Trainee Projects and Activities

Ramona Beltran

obtained her MSW from Portland State University in 2005. She has over ten years of experience working with diverse youth and families in clinical and programmatic capacities. The majority of her work has centered around services to Latino and Native American communities. Ramona emphasizes the use of creativity and art in programming including film and photography. She worked with a group of young Latinas to produce a short film which has been in national film festivals and is currently used in collegiate and community curricula in Oregon. Most recently she has worked in the Department of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Oregon Health & Sciences University as a senior research assistant and protocol coordinator for a Spanish language clinical trial of Motivational Enhancement Therapy for treatment of drug and alcohol abuse through the National Institute on Drug Abuse Clinical Trials Network (NIDA-CTN). As a NIMH Prevention Trainee, Ramona plans to focus her doctoral studies on the role of spirituality in prevention and healing from co-occurring disorders and chronic health issues in indigenous communities.

Aileen Duldulao

is studying with David Takuchi and the resaerch team of The National Latino and Asian American Study (NLAAS), which provides national data on mental illness and service use of Latinos and Asian Americans. The NLAAS is one of the most comprehensive studies of Latinos and Asian Americans ever conducted using up-to-date scientific strategies in the design, sampling procedures, psychiatric assessments, and analytic techniques. The NLAAS interviewed 2,554 Latinos (Puerto Ricans, Mexican Americans, Cubans and Other Latinos) and 2,095 Asian American respondents (Chinese, Vietnamese, Filipinos, and Other Asians) across the United States in 2002. Data analyses will provide important baseline information about Latinos and Asians that will be critical when assessing whether there are diminished mental health disparities by 2010 (Health People 2010). Aileen has worked on conducting data analysis of levels of suicidality among the Asian American cohort and composed a literature review of suicide prevention models and suicidality among Asian American populations.

Carl Maas

completed a combined MSW/MHA at the University of South Carolina, and worked as Director of Research, Assessment, and Evaluation with Prevent Child Abuse South Carolina before coming to the University of Washington. As a NIMH Prevention Trainee, Carl is studying prevention via the cycle of violence within families through the effect of emotional abuse factors found in both spousal abuse and child abuse and neglect. Carl currently is training at the Social Development Research Group (SDRG) with the Raising Healthy Families project under a variety of researchers including Charlie Fleming, Tracy Harachi, Jim Mazza, Kevin Haggarty, and Richard Catalano.

Nancy Lynn Palmanteer Holder

is currently training with a project entitled “REACH 2010, A Racial and Ethnic Approach to Community Health” in Seattle, with King County Public Health as the administrative and fiscal agent. Funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, this project is guided by a Coalition of community partners that provide direct services to and represent the three targeted racial/ethnic groups: African Americans, Latino Americans, and Asian and Pacific Islander Americans. The trainee is assisting her mentor, Dr. Noel Chrisman, one of the community-campus evaluation team working on the Coalition process evaluation and the project outcome evaluation. The REACH intervention is an educational approach for the secondary prevention of diabetes for the three large groups encompassing a number of cultures and eight different languages. Nancy is working on a literature review on coalition development, coalition empowerment and strategies for project sustainability. This will be followed by supervised qualitative research with Coalition members to determine the dynamics supporting or reducing sustainability. The trainee has actively participated in Coalition, committee, and individual staff meetings. This unique cross-cultural project will allow the trainee to transfer a theoretical framework, qualitative research skills, and newly gained personal experience to design a Cultural-CBPR Mental Health Promotion Project for an American Indian/Alaska Native Community.

Patricia Russell

joined the PhD Program after completing her MSW at the University of Tennessee at Knoxville in 2006. During an internship at the Rape and Sexual Abuse Center in Nashville she formed her passion for working with and understanding the needs of children, men, women, and groups recovering from sexual abuse or assault. She also worked on community awareness and education, including the Clothesline Project, which is an outreach program in local Knoxville schools. Patricia’s research interests focus on the experience of violence, in particular sexual abuse and assault, and psychological functioning and recovery. She is working with Dr. Paula Nurius on a project that examines lifetime exposure to violence and developmental trajectories related to other resilience and risk factors.

Alma M.O. Trinidad

brings an array of work in community organizing and research in mental health and education among diverse communities. She earned her MSW from the University of Michigan in 1999 with a concentration in community organization and social policy, and her BSW from the University of Hawai’i, Manoa, in 1998. Alma's research interests involve the examination of positionalities, mental health promotion, and community factors (e.g., collective efficacy, social cohesion, sense of community, place making) among Asian Pacific Islander (API) adolescents and emerging adults. More specifically, her dissertation hopes to examine how critical pedagogy serves as a venue for empowerment, collective consciousness, and community contribution as well as health and mental health promotion. Other research interests include community youth organizing and development that promote community assets, social justice, and enhance positive well-being for impoverished minority communities, and culturally responsible research and evaluation methods. Alma was a former CSWE Fellow.

