Department of Human and Organizational Development faculty and students played a key role in securing a Promise Neighborhood Planning Grant awarded to Nashville’s Martha O’Bryan Center. The grant is one of only 15 nationwide, including just three in the South. The Nashville Promise Neighborhood Initiative plans to provide effective cradle-to-career services for the 6,000+ school-age children and their families in the Stratford cluster located in East Nashville. Kimberly Bess, assistant professor of education and human development, Maury Nation, associate professor of human and organizational development, and students Krista Craven, Bernadette Doykos, Joanna Geller, Brendan O’Connor and Zoie Saunders were instrumental in obtaining the grant.
Meghan Burke, a doctoral student in special education, received the Anne Rudigier Award of the Association of University Centers on Disabilities. The award recognizes an outstanding trainee or student.
Steve Graham, Currey Ingram Professor of Special Education, took part in an international meeting of experts convened by UNESCO on the formative assessment of writing in the early grades in January.
Craig Anne Heflinger, professor of human and organizational development, served as an expert witness last November on the federal lawsuit John B. v. Emkes, a class-action lawsuit on behalf of the 750,000 children enrolled in TennCare brought by the Tennessee Justice Center. She was supported in developing her evaluation of the service system for TennCare children with emotional and behavioral problems by Community Research and Action graduate student Lindsay Satterwhite Mayberry.
Velma McBride Murry, Betts Professor of Education and Human Development, has been appointed by the Board for the Advancement of Psychology in the Public Interest to its committee on psychology and AIDS.
Ron Zimmer, associate professor of public policy and education, was named by Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam to a task force investigating a possible opportunity scholarship initiative in Tennessee.