Mary Christie Institute
  • About Us
    • Our Mission and History
    • Who We Are
      • Leadership
      • Presidents’ Council
      • Our Partners
      • Our Funders
      • Fellows Program
    • News
    • Contact Us
  • Focus Areas
    • Mental and Behavioral Health
    • Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
    • Sexual Assault and Title IX
    • Substance Use
    • Student Success
    • College Affordability
    • Basic Needs
    • Physical Health
  • Publications
    • Mary Christie Quarterly
    • The MCFeed
    • The Quadcast
    • MCI Research and Reports
  • Events
  • Support MCI

Home  /  Mary Christie Quarterly  /  Penn State’s Piazza Center Seeks Scholars for New Research Agenda

Substance Use, Sexual Assault and Title IX

Penn State’s Piazza Center Seeks Scholars for New Research Agenda

By: Marjorie MalpiedeMarjorie Malpiede
April 14, 2021
A fraternity house in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Photo: Daniel Vorndran CC-BY-SA (2016)

Penn State University launched the Piazza Center in January 2019, in an effort to become the nation’s principal home for identifying sound professional practice in fraternity and sorority advising. With a robust agenda that includes promising new research that identifies a “triad of risk,” (hazing, substance abuse, and sexual violence), the Center is seeking three-to-five scholars to be part of the research team.

The call for scholars reflects the momentum of the organization and its mission to empower higher education to make the fraternity and sorority experience safer and more meaningful based on comprehensive research. Since its launch, work has been underway in identifying gaps in research and setting an agenda for future efforts.  Experts Biddix (2016) as well as Sasso, Biddix, and Miranda (2020) have called for adding to fraternity and sorority research with a focus on key areas which include how the experience contributes to student development across intersectional identities, student learning, and university retention.

Additionally, promising research by the Center drawn from focus group data suggests that the most practitioner-pressing needs are: (1) hazing; (2) mental health; (3) inclusion/belonging; (4) sexual violence; (5) peer accountability; and (6) cocurricular learning. In response to these suggestions from fraternal movement partners, the Center is focusing on the triad of risk (hazing, substance abuse, and sexual violence) as well as issues of inclusion in conceptualizing its research agenda which is congruent with its founding mission and namesake.

The Center is beginning a scholars program to address these themes of research to build capacity and further the scholarship. This new research mentoring program will support a cohort of three-to-fve scholars to serve on research teams under the supervision of the principal investigators across a number of existing research projects. The emerging scholars will be supervised by an existing faculty member and will receive additional mentoring from the Center Faculty Research Fellow. For more information and to learn how to apply, please contact the Executive Director, Dr. Stevan Veldkamp, at sjv54@psu.edu, or Faculty Research Fellow, Dr. Pietro Sasso, at psasso@siue.edu for general inquiries. To apply, send your cover letter and CV to PiazzaCenter@psu.edu.

TRENDING

  • 1 Physician, Heal Thyself: The increasing levels of stress in medical school
  • 2 FRONTLINES: Interview with Jake Baggott
  • 3 Real World Anxiety: Young professionals report poor mental health/burnout
  • 4 With Elis for Rachael, Yale alumni use their power to influence mental health policy
  • 5 Kylie Unell’s Leap of Faith

Related Articles

Physical Health, Mental and Behavioral Health, Substance Use

WE Strong: UVM’s Wellness Environment Then and Now

The students on the Zoom platform take a deep breath in and then exhale with ear-piercing screams. They are doing the “WE Breath,” a unique way to let go of stress and anxiety practiced at the Wellness Environment from which they are graduating – remotely.  They are the fifth first…

MCQ. Issue 18
07/14/2020
Substance Use

Vaping on the Rise: How Colleges are Responding

Vaping, the use of electronic cigarettes to vaporize nicotine-laden liquid, has become widespread within American high schools, colleges, and universities. These institutions are faced with the challenge of deciding whether they should adopt vaping-friendly policies, as a means of encouraging smoking cessation and harm reduction, or if they should ban…

MCQ. Issue 18
07/14/2020
Opinion | Substance Use

Proms, Parties and the Power of Social Norms in Preventing Event-Specific Alcohol Use in High School

I recently met with a school district administrator about conducting a research project in one of the district’s high schools around alcohol use during high school prom, since this can be a high-risk event related to drinking, driving, and other behaviors for students. I knew that there was interest in…

MCQ. Issue 17
04/09/2020
Previous Article Next Article

Subscribe to the Mary Christie Quarterly and MCFeed

80 Hayden Avenue
Lexington, MA 02421

Email: info@marychristieinstitute.org

© 2023 Mary Christie Institute. All rights reserved.        Privacy Policy | Terms | CA Terms
×
×
×