Author: Janice Berriault

Kevin Ferreira van Leer featured on the ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? podcast

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Kevin Ferreira van LeerThe Using Our Voices to Transform Hispanic Serving Institutions project, of which Assistant Professor Kevin Ferreira van Leer is a Co-PI, was featured on the ¿Qué pasa, HSIs? podcast with Dr. Gina Garcia. The podcast episode is entitled Sac State Using Student Voices to Transform HSIs and is available to stream now and you can listen to it here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/74KCuJQ4jKnEfg5cI0qW32. The episode features the two faculty PIs and two student co-researchers. It provides an overview of the mixed methods, participatory action research project at California State University, Sacramento (Sac State) which explores Latine student perceptions of “servingness” at Sac State and aims to interrogate how university policies, programs, and practices support Latine student success.

Melissa Lovtiz (BA ’15), HDFS Alumni Spotlight, May 2024

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Melissa Lovitz (BA '15)- HDFS Alumni Spotlight May 2024Melissa Lovitz graduated in 2015 with a BA in HDFS and a minor in public policy. At UConn, she participated in the HDFS honors program, which was a highlight of her undergraduate experience. The major’s small cohort of honors students and the individualized attention from her thesis advisor, honors advisor, and teaching assistants were unforgettable. Her experience writing an undergraduate thesis was a catapult into a lifelong journey of studying and teaching about families and children. Her honors research focused on family engagement in education and used approaches inspired by community-based research that highlighted parents’ voices. Nearly 10 years later, she is still researching this topic!

After graduating from UConn, Melissa earned her master’s degree in urban education policy at Brown University. In addition to coursework, she interned with a parent advocacy group at a local charter school and helped teach parents the skills to testify at public hearings about school choice. She also worked on challenging traditional ideas about parent engagement. Relatedly, she published a paper on  urban parents’ school engagement. Melissa also gained valuable experience as a research and teaching assistant in Education. The research skills she gained at UConn made her a competitive applicant for these opportunities. She presented about family engagement in education at a national conference in collaboration with her undergraduate and graduate mentors. She also was able to use her HDFS background to bring a unique lens to understanding education policy; she was not satisfied with only averages and statistics, but wanted to be mindful of children and families as individuals. This challenge was what solidified her path in HDFS-related jobs and education moving forward.

After receiving her master’s degree, Melissa worked as a research study coordinator at the Brazelton Touchpoints Center. There, she learned from some of the best in the field – including Dr. Brazelton himself! – about supporting families and young children and the essential role of research in funding family and community programming and documenting child and family outcomes.

In 2018, Melissa joined the Tufts Child Study and Human Development Ph.D. program, where she worked with Dr. Ann Easterbrooks and Dr. Jayanthi Mistry to deepen her understanding of parenting and families. Her dissertation research focused on understanding the parent-teacher relationship in early childhood education. She used responses from teachers and parents to identify areas of convergence and divergence regarding their perceptions of that critical partnership. Her honors thesis advisor, Dr. Alaina Brenick, attended her dissertation defense, demonstrating the lasting relationships and advice she received from her UConn mentors. During her Ph.D. program, Melissa also developed a love for teaching. She moved from being a teaching assistant to a teaching fellow and finally to an adjunct professor at Boston College, strengthening her pedagogical skills and confirming her desire to pursue a career path in teaching in higher education.

In 2023, Melissa became a full-time HDFS faculty member at Queens College, where she can connect her passion for teaching and urban education with her vast knowledge and experience with HDFS. Melissa fondly remembers the compassion of her instructors and the relationships she built with faculty members at UConn – many of which are still strong today! She strives to be an approachable, caring, equity-minded educator and build authentic relationships with her students. Those relationships were so meaningful to her as an undergraduate, so she knows it’s important for her students, too!

Melissa lives in Queens, NY, with her two rabbits – Freyja and Oakley. She is a licensed foster care provider. She enjoys singing with her choir, attending Broadway shows, exploring green spaces around NYC, and finding unique coffee shops around the city. She is so proud of her time at UConn and grateful for all it inspired!

Abagail Horton, Graduate Student Spotlight, May 2024

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Abagail Horton, PHD 2024Abagail Horton joined the HDFS graduate program in 2019 and completed her Ph.D. in HDFS in Spring 2024. During graduate school she worked with Dr. Beth Russell. Her first line of research was to understand the processes through which emotion regulation, stress, and relationship quality influence mental health outcomes. For example, during the pandemic, she collaborated with Dr. Beth Russell, Dr. Rachel Tambling, and other graduate students to collect data from several hundred parents nation-wide during the first few weeks of the Covid-19 pandemic. This work was one of the first to examine families’ experiences during the pandemic and revealed that caregivers experienced heightened rates of depression, anxiety, and stress as a result of the pandemic. In 2023, Abagail collaborated with Dr. Crystal Park, Dr. Beth Russell, and a clinical psychology graduate student to collect descriptive data on college students’ engagement in stress management activities, perceptions of these activities, and mental health symptoms based on apparent gender-based perceived barriers to recruitment.

Her second line of research centered around answering the question, “What works for whom and when, where, and why?” when examining mindfulness-based or school-based interventions and applying science. During graduate school, she was a team member and project manager for the evaluation of Connecticut’s 21st Century afterschool program, a nationwide effort to reduce the race-based achievement gap in K-12 public schools. Through her work on this project, she gained many skills. For example, she worked with a large 10-year longitudinal dataset with more than 10,000 students and was granted leadership opportunities to mentor a team of junior doctoral students and undergraduate students.  She also worked with stakeholders to develop evaluation products that best fit their community needs as well as contributed to the pilot of new data collection on participating students’ social and emotional skills.

Abagail successfully defended her dissertation in March. Her mixed-methods dissertation brought a fresh lens to questions about mindfulness-based interventions. Specifically, she wrote a systematic review and proposed a mid-level theoretical model; conducted a qualitative study about early childhood educators’ stressors and perceptions of scaffolding children’s emotional development; and implemented and examined the acceptability, feasibility, and preliminary efficacy of an adapted group mindfulness-based intervention (PRISM) for early childhood educators.

In April, Abagail started a position as a Research and Evaluation Manager for the Institute for the Advancement of Community Health (IACH) at Furman University. She is looking forward to continuing working on applied research and evaluation of programs that support health and wellbeing. Outside of work, she can be found traveling, enjoying the sunshine, or spending time with her friends and family.