Author: Tessa Cugno

William T. Grant Foundation Funds Study on Child Welfare and Cash Assistance

Two UConn School of Social Work faculty, Meg Feely, Ph.D., and Ann Marie Garran, Ph.D., MSW, LCSW, have joined a national mission to investigate whether increasing economic support to low-income families can improve child maltreatment outcomes.

The project, Empower Parenting with Resources (EmPwR), received $350,000 in funding from the William T. Grant Foundation, and is the first large scale study in the U.S. to evaluate how families identified by the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services as at risk of child maltreatment respond to strengthened financial security. Researchers hope to ultimately determine if monthly cash gifts over the course of a year prevent future involvement with the Illinois child welfare system by randomly assigning 800 families who are receiving services through the Intact Family Services program to receive a monthly stipend. This is one of the first studies to test this type of intervention across varying geographies (urban to rural), tailor it for child welfare involved families, and explicitly address the role of systemic racism.

Feely and Garran, associate professors at the UConn School of Social Work, began working with EmPwR’s co-principal investigator, Will Schneider, MSW, Ph.D., several years ago.

“We’re looking to understand if and how families’ ability to provide safe and consistent care for their children changes when they have more resources. Additionally, we want to explore the mechanisms, or what types of changes influence improved care when families have more money,” Feely noted.

Child maltreatment, defined as abuse or neglect of a child under the age of 18, remains a substantial problem in the U.S. particularly among families who struggle with meeting their basic economic needs.  Feely also says that this program may have important implications for racial and ethnic equity. Compared to their respective presence in the general population, nationally and in Illinois there are a disproportionate number of BIPOC children and families relative to white children and families in the child welfare system.

“Part of our contention is that while individual biases, implicit and explicit, are relevant factors in disproportionality, economic oppression and in particular the impact of structural and systemic racism are the strongest drivers of the racial and ethnic disproportionality in child welfare. For case workers, really understanding the powerful role of systems and structures in shaping and constraining the choices of individuals is an important perspective in comprehending families’ behaviors and choices,” she said, explaining this is why she is thrilled with the anti-racist and anti-oppressive process lens Garran brings to this project.

“Ann Marie is someone I not only enjoy working with, but one of the best people in the country to do this work,” Feely noted.

Garran, who has been at UConn for 15 years, has lectured nationally and internationally on anti-racism, anti-oppression, and inequality. She is a published author on those topics and regularly leads trainings across the U.S. including one with this project, which will help case workers understand their socialization, how that creates implicit biases, and the ways that structural inequality and economic oppression unknowingly influence those biases, assumptions, and stereotypes.

“I was brought in on this project because of my expertise in anti-racism, but also to help understand the case worker’s mindset in terms of their work with the families,” she said.

Garran will work with both the families and case workers to understand their own values, belief systems, and biases that come into play, such as, “What will it mean to them to be a part of this study in terms of cash transfers for families? Are these families deserving of this money, why or why not?” She will also encourage them to move away from a stance of blaming individuals for their circumstances, instead considering the ways that structural oppression influences the options available to families and their decision-making processes.

Feely, Garran, and their research team will compare the outcomes of families who receive the subsidies with the families in a control group who do not. The goal: gain a better understanding of whether financial subsidies work for some families more than others in reducing neglect, particularly when it is led by a lack of resources; understand the amount of cash needed and timeframe and determine if the outcomes vary by race or ethnicity, family structure, or type of community (e.g. rural vs suburban). The researchers will also interview families to track if cash transfers improved risk factors for maltreatment such as parents’ mental health, child health, and parental cognitive load.

Read more about the EmPwR program.

Researchers Receive UConn Internal Funding Award to Study Refugee Community Sponsorship

During the Biden administration, the U.S. Departments of State and Health and Human Services launched a new initiative for community and private sponsorship of refugees. UConn School of Social Work faculty and doctoral students are among the first in the U.S. to conduct qualitative research on this new model.