 

Past Trainees

Rupaleem Bhuyan

Assistant Professor of Social Work, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas. Interests: Violence against women, immigration policy, gender and migration, globalization, and participatory action research.

Dissertation Title

Disciplining Through the Promise of "Freedom": The Production of the Battered Immigrant Woman in Public Policy and Domestic Violence Advocacy (2006).

Erin Casey

Assistant Professor, University of Washington, Tacoma. Interests: sexual violence prevention with a focus on examining multi-layered prevention efforts across individuals, families and communities and exploring the role of social networks in violence prevention.

Dissertation Title

Sexual Assault Perpetration among Adolescent and Adult Males: Ecological Approaches to Conceptualizing the Etiology and Prevention of Rape (2006).

Yoonsun Choi

was the second of the trainees to join the University of Chicago as an Assistant Professor in the School of Social Service Administration after she graduated from the program in June of 2001. She received an NIMH grant to fund her dissertation research "Risk and protective factors of problem behaviors among ethnic minority youth". In addition to her dissertation, Yoonsun worked with Tracy Harachi on research projects, such as examining the cross-cultural equivalence of family measurements across Vietnamese and Cambodians. Yoonsun's areas of interest include ethnic minority youth development (ethnic identity and the prevention of problem behaviors); issues related to immigrant/refugee children & families; research methods and statistics; preventive intervention in social work practice; and culturally competent social work practice. During her final year in the program, Yoonsun served as a Research Analyst. at the Social Development Research Group where her duties involved conducting multivariate analysis of study data, summarizing results, and writing manuscripts for journal publication.

Dissertation Title

Risk and Protective Factors of Problem Behaviors among Ethnic Minority Adolescents (2001)

Dana Ezell

joined the program in fall 2001 after working as an adjunct instructor at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, where she completed her MSW in 1995. She also worked in agencies counseling adolescent girls with depression and working with HIV prevention programs for teens. Dana is working at the Children's Health Awareness Project with Betsy Wells as her mentor. As a team member with a the project, Dana is looking at neighborhood and school contexts as well as interpersonal and intrapersonal factors that affect sexual behavior in adolescents. Dana's area of interest in these factors include the role parental monitoring and family structure play in adolescents engaging in high-risk sexual behaviors.

Karen Fieland

entered the University of Washington School of Social Work doctoral program in the fall of 2003. She has an M.S.W. with an emphasis in Multi-Ethnic Practice (University of Washington, 2002) and an M.S. in Psychology (Indiana State University, 1989). She has over 20 years of experience in the prevention, intervention, and treatment fields providing substance abuse, mental health, and medical social work services. Karen completed the Multidisciplinary Graduate Certificate Program in HIV & STIs in June 2006. She has been an NIMH Prevention Research Trainee (9/2003-9/2005; 5 T32 MH020010), and currently is an NIMH NRSA Research Fellow (9/2005-9/2008; 1 F31 MH076663-01). Karen works with Dr. Karina Walters and colleagues at the Indigenous Wellness Research Institute on a national seven-site study: the Honor Project, A Health Survey of Two-Spirited Native Americans and its supplement, Trauma, Coping, and Health Outcomes Among HIV+ Native Americans (P.I. Karina Walters, 5 R01 MH 65871-02). Karen's dissertation study, Spirituality and Health among Native Americans living with HIV, is funded by an NIMH NRSA (F-31) grant. The purpose of this study is to: explore the barriers and facilitators to HIV service utilization, understand the role of spirituality in living with HIV, develop culturally-specific spirituality measures and examine the association of spirituality with depression and quality of life among HIV+ Native Americans.

Darrel Higa

joined the program in fall 2000 and is training with Diane Morrison on two projects: the Focus on Youth and Health Habits. Focus on Youth is a study designed to replicate a successful teen HIV/AIDS prevention intervention. The initial test of this culturally tailored intervention was with African-American youth in public housing projects in Baltimore. Our replication aims to determine whether this intervention can be successfully retailored and made relevant and useful to a rather different African-American community in the Northwest as well as to Asian-American teens and to immigrant youth from Asian and African countries. Darrel enters this project as it is moving from the formative stage to the field, and he will be involved in all aspects of the project, including designing the curriculum, training facilitators, data collection, and project planning. The other project, Health Habits, is at the other end of its project "life;" data for the Health Habits project has all been collected and is now being analyzed. Heath Habits is a study designed to address questions related to the effect of alcohol and substance use on risky sex by examining event-level data. For 8 weeks, respondents reported daily on a range of risky and health-related behaviors, including alcohol/substance use and sexual activity. Primary analyses of these data focus on determining whether respondents are more likely to engage in risky sexual activities when they are high than when they are not. Darrel's role is to collaborate in analyses of gay men's risk taking with the use of data from extensive baseline questionnaires as well as daily event data.

