Student Success
PhD Candidate Cliff Whetung Named Inaugural Grand Challenges Doctoral Awardee
PhD Candidate Cliff Whetung, whose research is focused on inequities in cognitive health among Indigenous older adults, is one of 13 social work doctoral students selected for the inaugural Grand Challenges for Social Work Doctoral Award cohort. The fellowship provides mentorship and a $3,000 stipend, sponsored by a grant from The New York Community Trust, to support research that better connects the recipients’ dissertation or capstone projects to the people and communities they are studying.
PhD Student Aaron Rodwin Explores Music-Based Interventions to Improve Young People’s Mental Health
In the wake of U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy’s advisory that highlighted the mental health crisis among the nation’s adolescents and young adults (A-YA), a systematic review lead authored by PhD student Aaron Rodwin found promising evidence that music-based intervention programs can improve engagement in treatment and mental health outcomes among A-YA.
PhD Student Brittney Singletary Awarded Inequality Fellowship
First year PhD Student Brittney Singletary has been selected by the New York City Reducing Inequality Network (NYC-RIN) as a member of its fifth cohort of Inequality Fellows. Her research emphasis is on understanding cultural influences on complex trauma and adverse experiences in African American youth, and how cultural influences impact mental health outcomes, with a supplemental focus on suicidal youth and intervention development. As an Inequality Fellow, Brittney has been awarded a $5,000 stipend to apply to her research and professional development.
PhD Student Moiyattu Banya Awarded NYU Urban Doctoral Fellowship
Second year PhD student Moiyattu Banya was selected as a fellow in the 2022-23 class of NYU’s Urban Doctoral Fellowship Program, a highly competitive fellowship that fosters collaboration and scholarly discourse among a diverse group of faculty and students engaged in urban research. Her research interests focus on the mental health of girls, young women and communities in African countries, as well as the mental health of refugee and immigrant African youth in the United States.
PhD Candidate Sabrina Cluesman Awarded NIH Predoctoral Research Training Grant
The National Institute on Drug Abuse awarded NYU Silver PhD Candidate Sabrina Cluesman a two-year, $76,378 Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award (F31) for her dissertation research. Her project will examine the impact of gender minority stress and gender affirmation on HIV preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) use by Black and Latinx transgender and gender-expansive (e.g. gender non-binary, non-conforming, genderqueer) youth and emerging adults ages 13-24 years.
PhD Candidate Cliff Whetung Awarded NIH Grant to Study Cognitive Inequities in Indigenous Older Adults
PhD candidate Cliff Whetung was awarded a two-year, $127,735 National Institute on Aging R36 Aging Research Dissertation Grant to Increase Diversity for his research on inequities in cognitive health among indigenous older adults. Cliff will test the Minority Stress and Cognition Model with Native American and Alaska Native older adults using restricted data from the University of Michigan Health and Retirement Study (HRS) from 2006 to 2018. He aims to shed light on the cognitive health profiles of these indigenous older adults and also to promote their equitable inclusion in future cognitive health research, policy, and interventions.
Two NYU Silver PhD Students Awarded ICPSR Summer Training Scholarships
NYU Silver PhD student Daniel Baslock and PhD candidate Sabrina Cluesman have been awarded highly competitive scholarships to attend the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research’s (ICPSR) 2022 Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research at the University of Michigan. The prestigious program, held over the course of eight weeks, offers a comprehensive curriculum of intensive courses in research design, statistics, data analysis, and social methodology.
PhD Student Yuanyuan Hu Awarded C.V. Starr Fund for A/P/A Research Grant
Third-year PhD Student Yuanyuan Hu was awarded a $500 grant from the C.V. Starr Fund for Asian/Pacific/American Research to support her dissertation research on improving mental health services use among older Chinese adults through a mixed-methods study exploring integration of behavioral health and social services.
Lynden Bond Awarded NIH Funded Pre-Doctoral Fellowship, Selected for Doctoral Student Policy Forum
PhD candidate Lynden Bond has been accepted into both the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) funded Behavioral Sciences Training in Drug Abuse Research (BST) pre-doctoral fellowship program and the inaugural cohort of the Social Work Doctoral Student Policy Forum, co-sponsored by the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE), the Society for Social Work and Research (SSWR), and Group for the Advancement of Doctoral Education in Social Work (GADE).