Under this model, community members take the lead responsibility for resettling refugees in their local community. This support includes locating housing, assisting refugees in finding jobs, and facilitating access to schooling, healthcare, and social services.

Kathryn Libal, Ph.D., director of UConn’s Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute and social work and human rights professor, is the principal investigator of a qualitative study, “Refugees and Asylum Seekers’ Perspectives on Community Sponsorship Initiatives in the United States,” that received a 2024 UConn Internal Funding Award REP (Research Excellence Program) grant of approximately $25,000.

Libal leads a team of co-PIs including: associate professor and associate dean for academic affairs, Scott Harding, Ph.D., and social work professor S. Megan Berthold, Ph.D., LCSW, along with recent UConn SSW alumna, Madri Hall-Faul, Ph.D., assistant professor of social work at the University of Kentucky, and social work doctoral students Craig Mortley, Elnara Klicheva, and Yvonne Mbewe.

Libal’s interest in working with refugees began in 2007 when she and Harding initiated research to understand social work’s role in advocacy for Iraqi refugees who had been displaced after the U.S.-led war in Iraq. They partnered with Berthold to form a team with expertise in clinical and policy related issues on forced migration.  Berthold brings 40 years of experience in understanding and supporting the experiences of refugees adapting to life in a new world. She serves as the newly appointed Fulbright Canada Distinguished Research Chair in Public Affairs in North America: Society, Policy, Media, at Carleton University, a prestigious award that will allow her to expand the collaborative refugee research with Libal and Harding to Canada.

Throughout the course of their current project, the team has interviewed community sponsorship volunteers and medical, mental health, and immigration attorneys throughout the U.S. to learn about how they operate, where they excel, what challenges they face, and how community sponsorships could be strengthened. The next project phase entails interviewing refugees who have experienced the community sponsorship program in the U.S. and Canada where Berthold will conduct research with refugees, service providers, and community members.

Harding, whose research interests include forced migration and refugee resettlement, served for eight years on the Board of Integrated Refugee and Immigrant Services (IRIS). The nonprofit organization was an early innovator of community sponsorship and has helped thousands of refugees and displaced people start new lives in Connecticut as well as across the U.S.

“This project can ideally help us contribute to better preparation of social work students and allied practitioners to understand the challenges refugees themselves are experiencing and repoint them in terms of their transition to life in a new country,” Harding said. “We intend to use this information to better meet their needs, whether that’s their health needs, service needs, educational needs, whatever it might be. In that sense, the research will allow us to provide support in different ways to community sponsorship groups, and better promote their health and well-being.”

In the first phase of the project, the team focused on interviewing people in the U.S. who supported refugee resettlement, including community sponsorship group members. In the second phase, they will seek insights from refugees who experienced community sponsorship and gather their feedback on the program firsthand. The team has expanded the research to Canada due to Canada’s leadership in community and private sponsorship programs. They hope to apply insights from Canada’s model to inform research and advocacy on similar approaches that could be implemented in the U.S.

Berthold believes more trauma-informed care is needed that is accessible to refugees, which is another focus for the project.

“Refugees by definition have been persecuted. They have experienced one or more traumas on top of fleeing their homeland and often have been separated from family members. We are asking refugees for their insights regarding how appropriate the services they have received are given their culture and experiences of trauma,” Berthold said. “We are also exploring their experiences in trying to access health, mental healthcare, and social services.”

Libal, Berthold, and Harding are particularly interested in hearing refugees’ feedback about working with community service organizations.

“We seek to better understand how newcomers feel about teams of people working with them in their first year in the U.S. and Canada,” Libal said. “Imagine arriving in a new country and then having a large team of individuals volunteer their time to support your family. We want to know what is that like? How do refugees build and sustain relationships with volunteers? What are their perceptions of being welcomed into new communities by community sponsor volunteers? How do they grapple with the challenges of securing work, getting children into schools, learning a new language, and making connections with others in the community, while being supported by volunteers?”

