Bryan Victor
Associate Professor
Expert in child welfare, child maltreatment prevention and domestic violence
Bryan Victor
Biography
Bryan Victor, Ph.D. is an associate professor in the WSU School of Social Work. Previously, he served on the social work faculty at Indiana University, and as a postdoctoral fellow with the Child and Adolescent DataLab at the University of Michigan School of Social Work where he remains a faculty affiliate.
Victor’s current program of research centers on the child welfare system in the United States and has three focal areas: 1) system responses to children’s exposure to domestic violence; 2) reducing harm and social injustice associated with child welfare involvement; and 3) enhancing primary prevention capacity through cross-systems collaboration. He specializes in the use of data science methods and administrative records research to better understand system operations and drive data-informed decision-making in child welfare practice. His work has appeared in leading social work and child welfare journals including The British Journal of Social Work, Child Maltreatment, Journal of the Society for Social Work and Research, and Child Abuse & Neglect.
Victor practiced both clinical and macro social work in Detroit for a number of years in the areas of domestic violence, LGBTQ health, and HIV decriminalization.
Degrees and Certifications
- Ph.D., Social Work, Wayne State University
- MSW, University of Michigan - Ann Arbor
- B.A., Social Relations and Social Policy, Michigan State University
Teaching Interests
- Introduction to social work
- Social welfare policy
- Domestic violence
- Child maltreatment
- Violence prevention
Areas of Expertise
SUBSTANTIVE
- Domestic violence
- Child welfare
- Parental substance misuse
- Child maltreatment prevention
METHODS
- Program evaluation
- Data science methods (text mining, machine learning, etc.)
- Qualitative data mining
- Policy analysis
Grand Challenges Project
Strengthening Indiana Families
The Strengthening Indiana Families (SIF) project -- which Victor co-leads with Dr. E. Susana Mariscal -- focuses on the development and implementation of family resource centers as a primary prevention strategy for child maltreatment. This project is being carried out in collaboration with a number of community partners including the Indiana Department of Child Services, Indiana Department of Health, Commission on Improving the Status of Children in Indiana, Children's Bureau, Inc., Prevent Child Abuse Indiana, the Indiana Family and Social Services Administration, local municipalities, and families and youth with lived experience in the child welfare system. The project is funded by a five-year, $2.74 million award from the Children's Bureau in the U.S. Administration for Children & Families.