Dr. Yunyu Xiao, PhD ’20, Receives NYU Outstanding Dissertation Award
Dr. Yunyu Xiao, a 2020 graduate of NYU Silver’s PhD Program who is now an Assistant Professor at Indiana University School of Social Work, has received NYU’s 2021 Outstanding Dissertation Award in the Public Health and Allied Health category for “Social Network Influences on Trajectories of Suicidal Behaviors Among Adolescents Transitioning to Adulthood.” NYU Provost Katherine E. Fleming said Dr. Xiao’s dissertation “stood out from other nominees’ for its great scholarly rigor, quality of writing, and potential for academic and social impact.”
PhD Student Sabrina Cluesman and 2020 PhD Graduate Lauren Jessell Receive APHA Honors
NYU Silver’s PhD Program was well represented at the sectional awards ceremonies at the American Public Health Association (APHA) 2020 Annual Meeting and Expo. Second-year PhD student Sabrina Cluesman, MSW, LCSW, received the APHA HIV/AIDS Section’s David Rosenstein Award for Best Student Abstract and 2020 graduate Lauren Jessell, PhD, received the APHA Public Health Social Work Section’s Public Health Social Work Student Award.
Meghan Romanelli and Yunyu Xiao Secure Research One Faculty Positions
Congratulations to Class of 2020 PhD Program graduates Meghan Romanelli and Yunyu Xiao on receiving faculty appointments at nationally competitive research universities. Dr. Romanelli, whose research focuses on health and mental health disparities among LGBTQ communities, is now an Assistant Professor at the University of Washington School of Social Work. Dr. Xiao, whose research focuses on health disparities in suicide and mental illness across the lifespan, is an Assistant Professor at Indiana University School of Social Work. During their doctoral studies, both Dr. Romanelli and Dr. Xiao were Fellows at NYU Silver's McSilver Institute for Poverty and Research and were mentees of McSilver Institute Executive Director and Constance and Martin Silver Professor of Poverty Studies Michael A. Lindsey.
PhD Candidate Rachel Ludeke Awarded Social Networks and Health Workshop Fellowship
PhD candidate Rachel Ludeke was selected as a 2020-21 Fellow for the Social Networks and Health Workshop, coordinated by the Duke Network Analysis Center and the Duke Population Research Institute, with support from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. In addition to attending a week-long virtual workshop that will introduce attendees to topics in social networks and how they can be applied to research on health, Rachel will be paired with a mentor who will work with her over the next year to help strengthen the methodology of her dissertation research.
PhD Candidate Yeqing Yuan Awarded Social Work HEALS Doctoral Fellowship
PhD candidate Yeqing Yuan has been selected by the NASW Foundation Jane B. Aron/Social Work HEALS Doctoral Fellowship Awards Panel as a 2020-2021 Social Work HEALS Fellow. The fellowship will provide partial support for Yeqing’s dissertation research, a mixed methods study on housing stability among individuals with co-occurring mental health and substance use disorders receiving Assertive Community Treatment services.
PhD Candidate Yunyu Xiao Awarded Family Process Institute's New Writers Fellowship
PhD Candidate Yunyu Xiao was named one of ten 2019 New Writers Fellows by the Family Process Institute. The fellowship, which provided tuition and expenses for an intensive workshop on the craft of scholarly writing, supports the development of new scholars who will advance systemic theory, research, and practice grounded in a commitment to social justice.
PhD Student Cliff Whetung Awarded Association for Gerontology Education in Social Work Fellowship
First year PhD Student Cliff Whetung was chosen by the Association for Gerontology Education in Social Work (AGESW) for the ninth cohort of its Gerontological Social Work Pre-Dissertation Fellows Program.
PhD Students Yeqing Yuan and Laura Curran Awarded NIH Funded Pre-Doctoral Fellowships
PhD students Yeqing Yuan and Laura Curran have been awarded National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) funded pre-doctoral fellowships at the Behavioral Sciences Training in Drug Abuse Research (BST) program at NYU Rory Meyers College of Nursing.
PhD Student Rachel Ludeke Awarded Scholarships to Three Competitive Summer Training Programs
Third-year PhD student Rachel Ludeke has been awarded scholarships to attend three competitive training programs during summer 2019 which will further her dissertation research as well as her professional development as a child welfare scholar.
PhD Student Laura Esquivel Awarded New York Academy of Sciences Fellowship
NYU Silver third-year PhD student Laura Esquivel has been selected as a 2019 Science Alliance Leadership Training (SALT) Program Fellow by the New York Academy of Sciences (NYAS). Each year, the fellowship provides exceptional PhD students in STEM fields with preparation and training to assume leadership roles throughout their professional careers.