As importantly, Libal added, interviewing refugees can lead to a better understanding of how community sponsorship may be strengthened in the future and how social work can play a more robust role in supporting this approach.

Innovations Institute Receives New U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration Grant

Innovations Institute has partnered with the Mental Health and Recovery Board of Union County, Ohio (MHRBUC) in a new U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration grant of just over $1 million to expand needed infrastructure, processes, and services to build strong early childhood mental health services.

The funds will help address an observed increase in mental health needs for children from birth to eight years old—consistent with nation-wide findings—and gaps in the continuum of care for the youngest residents of Union County. As the fastest growing county in Ohio, the needs of Union County families are rapidly changing. This underscores the need to be data driven in the approach to this work and to focus on continuous quality improvement (CQI) that ensures all families have access to services.

Margo Candelaria, Ph.D., research associate professor at UConn’s School of Social Work and co-director of the Parent, Infant, Early Childhood (PIEC) team at Innovations Institute will serve as the evaluation principal investigator for the project.  Accordingly, Innovations Institute will develop an evaluation plan with annual goals and specific measures, relying on established evaluation practices.  Evaluation approaches will include the use of survey tools to collect required client outcome data, progress measures and training impact; qualitative interviews to assess family and provider experiences; and network analyses to track partner growth.

Innovations Institute will also engage in collaborative data interpretation to inform progress using continuous quality improvement cycles, data dashboards and visualizations, and implementation science principles to ensure that the project decisions, changes, and adjustments are data driven. Researchers will examine who is served (e.g. race, ethnicity, geography), how and where families are served, and identify access and implementation barriers.  Kate Sweeney, assistant extension professor at UConn School of Social Work and co-director of the PIEC team at Innovations Institute will offer technical assistance and serve as a content expert. She will assist with implementation of infant and early childhood mental health evidence-based programs including the Pyramid Model, Circle of Security Parenting, and the Chicago Parenting Program.

Collectively, the Innovations PIEC team will work with MHRBUC to expand the array of infant and early childhood mental services, build the workforce capacity to work with Union County’s youngest children, and use evaluation practices to demonstrate positive outcomes and inform needed programmatic changes.

This Building Strong Foundations project builds on the work of MHRBUC and its partners to link child serving systems, behavioral health providers, and payers in support of expanded mental health services to Union County youth.

Samantha Lawrence Brings Children’s Behavioral Health Research Expertise to New Role

Samantha E. Lawrence, Ph.D., recently joined the UConn School of Social Work as an assistant research professor and research and evaluation lead. She also serves as co-principal investigator for the Connecticut Office of Early Childhood – UConn School of Social Work Partnership.

Lawrence earned her doctorate, M.A., and B.A. degrees from UConn. She brings extensive expertise related to mental and behavioral health disparities. She is passionate about promoting equitable access to high-quality, culturally, and developmentally responsive care and education.

Lawrence’s research examines social influences on children’s health, behavior, and well-being, particularly in school, childcare, and family contextsShe emphasizes the importance of understanding the environments that shape children's health.

“I believe that children's health and thriving are rooted in their environments, including those created by their families, schools, and communities,” she said.

Her current work includes evaluations of federal and state-funded early childhood initiatives, child services policies, and the early education system to ensure equitable access to high-quality resources for families. She also uses mixed methods research on experiences and health outcomes among LGBTQ+ youth.

Lawrence’s recently published study in LGBT Health received a Third Annual 2023 Rosalind Franklin Society (RFS) Award in Science recognizing outstanding peer-reviewed research by women and underrepresented minorities in STEM.

Reflecting on her work, Lawrence noted, “It's a privilege to be a part of the OEC-UConn Partnership where I can engage in research and evaluation activities related to vital contexts for healthy child development. Our work has direct implications for Connecticut's early childhood programs, policies, and practices, and it is so rewarding to work in partnership with an agency – the Connecticut Office of Early Childhood – that can actualize these evidence-based findings.”

