Research Newsletter | Fall 2025

Research in the University of Kansas School of Social Welfare drives discoveries that transform lives, with projects creating solutions to complex problems in areas including health care access, child welfare, and behavioral health.

I am pleased to share our Fall 2025 Research Newsletter. This edition includes updates about funded projects, results from research studies, and spotlights on our faculty and research staff.

We invite you to contact us at kusswdo@ku.edu. Your feedback and collaboration are extremely important to us.

Take good care,

Michelle Mohr Carney, PhD, MSSA
Dean and Professor, KU School of Social Welfare

A University of Kansas training program that addresses mental health workforce shortages has received funding to continue through 2029.

The Integrated Health Scholars Program (IHSP) at the KU School of Social Welfare recently received a $2.4 million award through the Behavioral Health Workforce Education and Training Program, funded by the Health Resources & Services Administration.

IHSP partners with community agencies to train Master of Social Work students to provide integrated behavioral health services in rural, high-need Kansas communities. The program addresses critical gaps in care – in Kansas, 96 of 105 counties are in Health Professional Shortage Areas for Mental Health.

Researchers at KU have received a $3.75 million grant to implement a partnership designed to promote responsible fatherhood by fostering healthy relationships, engaged parenting practices and financial stability.

The partnership with Cornerstones of Care will help implement Family Opportunity, Resilience, Grit, Engagement (FORGE) in five counties in northeast Kansas.

“It’s all about building strong relationships for parents. The program will focus on parenting, communication skills and strengthening families, and will focus on fathers specifically, as there are not a lot of services available for dads, especially single fathers,” said Pegah Naemi Jimenez, associate researcher senior and principal investigator in KU’s School of Social Welfare.

Associate Professor Meredith Bagwell-Gray is working with faculty in the KU School of Business to combine research on implementing trauma-informed care in business organizations.

Bagwell-Gray is a 2025-2026 recipient of the KU Keeler Family Intra-University Professorship, promoting research collaborations across disciplines.

Researchers from the KU School of Social Welfare implemented an intervention for Kansas child welfare caseworkers that lowered secondary traumatic stress and boosted workforce resilience.

Assistant Professor Ricka Mammah focuses her research on Intimate Partner Violence (IPV), particularly its impact on immigrant and other historically underserved populations. Her work emphasizes evidence-informed, client-centered social work practice and policy. 

Assistant Professor Kathryn Berringer dedicates her research to exploring the relationships, paradoxes, and tensions inherent to the LGBTQ+ movement in the United States. Over the past eight years, Berringer has partnered with activists and practitioners at an LGBTQ+ youth center in Detroit.

Kortney Carr joined the School of Social Welfare as an associate professor of the practice in 2017 and takes on a new role this fall as an assistant professor. In October 2024, Carr successfully defended her dissertation and earned her Ph.D. in Social Work from KU.

Read more

Christopher Ward, a new associate professor of the practice and MSW program director, comes to KU from Winthrop University in Rock Hill, South Carolina, where he was graduate director in the Department of Social Work. Ward completed a Doctor of Social Work degree from the University of Alabama.

Read more

Michelle Ridley shared her first-hand experience as a teen mother of color, the struggles of pursuing education and the stigmas around teenage pregnancy during a "Brief and Brilliant" presentation at SSWR 2025. Ridley earned her Ph.D. from KU in May.

Video: Watch Ridley's "Brief and Brilliant" presentation

KU Social Welfare researchers presented their work on a behavioral health training program, social work teaching practice, and inclusion across disability during the CSWE 2025 Annual Program Meeting in Denver.

Photos: KU researchers presenting at CSWE 2025

More than 20 presentations during the Society for Social Work and Research (SSWR) 2026 Annual Conference will feature work by KU Social Welfare researchers. Presentation topics include child welfare, aging services and eco social work.

Schedule: KU research presentations at SSWR 2026

Looking Back to Move Forward: Social Work, Labor, and Economic Justice
Thursday, Jan.22, 2026
12-2 p.m.
Online
CEU: 2

Culturally Congruent Engagement and Assessment with Military Servicemembers and Their Families
Wednesday, Feb. 4, 2026
9 a.m. - 12 p.m.
Online
CEU: 3

Research Impact Talk: Combating Stigma, Honoring Strengths, Cultivating Resilience
Tuesday, March 10, 2026
12-1 p.m.
Online
CEU: 1

Real Self-Care and Ethical Social Work in this Political Moment
Tuesday, March 31
9 a.m. - 12 p.m.
Hybrid (Salina, KS, and online)
CEU: 3 ethics

Diagnosing and Treating Youth Anxiety
Tuesday, March 31
1:30-4:30 p.m.
Hybrid (Salina, KS, and online)
CEU: 3 clinical diagnosis/treatment

Green Hall
1535 West 15th Street
Lawrence, KS 66045
socwelweb@ku.edu
785-864-4720

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