School of Social Work News

Charity Hoffman (PhD student) along with mentor Professor Mary Ruffolo received a grant from Rackham Graduate School to interview first-time mothers for her dissertation which focuses on the transition to motherhood. She is especially interested in how the U.S.'s lack of maternity leave policy impacts women and their families, and how the absence of formal policy may reproduce race and class inequalities.

Professor Larry Gant was cited in the Huffington Post article, “Let’s Talk About Prison Reform”.

Professor Lorraine Gutierrez was appointed by the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) Board as a member of the Commission on Research.

Clinical Assistant Professor Sue Ann Savas received a grant  from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to evaluate the Michigan State University, Center for Regional Food Systems (CRFS) which supports a quality food system in Michigan where vulnerable children and families have access to good food, where and farm and food system households can thrive.

She also received a grant from the Washtenaw County Sheriff's Office to implement a  project-level program evaluation for their Office of Community Engagement.

Associate Professor Andrew Grogan-Kaylor was profiled on the NLS at 50 website which commemorates 50 years of that National Longitudinal Surveys (NLS).

 Assistant Professor Reuben Miller received the Outstanding Mentor Award, awarded by the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program. This past year, he worked with Adrianna Ryba (LSA'18) and Kyle Finnegan (LSA'17) on the Detroit Reentry Study (prison reentry of inner city black men). 

Ann Nguyen successfully defended her dissertation entitled "Social Support Network Typologies and Mental Health among African Americans" and obtained her PhD in Social Work and Psychology. Dr. Nguyen has accepted a Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Edward R. Roybal Institute on Aging, University of Southern California, in Los Angeles.

Professor Emerita Kathleen Coulborn Faller presented “Protections for child witnesses” at the University of Pennsylvania’s One Child, Many Hands: Multidisciplinary Conference on Child Welfare with Frank Vandervort of the U-M Law School.