Mini-Grants for Community-Engaged Student Research
The EPRC works to expand community engagement by supporting student-led research projects through a competitive mini-grants program. Eligible students are master’s or doctoral students at Emory with a thesis or dissertation research project conducted in collaboration with a community partner. The research focuses on chronic disease prevention, broadly defined to include social determinants of health.
2020-21 Student Mini-Grant Awards
Rebecca Nash, PhD student at Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health, Epidemiology Department
This project aims to identify specific counties or regions in Georgia where the NHB-NHW disparity in breast cancer-specific mortality is highest. By targeting community-based interventions in areas most affected by the racial disparity we can begin to narrow the breast cancer mortality gap. A secondary aim is to examine how area-level socioeconomic factors are spatially associated with the mortality disparity. Partners include Sisters by Choice, a Georgia-based organization that provides services for uninsured and underserved women, Georgia Center for Oncology Research and Education, and Komen Atlanta’s Worship in Pink initiative. Mini-grant funds will be used to support dissemination of study findings in Georgia.
Janelle Gore, an MPH Student at Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health, Department of Behavioral, Social Sciences and Health Education.
This qualitative study has two specific aims: 1) to understand how Black religious youth perceive the mental health culture within their faith communities, and 2) to explore the strengths and assets within Black religious youth’s faith communities to reduce mental health stigma. Faith Village Connections, a nurse-led collaborative whose mission is to bring research opportunities and provide health education, is the community partner for this study. Mini-grant funds will support recruitment and data collection.
2021-22 Student Mini-Grant Awards
Myrna del Mar González-Montalvo, MPH student at Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health, Department of Global Health
The project’s first aim is to understand sociodemographic and geographical factors that are associated with change in control of diabetes and hypertension as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic across HealthproMed clinics in Puerto Rico. The second aim is to use the standardized tool, Protocol for Responding to and Assessing Patient Assets, Risks, and Experiences (PRAPARE), to examine associations between control of diabetes and hypertension after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and social determinants of health. The project will help reduce the burden of social determinants of health and improve management of NCDs (noncommunicable diseases), particularly during adverse events such as a pandemic or natural disaster. Mini-grant funds will be used for dissemination of results to stakeholders in Puerto Rico and to support data analysis.
Emily “Em” Lemon, Doctoral Candidate at the Rollins School of Public Health in the Behavioral, Social, and Health Education Sciences Department
This mixed-methods study will 1) explore how connectedness and collective efficacy may link immigration policy climate and enforcement to depression and suicide ideation in Latinx adolescents in an SEM framework, 2) use youth participatory action research (YPAR) to explore youth perspectives and experiences of immigration policy enforcement and its relationship to adolescent depression and suicidal ideation, and 3) explore adolescent perceptions and experiences of connectedness and collective efficacy in the YPAR process, using qualitative in-depth interviews with YPAR participants. These formative, qualitative data will serve to inform future development of YPAR as a potential community-level intervention that integrates strategies to build on connectedness, collective efficacy, and additional emergent social cognitive factors as targeted mechanisms of change. This research is guided through the support of a community advisory board and is conducted in partnership with community-based organizations serving Latinx youth and community organizers advocating for undocumented communities.
Lauren Nisotel, an MPH Student at Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health in the Behavioral, Social, and Health Education Sciences Department.
This mixed methods research study has two aims: (1) to evaluate the degree to which the COVID-19 pandemic interrupted antiretroviral therapy (ART) adherence, and (2) to examine how individual, social, and structural syndemic conditions effect ART adherence. In collaboration with a local National HIV Prevention Consultant, Leisha McKinley-Beach, a community-based participatory research approach will be employed to support meaningful engagement with community partners and research participants. Mini-grant funds will support research activities, study staff salary, and honorarium.