Stella Gran-O'Donnell

entered the program in Fall 2003 after working for Public Health – Seattle & King County. While at Public Health, Stella worked as a researcher/evaluator on several community-based participatory research projects sponsored by Seattle Partners for Healthy Communities, the local Urban Research Center. She earned a dual masters in Social Work and Public Health from the University of Washington. Her background includes serving as research project director, program planner/evaluator, and technical assistance provider for several initiatives addressing the social, behavioral and health/mental health needs for refugee and immigrant youth and their families. Currently, Stella is part of team conducting a process and outcome evaluation of The New Schools Initiative. The project is a public-private venture funded by Sloan’s New School Foundation and co-sponsored with Seattle Public Schools. The evaluation team is based out of the University of Washington’s School of Public Health and Community Medicine, Maternal and Child Health Unit. The project involves establishing a school community of committed individuals that focus on the whole child. The following outcomes are being explored: student learning, school affiliation from the student, parent, staff, and community perspectives, and well-being. The latter is part of the development of a unique Wellness Program based within the school that provides prevention and early intervention services to address students’ (and families, where appropriate) basic, social, emotional, and spiritual needs. Additionally, efforts to support exceptional students in their growth and development are also part of the Wellness Program. A subcomponent of the evaluation is to assess the implementation and outcomes of the Wellness Program. Process and outcome evaluation measures are being used to assess student’s overall well-being. The rationale for the project is to support and restructure public education and social policies in order to produce the next generation of successful and productive community members. This is especially significant for economically and socially disadvantaged communities. The premise is that educational reform will be leveraged based upon the success of a thoughtfully designed, holistic academic program funded by private donors resulting in academic achievement, long-term success, and well-being of these children.

Linda Ishem

continues to research existing models and theoretical frameworks for neighborhood revitalization and the creation of healthy (physically and mentally) African American, urban communities. Resident mobilization, economic stimulation, job creation, and strategic partnerships with universities are among the specific strategies Linda is exploring. Other interests include examining the relationship between researchers and the neighborhoods and communities under study, as well as the academy's responsibility to ensure mutually beneficial relationships with "subject" communities.

Lovie Jackson

became an NIMH Trainee in 2003. Her mental health research mentor is Dr. Peter Pecora, Research Director at Casey Family Programs and UW SSW Child Welfare faculty. Her current project is the Casey Field Office Mental Health Study investigating mental health, spirituality and ethnic and sexual identity in youth in foster care. Lovie plans to focus her future academic and clinical outcomes research career on child and adolescent health, mental health, and trauma with a focus on African American communities and multi-generational family patterns in biopsychosocial outcomes.

Hye-kyung Stella Kang

Assistant Professor, Fordham University Graduate School of Social Services. Interests: Transnational migration and identity, Immigrant and refugee mental health, Community mobilization and organizing, Domestic and sexual violence.

Dissertation Title

Immigrant Cultural Citizenship: Construction of a Multi-ethnic Asian Pacific American Community (2006).

Tom Keller

is the Duncan and Cindy Campbell Professor for Children, Youth, and Families, Portland State University, Portland, OR. His research interests focus on the social, emotional, and behavioral development of children with special attention to the influence of attachment relationships with parents as well as non-parental adults. Other interests include community-based interventions for the prevention of child mental health problems and the analysis of developmental change using innovative statistical methods for longitudinal data.

Dissertation Title

Investigating the Development of Early Childhood Problem Behaviors: A Person-Oriented Analysis of Attachment in the Context of Multiple Risks (2000).

Rebecca Macy

is an Assistant Professor in the School of Social Work, University of North Carolina. Rebecca's interest include: social cognitive processes and their influence on coping with and responding to personal threats; illumination of the mechanisms by which experiences of trauma and violence influence physical and mental health outcomes; risk and protective factors in the development of empirically-based prevention interventions; advanced statistical methods including structural equation modeling, hierarchical liner modeling, and mixture modeling.

Dissertation Title

Coping with Repeated Sexual Aggression: Profiles of Risk, Protection, and Resilience (2002).