Prior to joining the UConn School of Social Work, Lawrence was a research fellow at the University of Minnesota Medical School in the Department of Pediatrics, where she led quantitative and qualitative research efforts to identify disparities among youth. She focused on the intersections of sexual orientation, gender identity, and race/ethnicity in emotional distress, disordered eating, sexual and HIV-prevention behaviors, experiences of bias-based bullying, interpersonal protective factors.

Rachel Schwartz Begins Role Leading Online MSW

Rachel Schwartz, Ph.D., has spent the past 15 years of her career working with MSW students focusing on online education and student success.

She joins the UConn School of Social Work as the new director of the MSW program and associate professor in residence. Some of her most recently published work can be viewed here. Schwartz also serves as co-chair of the Technology and Social Work Practice track with the Council on Social Work Education.

“Most recently, I have completed research that focused on the experiences of online social work students who identify as women and hold multiple roles and responsibilities.  This research found that online education provided the opportunity for these students to complete their degree because of the flexibility and access that programs provided,” she said. “However, it also raised important considerations related to gender roles and expectations around gender, finding that as women took on the role of student, their other roles as caretaker (and all associated roles within the home), and employee did not diminish.  The research found that women had to negotiate and prioritize different roles and that meeting expectations (from themselves, family, society overall) particularly around their caregiving roles often created role conflict. The findings provide recommendations for how social work programs can support students, by considering intersectional critical feminist pedagogy and practices, and applying the community of inquiry framework.”

Schwartz has noticed particularly over the last few years a shift in the social work field to virtual, as many agencies pivoted to telehealth during the pandemic.

“Many students are doing a lot of their work online and in the field and practice. We’re recognizing more and more the importance for students to gain valuable skillsets with virtual education,” she noted.

Schwartz received her Ph.D. in higher education from the Rutgers University Graduate School of Education in October 2024.  Her most recent experiences with online education included the development and management of an online and blended MSW program. She has also worked closely with faculty teaching across the MSW curriculum to provide pedagogical support and expertise in teaching as well as developing courses. Schwartz’s scholarship regularly reaches a national audience on issues related to social work education including online education, student supports, practicum education, and technology.

“The online program I previously developed grew to support many students across the country, so it’s exciting to be here at UConn to offer expertise and providing access to students to quality online and in-person social work education.  I am glad to be part of a program that offers so many different options to meet the needs of students across the state of Connecticut,” she said.

Latest Early Childhood Contract with State Expands on Relationship

Combined Reports

A team from UConn’s School of Social Work says a new two-year, $4.3 million contract with the Connecticut Office of Early Childhood expands on a six-year relationship with the state agency to provide significantly more resources for the evaluation and development of critical programs benefitting the state’s youngest residents.

From assessing access to quality child care and current child care market rates to mapping resources in high poverty and low opportunity communities, the work of the OEC-UConn SSW Partnership team impacts programs, policies, and practices that affect children, families, and early childhood professionals around the state.

“Summer of 2023 was a perfect time for us to come on board and begin looking at the initiatives Connecticut put in place using federal American Rescue Plan funds,” says Carrie Gould-Kabler, co-principal investigator and program manager at Innovations Institute in the School of Social Work. “Now we can support the OEC to fine-tune how decisions are being made based on what the data says and, in some cases, refine those data collection processes to better meet their needs.

“We also want to ensure the data and findings are accessible not just to leadership but to programs and providers to say, ‘Here’s your data. What does this mean for you as a program and how could this help support the work that you’re doing,’” she adds.

The OEC-UConn SSW Partnership team expanded this year to include the  Parent, Infant, Early Childhood team at Innovations Institute to provide research and programming support in the areas of early childhood behavioral health and the statewide implementation of the Pyramid Model.

Kate Sweeney, co-principal investigator, Innovations assistant extension professor, and co-director of the Parent, Infant, Early Childhood team, says the Pyramid is a national model designed to support early child care and education providers by giving them the skills and competencies needed to bolster social and emotional development for children in their programs.

