Joy Hammel’s research focuses on four major areas: participatory action research with disability communities to identify key environmental barriers and supports to community living and societal participation; designing and testing innovative community living, participation and environmental programming; evaluating the impact of policy and systems changes on civil rights; and building community capacity and empowerment.
Community Engagement, Independent Living and Participation SOPC
Remove barriers to support full and equitable participation in society
The Community Engagement, Independent Living and Societal Participation Scholarship of Practice Collaborative is focused on collaborating with individuals, groups, communities, organizations, and/or populations to support desired and meaningful occupational engagement, independent living, and community and social participation.
Using evidence-based strategies, our collaborative strives to remove barriers to support full and equitable participation in society. These strategies may include, but are not limited to, involvement in advocacy initiatives, instrument development and validation efforts, and a variety of intervention approaches such as self-management programming to support community living and participation, support during life transitions and strategizing environmental barriers to full societal participation.
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Strategizing equitable participation and social justice
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Addressing falls and fear of falling
Elizabeth Peterson‘s research focuses on falls and fear of falling: epidemiology, measurement and interventions for community-dwelling older adults and people living with multiple sclerosis. Her research also examines fall prevention practices among health care providers, fall prevention behaviors among service recipients, and strategies to evaluate interprofessional education efforts.
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Contributing to neurorehabilitation and fieldwork education
Kathy Preissner advances best practices for people with multiple sclerosis. She has developed and tested group-based interventions for fatigue and caregiving, creating resources to translate knowledge to practice. Her contributions to fieldwork education include a study to validate new items of the AOTA Fieldwork Performance Evaluation for occupational therapy and occupational therapy assistant students.
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Promoting occupational therapy’s role in mental health and supporting fieldwork education
Ryan Thomure focuses on the role of occupational therapy in community mental health settings. Specifically, he is interested in the role that occupational therapy can play in serving people affected by issues of homelessness and addiction as well as potential roles for occupational therapy in non-traditional settings such as social service agencies and federally qualified health centers. Ryan also has a strong interest in fieldwork education and the role that stress and anxiety can have on fieldwork performance.
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Supporting self-management of falls and fatigue for people with multiple sclerosis
Toni Van Denend‘s research focuses on the self-management of falls and fatigue for people living with multiple sclerosis. She is also interested in process evaluation efforts related to complex interventions, considering the implementation, mechanisms of change and contextual factors that support intervention delivery.
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Student members
Student members are central to the collaborative. They work with faculty to design and conduct innovative capstone projects that are responsive to the needs of community partners.
| Class of 2025 students | Class of 2026 students |
|---|---|
| Allison Antman | Abigail Ambler |
| Michele Burkholder | Meghan Cabrera |
| Arielle Buslovich | Angelina Castle |
| Hayley Cohen | Nancy Cuellar-Sanchez |
| Alicia Ethen | Kelly Dunphy |
| Deeva Evangelista | Aikaterina Garbis |
| Leah Lasher | Indre Mickevicius |
| Shemin Lee | Rachel Montoya |
| Kaitlyn Maas | Stephanie Orr |
| Amanda Montoney | Abigail Smith |
| Rachel Paul | Aileen Velasquez |
| Katelin Rogacki | |
| Leah Thoma | |
| Cassandra Pagliaruli |
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Questions?
Want to learn more about the Community Engagement, Independent Living & Participation SOPC? Curious how this collaborative fits in with your career and education goals?