West Arapahoe News

Congratulations to the following faculty and staff members who received grants and awards in December 2022:

Ashley Brock-Baca, Robin Leake, Nancy Lucero, Brenda Lockwood and Amy He, faculty and staff at the Butler Institute for Families

• Grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
• Project abstract: Butler will create a Treatment and Service Adaptation Center to develop and implement a comprehensive approach to developing a diverse, skilled, well-supported and resilient Behavioral Health workforce. The goals of the project include supporting a diverse workforce by advancing equity and addressing race-based traumatic stress in the workplace and improving the knowledge and skills of the workforce to care for children and families impacted by trauma with a lens of equity.

Phillip Strain, faculty at Morgridge College of Education

• Grant from the University of North Carolina (subaward Department of Education)
• Project abstract: This project aims to increase state examples to support the use of the State Implementation Guide to demonstrate relevance and why states should use it.

Eric Chess, Kaipeng Wang, Jodi Catlow and Donny Gerke, faculty and staff at the Knoebel Institute for Healthy Aging

• Grant from SilverBills (subaward National Institutes of Health)
• Project abstract: Age is the greatest risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia (AD/ADRD), and an estimated 2.7 million LGBTQ+ Americans are older adults. LGBTQ+ individuals with cognitive impairment are disproportionately impacted by their illness because of their sexual/gender minority status. This project addresses the lack of financial management and legal support for older LGBTQ+ individuals with cognitive impairment, so SilverBills will develop and add features to its product that will help prevent fraud, encourage savings and provide support for legal matters including legal claim support and obtaining powers of attorney.

Meredith Silverstein and Kali Jefferson, staff at the Butler Institute for Families

• Grant from SummitStone Health Partners (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration)
• Project abstract: Butler will support SummitStone's SAMHSA-funded Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic Planning, Development, and Implementation Grant through collecting all funder-required data, conducting an ongoing performance assessment, conducting a community needs assessment, and more.

Christopher Reardon, faculty at Ritchie School of Engineering and Computer Science

• Grant from the Department of Army (subaward Army Research Office)
• Project abstract: In future multi-domain operations, Army Next-Generation Combat Vehicle (NGCV) units will be teamed with autonomous Robotic Combat Vehicles (RCVs). Outcomes of this research will provide RCVs with AI/ML techniques to intelligently perform reconnaissance activities in the face of peer adversaries in contested environments.

Rashida Banerjee, faculty at Morgridge College of Education

• Grant from Colorado Department of Human Services (subaward U.S. Department of Education)
• Project abstract: Led by the Colorado Department  of Early Childhood, Retention and Recruitment of Early Intervention Professionals in Colorado (Project RREIP-CO) addresses the critical need for retention of licensed and non-licensed early intervention personnel who use evidence-based practices in service delivery for positive child and family outcomes.

Daniel Brisson, faculty at the Graduate School of Social Work

• Grant from The Denver Foundation
• Project abstract: This study is a qualitative phenomenological study demonstrating the feasibility of implementing a tailored Trauma-Informed Design (TID) approach and its benefits on well-being and likelihood to keep people in permanent housing. TID is the creation of physical spaces that promote agency, create community, promote feelings of safety and support the human healing process while preventing further harm from past trauma. TID in permanent supportive housing is emerging as a potentially important mechanism to improve the health and well-being of people moving from homelessness into housing.

Tom Rowe, faculty at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies

• Grant from the Open Society Institute
• Project abstract: Support for the annual International Career Advancement Program conference.

Sunil Kumar, faculty at the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics

• Grant from the American Parkinson Disease Association
• Project abstract: Alpha-Synuclein (aS) is a neuronal protein expressed at high levels in dopaminergic neurons in the brain. The aggregation of aS is a pathological hallmark of Parkinson's disease (PD). Modulation of these pathological processes is a promising therapeutic intervention to slow or stop the progression of PD. The study of the specific targeting of aggregation-prone aS sequences using a novel synthetic protein mimetic approach and its effect on PD phenotypes will allow us to establish these aS sequences as novel therapeutic targets.

Meredith Silverstein, staff at the Butler Institute for Families

• Grant from SummitStone Health Partners
• Project abstract: Larimer County has a dedicated "Competency Court" in which people with serious/persistent mental illness (SPMI) who end up in jail are assessed for their ability to stand trial. The Butler Institute will conduct an evaluation of the SummitStone and Larimer County Jail collaborative project to help people with SPMI move out of jails and into treatment. Butler will also help document the model used.

Andrew Linshaw, faculty at College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics

• Grant from the National Science Foundation
• Project abstract: Quantum field theory has led to a unification of many seemingly disparate areas of mathematics during the last half century, including geometry, representation theory, algebra, combinatorics and number theory. The purpose of this conference is to bring together the most active researchers in these areas with the hope of strengthening ties, fostering communication and generating new ideas at the interface of physics and various areas of mathematics.

Original source can be found here.