“We knew this before the pandemic, but even more so during and after COVID, this is a huge reason why providers throughout the educational array say they’re leaving the workforce,” Sweeney says. “They’re saying there are too many behavioral concerns in their classrooms, and they don’t have the skills, knowledge, or ability to manage. It’s detrimental to their own mental health and well-being and causing them to burn out.”

Part of the team’s work is looking at how to help.

“Birth to 5 is such a sensitive and critical developmental period,” says Samantha Lawrence ’17 (CLAS), ’19 MA, ’22 Ph.D., assistant research professor who serves as the Partnership’s research and evaluation lead and co-principal investigator. “It really sets the stage for a child’s developmental trajectory. It’s important that we lay a strong foundation for these children to support their healthy, successful, happy development within their unique contexts.”

As part of their research and evaluation work, the OEC-UConn SSW Partnership team has supported the state in its mission to advance equitable early childhood policies, funding, and programs; support early learning and development; and strengthen the critical role of all families, providers, educators, and communities throughout a child’s life.

Several of the team’s recent projects identified disparities in resource distribution and access for families and early childhood professionals, and highlighted important next steps for research, policy, and practice to address inequities.

“We want to make sure our youngest citizens are thriving and grow up to have the highest capacity they can have, and that includes working with their caregivers and child care providers,” Margo Candelaria, co-principal investigator, Innovations associate research professor, and co-director of the Parent, Infant, Early Childhood team, says. “We want everybody to have a good start in life and that means infusing the systems with supports, so they can be as successful as they can be.”

The UConn team also conducts additional work not funded directly by the Office of Early Childhood, including annual evaluations of an Infant and Early Childhood training for child care providers and three Even Start sites in Connecticut.

The latest contract, which began July 1, comes on the heels of a previous one-year contract that included a buildup of staffing and resources in preparation for this work. The School of Social Work and Office of Early Childhood began working together in 2018.

A multidisciplinary team of researchers, practitioners, and data analysts with backgrounds in social work, geography, developmental psychology, pediatrics, statistics, among other areas, staffs the OEC-UConn Partnership.

Team members include Samantha E. Lawrence, Ph.D., research and evaluation director, co-principal investigator; Carrie Gould-Kabler, MSW, co-principal investigator; Margo Candelaria, Ph.D., co-principal investigator; Kate Sweeney, MSW, co-principal investigator;  Veronica Hanna, Ph.D., research associate; Juliany Polar, MA, research manager; Bonnya Mukherjee, MSFRM, MSBIST, senior data analyst; Harini Buch, BS, research assistant/data analyst; Veronica Rosario, MS, 2Gen parent researcher; Jessica Goldstein, Ph.D., Elevate & ECE manager; Liz Hoey, MSW, 2 Gen special projects coordinator; Sabina Bhandari, BSc, Ph.D. candidate, geography graduate research assistant; Jane Lee, MSW, SSW graduate research assistant; Heather Hutchison, MA, research associate; Aaron Isiminger, MSc, senior research analyst; Liz Chambers, MEd, program manager; Elizabeth Celona, BA, research assistant; and Rachel Vannatta, Ph.D., research associate.

Hispanic and Latine Heritage Month

Photo of the outside of the School of Social Work building.

Dear UConn SSW Community,

National Hispanic and Latine Heritage Month, which runs from September 15 through October 15, offers us the opportunity to honor prolific and diverse cultures of Latine communities. At the UConn School of Social Work, we believe in spotlighting this important occasion and the benefits these communities bring to our School, nation, and world. We know our school is stronger for the inclusion of Latine peoples, cultures, and traditions.  Recognizing the history, innovation, and achievements of Latine communities aligns with our social work values and the School’s commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism. This commitment, affirmed in our strategic plan, calls on us to engage in meaningful dialogue and hold ourselves accountable to action toward social justice.

