The Impact of familial incarceration on youth outcomes; the promise of the university-community partnerships for health and wellbeing
Monday, April 24, 2023 at 3:00 p.m.
Location - The Orchard Conference Center or via ZOOM.
Please be sure to RSVP by Friday, April 14, 2023 at 5:00 p.m.
In-Person RSVP to the Event
Zoom RSVP to the Event
Research and Sponsored Programs, with support from the Jerome Richfield Memorial Fund, organizes each year an event that celebrates a CSUN faculty member engaged in high quality, high-impact research, where they are named as the Richfield Memorial Fellow. The Fellow presents a lecture at the Provost’s Colloquium Series, which is designed to highlight and celebrate the scholarly achievements of our faculty, and to provide an opportunity for socialization among faculty, administrators, students, and staff.
We are happy to announce that this year’s 2023 Jerome Richfield Memorial Fellow is Dr. Myriam Forster from the department of Health Sciences. Dr. Forster's work focuses on the role of early life course adversity in adolescent and young adult health outcomes. One significant adversity, familial incarceration, impacts millions of US children: predominantly youth of color and youth living in low-income communities. Dr. Forster’s lecture will discuss the impact of familial incarceration on youth and communities; summarize preliminary findings from the evaluation of a unique, arts-based socioemotional learning program tailored to meet the needs of youth whose families interact with the justice system; and highlight the promise of university-community partnerships for public health research and practice, and the training opportunities they provide. The Richfield Memorial Fellow celebrates a CSUN faculty member engaged in high-quality, high-impact research. Dr. Forster will present a lecture in the spring semester as part of the Provost Colloquium Series.
A reception to honor Dr. Forster is scheduled for Monday, April 24, 2023 at 3:00 p.m. located in The Orchard Conference Center. Attendees that will want to attend in person (Limited capacity), please register here. If you will attend via Zoom, please RSVP here. You will receive an email confirmation with Zoom details. Please be sure to RSVP by Friday, April 14, 2023 at 5:00 p.m.
Requests for accommodation services (e.g., sign language interpreters or transcribers) must be made at least five (5) business days in advance. Please contact Damian Velazquez (damian.velazquez@csun.edu) by March 29, 2023.
Adverse childhood experiences (ACE) (e.g., child sexual, verbal, physical abuse, parental divorce, substance use, intimate partner violence, incarceration, suicide, mental illness) affect two-thirds of the US adult population. One significant ACE, household incarceration (parent, sibling, extended relative), impacts millions of US children; predominantly youth of color and youth living in low-income communities. Youth whose families interact with the criminal justice system can experience upward of 3 ACE and the joint effects of household incarceration, correlated familial adversities, and structural disadvantage increase the risk for substances use, leaving school prematurely, behavioral problems, and interactions with the justice system themselves. Despite these trends, few prevention programs facilitate resilient functioning and prevent risky trajectories among youth affected by familial incarceration, and none have been evaluated. Qualitative (interviews describing the lived experience of youth and caregiver interviews) and quantitative data were gathered during the first year of an NIH funded project, “Supporting Student Health and Resilience (SHARE),” that evaluates a school-based program delivered in diverse urban and rural communities across four states for teens with incarcerated family members. This lecture will provide an overview of a) the impact of familial incarceration on socioemotional development, peer relationships, and school engagement among rural and urban youth; b) change and stability across domains of functioning (psychological, behavioral, and social) among youth participating in the program, youth whose families interact with the justice system but have no support programs, and general population students; and c), partnerships across schools and states and the training of student scholars. University-community partnerships are essential ingredients in the development and evaluation of programs designed to promote resilience among vulnerable youth. Health equity in the context of socioeconomic and racial disparities in adolescent development are key components of public health research and practice.
Previous Fellows
| Year | Name | Department | Presentation Title |
| 2022 | Denise Sandoval | Chicana and Chicano Studies | Low and Slow/Bajito y Suavecito |
| 2021 | Virginia W Huynh | Child & Adolescent Development | Family Approaches to Race and Inequality |
| 2020 | Helene Rougier | Anthropology | The Disappearance of Our Closest Relatives, The Neanderthals: Were We Involved? |
| 2019 | Allen Eugene Lipscomb | Social Work | I Know Why the Black Man Grieves |
| 2018 | Martin Pousson | English | Black Sheep Boy |
| 2017 | Peter Edmunds | Biology | Cooking Corals in Acid Water |
| 2016 | Kristen Walker | Marketing | Surrender Information Through the Looking Glass |
| 2015 | Erica Wohldmann | Psychology | Welcome to Your Plate: How Individual Choices Can Create a Better World One Bite at a Time |
