Dr. Rita Brusca-Vega who is an Associate Professor in the School of Education and an ISPR Faculty Associate has received an award through the United States Department of Education to support a Special Education: Intense Interventions training program.  Purdue University Calumet will offer a graduate level course of study to approximately 40 candidates leading to state licensure in Special Education: Intense Interventions.  Graduate of the program will serve students with autism spectrum disorders, severe emotional disorders, moderate and severe mental retardation, traumatic brain injury, multiple disabilities and other health impairments. Experts from Riley Child Development Center of the Indiana University School of Medicine, the PUC School of Nursing, and the PUC Institute for Social and Policy Research will collaborate in the training program to provide comprehensive interdisciplinary training.   The project is funded at approximately $750,000 and begins in the Fall of 2009.

Dr. David Nalbone, Associate Professor of Psychology and ISPR Faculty Associate received 1 of 2 summer research awards funded by the Purdue Research Foundation.  Chosen by a panel of his faculty peers,  Dr. Nalbone will use the support to continue development of his research program focusing on statistical literacy among health care providers.  

An ISPR poster presentation won honorable mention at the Annual Scientific Research Conference meeting of the United Kingdom’s Mental Health Research Network.  The conference was held at the University of Nottingham in Nottingham England between May 29-21, 2009.  The poster presentation titled “Mental Health, Substance Abuse, and Risk Behavior Disparities: Comparisons between Tribal Youth and other Race/Ethnic Groups in the United States” featured analysis of Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance Data comparing American Indian/Alaskan Native youth to youth from other race/ethnic groups.   The work is a collaborative effort between the National Indian Child Welfare Association, Prevent Child Abuse America, and the Institute.

In order to better support large internet web surveys,  ISPR has recently upgraded its survey web server.  With the support of CTIS staff,  the web survey software was migrated to the University’s “virtual” web server array.  This virtual server is comprised of multiple processing units designed to share processing. The new installation will provide more stable server operations for large scale data collection planned for the next 24 months.

ISPR staff presented study findings at the National Child Abuse and Neglect Conference in Atlanta Georgia on April 2, 2009.  Participating in a conference with Prevent Child Abuse America and the National Indian Child Welfare Association, the presentation focused on describing progress on the Tribal Youth Victimization and Delinquency study as well as data from the secondary analysis of YRBSS data. The conference venue provided an important opportunity to disseminate information about the project and to inform advocates about child abuse and neglect issues in Indian Country.