To meet the needs of Latine individuals, families, and communities, we have developed specialized programs that prepare social workers to work with the growing Spanish-speaking population in Connecticut. In 2022, with the support of a state grant, we launched Connecticut ¡Adelante!, a scholarship program for Master of Social Work students passionate about serving the mental health needs of Spanish-speaking youth and families. This groundbreaking program prepares bilingual students for careers addressing both children’s mental health and Spanish-speaking communities in our state, the fastest growing population in Connecticut. For our bachelor's students, we also offer the Child Welfare and Protection Track, which trains Spanish-speaking students to work with Latine families served by the state Department of Children and Families.

To celebrate this year’s National Latine Heritage Month, our school is working with the founder of J. Rene’s Coffee Roasters and Victus Coffee, José René Martínez, to host a special event: “Latino Identity, Coffee, and Conversation” on September 25 from 12:15pm-1:15pm in the School of Social Work Student Lounge. José’s coffee shop, which won the 2019 Small Business Association Connecticut Minority-Owned Business of the Year award, prides itself on fair trade. Martinez grew up in the South Bronx and attended UConn Law School. Still an attorney, today he also operates thriving coffee shop locations in Harford and West Hartford. Come hear his story about coffee’s unique ability to serve as a social bridge.

Please join us as we celebrate the richness of Latine heritage.

In Community,

Laura Curran
Dean and Professor
UConn School of Social Work

Spencer Award to Fund Professor’s Continued Study of Foster Care Youth in Higher Education

By Kimberly Phillips

Many young adults celebrate their 18th and 21st birthdays with presents and cake, but those in the foster care system might dread those milestones for the uncertainty they bring.

“One story that hits my heart is that of a young woman getting ready to turn 21 and age out of the foster care system in California,” says Nathanael Okpych, an associate professor in UConn’s School of Social Work. “She was getting close to finishing a two-year college degree, but her upcoming birthday meant that instead of focusing on classes and graduation, she was worrying about where to live and whether she’d have to have to drop of school.”

And hers is a so-called success story, Okpych says, because she navigated the college application process, classroom studies, homework loads, and advanced thinking without a familial support system to offer mental, emotional, and financial help.

If she failed, there was no place to fall.

“There are just so many barriers that prevent young people in foster care from reaching their dreams, especially those of getting into college and finishing college,” he says. “That’s where my research lies, trying to understand the factors that prevent them from graduating high school and getting into college and what we can do to help make that path smoother.”

Okpych, with colleague Jennifer M. Geiger from the Jane Addams College of Social Work at the University of Illinois Chicago, this summer received a Research Grant on Education from the Spencer Foundation for a new research study looking at data from 730 young adults in the California foster care system.

Those students were part of a past study that gathered information from them when they were 17, 19, 21, and 23 years old and sought permission to access even more data from the National Student Clearinghouse years into the future. This additional information will provide greater detail on things like which semesters they were enrolled in college and whether that yielded them a degree or certificate up to age 27.

“The purpose of this study is to determine the rates that young people in foster care go to college and earn a degree; are there disparities by race, gender, or sexual orientation; and what factors influenced their likelihood of finishing,” Okpych explains. “We’ll also look at aspects of their social support, education history, characteristics of the colleges they went to, how many were part-time versus full-time students.”

Another consideration of the study, he adds, is what financial support students received, including the federally funded, state-administered Education and Training Voucher, and whether receipt of the competitive funds influenced their educational path.

By next summer, Okpych says, he and Geiger will have presented their findings at conferences and written a handful of journal articles. But perhaps the most important outcome will be a short brief summarizing the study and its results that can be given to policymakers and others who can influence change.

“I don’t think students from the foster care system should have go to through Herculean efforts or have to be exceptionally bright or resilient to succeed,” he says. “What we need is to change systemic things to make their lives easier.”

He continues, “If that means offering housing during college breaks so they’re not homeless, let’s do it. If that means helping with daily living expenses, let’s do it. We need to change policies and help child welfare departments form a network of relationships for the young people in their care.”

