Elizabeth Agius of the Center for Social Work Research, an expert in substance abuse prevention research and evaluation, presented Dec. 1 at Operation Rx: Community in Crisis- Macomb County's Response. Elizabeth provided an epidemiological report on drug use conditions in Macomb County.

Assistant Professor Angelique Day is a featured expert on WalletHub. Checkout Day's interview on foster care, supportive citizen's and caring cities: https://wallethub.com/edu/most-caring-cities/17814/#angelique-day

Laurel Hicks, a dual-title Ph.D. student in Social Work and Infant Mental Health, was recently featured in the e-newsletter of the Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health (MI-AIMH). She was profiled in "MI-AIMH Snapshot: Meet A MI-AIMH Member," which described her research on ways that interventions such as yoga and mindfulness meditation may reduce the impact of chronic stress on nervous system activation and help improve mental health and resilience in baby and parent.

Laurel (below) also presented a poster titled “Dispositional Mindfulness Moderates Quality of Parental Bonding and Depression in Urban Expectant Parents” at the International Symposium for Contemplative Studies in San Diego. 

On Dec. 7, the Transition to Independence Program’s Airika Buford (Communications & Outreach Coordinator/Campus Coach) and Jasmine Uqdah (TIP and Wayne State student) participated in a House and Senate Briefing on Foster Youth and Higher Education. The pair sat in on a panel discussion and provided a presentation to educate House and Senate members and their staff on best practices and barriers that exist for foster youth achieving higher education. See Senator Grassley's post on the presentation here: https://www.facebook.com/grassley/photos/a.10150437772385797.420695.106480645796/10154691438965797/?type=3