify solutions to the ongoing national epidemic. Sokol focuses her research on youth exposure to adversity, and on firearm injury and violence prevention.

Andy Grogan-Kaylor’s team won a Breakthrough Award at the inaugural Psych Tank Funding Competition, hosted by the U-M’s Eisenberg Family Depression Center. The team came in second place, winning $75,000 for their project “Mental health care for ALL kids! What are we waiting for?”

Luke Shaefer explains in Vox how federal government support during the COVID-19 pandemic prompted child poverty to fall sharply. “It was, indeed, a triumph of policy.”

Professor Emerita Edith Lewis has been named the 2022 Alexis J. Walker Lifetime Achievement awardee. The award recognizes her decades of contributions to feminist scholarship, teaching and service and is sponsored by the Feminism and Family Science Section of the National Council on Family Relations (NCFR). Lewis will give a plenary address at the 2023 NCFR conference.

Professor Andrew Grogan-Kaylor’s review of 50 years of research on corporal punishment was cited in a Chicago Tribune article about the return of corporal punishment to a Missouri school district. The review was also cited in an editorial in the Washington Post.