Read more about Okpych’s work here.

Berthold Awarded Fulbright Canada Distinguished Research Chair Award for This Academic Year

UConn School of Social Work professor S. Megan Berthold has traveled around the world as far as Nepal to work with trauma survivors, but a yearlong academic Fulbright Canada Distinguished Research Chair Award at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario, will put her only about 400 miles to the north of Hartford.

While that’s closer than the 8,700 miles away when she was on the Thai-Cambodian border, working on the edge of a war zone, her research in Canada will be no less important.
Starting in September, Berthold will serve as the Fulbright Canada Distinguished Research Chair in Public Affairs in North America: Society, Policy, Media, at Carleton University, 2024-2025.

The prestigious award will allow her to expand on a project that began in 2017 with two social work colleagues from UConn.

“This will be a great opportunity to dig deep into my research,” Berthold says. “I also welcome the opportunity to work in a new environment. Early in my career, I worked in a few refugee camps. I enjoy working cross culturally and gaining a different perspective on the issues I care about.”

Her Fulbright is the next phase of a qualitative study that includes social work professor Kathryn Libal, director of UConn’s Gladstein Family Human Rights Institute, and associate professor Scott Harding, the School’s associate dean for academic affairs, along with several doctoral students.

Together, they’ve interviewed community sponsorship volunteers and health, mental health, and legal providers around the United States to learn about how they operate, where they excel, what challenges they face, and how community sponsorship could be strengthened.

“We originally conceived of this as a study that extends into Canada, because Canada is the global leader of these community sponsorship initiatives. Until now, we’ve had the capacity to do interviews only in the U.S.,” she says. “Fulbright Canada allows us to move our work into Canada.”

As a Fulbright Scholar, Berthold aims to determine best practices and strategies to overcome challenges faced by community sponsor groups in Canada that are supporting refugees as they resettle there. She says her work also seeks to identify whether there is effective trauma-informed coordination of care for sponsored refugees to meet their health and mental health needs and to explore in what ways the Canadian model might be applied in the U.S.

In 2015-16, she notes, many Canadians volunteered to help sponsor Syrian refugees during a time of intensive displacement from their country.

“There has been widespread support for refugees in Canada. The resettlement context in each country is unique. Canada has a very different health care system than the U.S., for example, so you can’t just replicate their exact model and expect it to work well in the U.S.,” Berthold says.

Part of her work over the next year also will include interviewing refugees who received services in Canada or were sponsored by a community group there; Libal and Harding will do the same in the U.S. That piece will add firsthand experience to their findings.

“I believe that there needs to be improvements to equip providers and volunteers with the skills to be more trauma-informed and more appropriately attend to the holistic health and social service needs of refugees and their families,” Berthold says. “Over the years, I’ve trained many professionals in that area, and I see there’s much room for improvement. That’s from my clinical experience, but I need to wait and see what our research says before drawing a conclusion.”

Berthold was a longtime mental health clinician and trauma specialist working with refugees and asylum seekers since the mid 1980s prior to joining UConn’s School of Social Work in 2011. From 1998 to 2011, she was a therapist, researcher, forensic psychosocial evaluator, and expert witness at the Program for Torture Victims in Los Angeles.

Her work has taken her to places including Nepal, Nicaragua, Thailand, and the Philippines, rural areas without running water and with cultures very different than her own.

“Those who study or are specialists in treating refugees and asylum seekers, including those who have experienced war trauma, torture, genocide, and other kinds of persecution, understand there really needs to be an in-depth and integrated approach to care. People deserve that and it’s their human right,” she says, adding, “They have a right to health. They have a right to have an adequate standard of living and to support themselves.”

She continues, “A lot of these people were fighting for democracy in their country, and they were persecuted as a result. Many of these refugees, albeit not all of them, were human rights defenders in their countries and that’s why they were targeted – because the powers that be in their country deemed them a threat.”

Read more about Berthold’s work.