Meghan McCarthy

received her MSW from the University of Michigan in 1999 and entered the NIMH Prevention Trainee program in the autumn of 2005. She has worked in the field of early childhood development in several capacities including home-based clinician, teacher, mental health consultant, researcher and policy consultant. She is committed to policies and practices that promote social and emotional well-being in children, families, and communities across the life span. Her traineeship will focus on attachment in context.

Deborah Nahom

has completed her PhD training in prevention science in the area of health promotion and disease prevention, particularly drug addiction, with adolescents and adults. She is an expert in the assessment of clinical intervention processes. She is currently living in Glasgow, Scotland, and serves as a consultant in these substantive areas to academic and services institutions in the United Kingdom. She is currently working with the Criminal Justice Division in the South Lanarkshire Council Area.

Dissertation Title

The Process of Change in Helping Relationships (2003).

Quynh-Tram Huu Nguyen

is continuing her work with the Vietnamese American, community where she has followed her passion for empowering and advocating for women and children. She served as the Co-Chair of a non-profit organization named Vietnamese American Human Services Association (VAHSA). Its mission is to empower the Vietnamese professionals in human services as well as to concentrate on the prevention of mental health problems and on community development for the Vietnamese community. Quynh-Tram's research focus is on investigating spirituality and religiosity in relation to trans-cultural mental health. Her research is exploring current models for human consciousness and self-concept within various paradigms for mental health; the cultural construction of mental health, illness, diagnosis, and treatment; and cultural and spiritual competence beyond the biomedical/psychological model.

A. Tyler Perry

brings a background in languages and creative writing to his work in the social sciences and in social justice. In 2000, he completed training as a Coro Fellow in Public Affairs, San Francisco. And, in 2001, he graduated from the University of Washington with an MSW. Since, Tyler has centered his professional work in the field of HIV/AIDS, most recently as a licensed social worker at the Madison Clinic, Harborview Medical Center, providing intensive case management in English and Spanish for persons living with HIV, AIDS, mental illness, chemical addiction, and hepatitis. In the first three years of the doctoral program, he worked as an NIMH Prevention Research Trainee, participating on the HONOR Project, a study of Two-Spirit Native American/Alaska Native wellness [NIMH 1 RO1 MH65871-01, see www.iwri.org]. Currently, Tyler is an NIH Multidisciplinary Pre-Doctoral Clinical Research Trainee [T32 RR023256, see http://nihroadmap.nih.gov], mentored by Drs Karina Walters (Social Work) and Crispin Thurlow (Dept of Communication). Tyler’s primary areas of interest include queer studies, discourse/s, sexual health, and interpretive and emancipatory method/ologies. For dissertation work, Tyler will locate his efforts on the not oft-investigated functions of the mediatization of HIV/AIDS discourses in everyday life. This is to say, he is concerned with how what we ‘know’ to be ‘HIV’ and ‘AIDS’ are conceptualized, constructed, produced, and transmitted through mass mediated means and technologies, by professionals in the HIV/AIDS industry to targeted populations in strategized places and spaces of counter / public spheres. Consequently, he will conduct critical discourse and social semiotic analyses of textual and visual data that typify contemporary HIV prevention efforts, which at once mark as well as substantiate understandings of queer male population/s, HIV/AIDS, and a variety of their embodied forms. On one level, this work seeks to impact the stigmatized populations and places investigated; on another level, the real object of intervention is the everyday practices that constitute the professionalization of social / marketing efforts of prevention by the HIV/AIDS industry.

Scott Rutledge

is an Assistant Professor at the School of Social Work, Temple University. His primary research interests are HIV prevention intervention with individuals, families and communities, social determinants of health, and contextualizing sexuality.

Dissertation Title

Dissertation: Contextualizing Serostatus Disclosure by HIV Positive Gay Men to Their Sexual Partners (2002).

Janice Sabin

Research Scientist, University of Washington.

Dissertation Title

Health Care Provider Implicit and Explicit Racial Bias and Medical Care (2006).

Brian Smith

Research Scientist, Committee for Children, Seattle, WA

Dissertation Title

Dissertation: The Effects of Community Level Adoption of a Risk- and Protection-Focused Prevention Framework on School-Based Prevention Activities (2005).

Fredi Staerkel

is an Assistant Professor at the University of Wisconsin, Oshkosh. Interests: prevention science, especially as it relates to prevention of child maltreatment and promoting family well being.

Dissertation Title

Early Head Start: Home Visiting and Parenting Group Program Uptake - An Implementation Study (2002).

Greg Yamashiro

is continuing his research into the conceptualization of culture, its use in social work research and practice, mental health issues among cultural minority groups especially around gerontology and cross-generational issues, diffusion of community-based intervention and prevention programs and the use of temporality and spatiality in theoretical and research models.

| Back to top |