Drs. William Kurtines and Wendy Silverman awarded $3 million to study cognitive behavioral therapy
Drs. Wendy Silverman and William Kurtines have been awarded $3,089,475 from the National Institutes for Mental Health (NIMH) for their grant Parent Mediation of Child Anxiety Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Outcome. They will conduct this work through The Child Anxiety and Phobia Program (CAPP) and the Youth Development Project (YDP). CAPP is a research program that operates under the auspices of the Child and Family Psychosocial Research Center and Department of Psychology, CAPP provides comprehensive diagnostic assessments and state-of-the-art treatments for children and adolescents. YDP has two main programs currently being implemented: the Longitudinal Lifecourse Change Project (LCP) and Changing Lives Program (CLP). CLP is a school-based counseling program that aims to empower troubled adolescents so they can be in control of their lives and take responsibility for changing their life course in positive directions. The LCP is an ongoing longitudinal study of quantitative and qualitative changes in the life course or life pathways of multi-problem adolescents in alternative school programs who do not receive psychosocial intervention.
Dr. Kurtines has won several grants that look at parent-child dyads and family processes. Professor Kurtines has been a visiting faculty member in the Department of Psychology at University of Texas at Austin, in the School of Education at Harvard University, a Visiting Scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Education and Human Development in Berlin, Germany, and a Visiting Professor at Kobe Shinwa Women's University, Kobe, Japan.
Dr. Silverman has several grants in the past received grants to design and evaluate psychosocial interventions for children with anxiety disorders in the past. In addition, she has published over 100 research articles and book chapters on childhood anxiety, including children’s reactions following exposure to natural disasters and crime and violence, and has coauthored four other books. However, Dr. Silverman's students are among her greatest priorities as she strives to provide positive mentorship models. For her work in this area, Dr. Silverman has won a NIH Award to mentor minority graduate students and the FIU Faculty Award for Excellence in Graduate Mentorship.
Dr. Dionne Stephens' online course selected for Blackboard Exemplary Award
Dr. Dionne Stephens received a Black Board Exemplary Course award for SOP 3742: Psychology of Women. Developed in collaboration with an FIU Online Learning E-Learning team- Yannick Thames and Felson Thomas Watson- Dr. Stephens' online course one of nine selected from over 500 international entries. This past July she was one of three award winners selected to showcase the course at the BbWorld ’08 in Las Vegas, the annual conference for Black Board International. Prior to this award, the class was already being used as a model for online course development both at FIU and other universities.
The Blackboard Greenhouse Exemplary Course Project (ECP) recognizes courses that model best practices in learning, course design, interaction and collaboration, assessment and evaluation, meaningful technology use, and learner support. Administered by scholars, reviewers of the submissions are chosen from colleges around the world, and an extensive rubric is used in the review precess.
Psychology of Women is offered jointly through the Department of Psychology and Women's Studies. Dr. Stephens teaches this course both online and in regular lecture sections. For both formats she feels it is important to use online tools: "We're in an era where text messaging, bluetooth and Myspace are the norm- technology is a natural part of most students' lives. Bringing it into the classroom can help make the course content real. Putting the computer application together for the Blackboard Award helped us take the course to the next level in terms of integrating technology and desired learning outcomes."
