OUR MISSION IS SIMPLE…

We work to promote positive youth development in schools through rigorous research, community partnerships, and outreach.

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YOUTH MENTORING

We are interested in supporting effective youth mentoring. We explore the ways that mentors and youth adjust what they do during the mentoring relationship in order to meet the goals of youth. To do this, we work with local and national mentoring organizations to explore effective mentoring practices. Learn more about specific projects below.

Adaptive mentoring

Using data collected from large studies of mentoring, we are exploring how mentors and youth shift goals and activities to adapt to the needs of youth participating in mentoring programs. Sample publications of this work are below:

  • Lyons, M.D. & McQuillin, S.D. (2019). Risks and Rewards of School-Based Mentoring Relationships: A Reanalysis of the Student Mentoring Program Evaluation. School Psychology. 34, 76-85. doi: 10.1037/spq0000265 

  • Lyons, M.D., McQuillin, S.D., & Henderson, L. (2019). Finding the Sweet Spot: Investigating the Effects of Relationship Closeness and Instrumental Activities in School-Based mentoring. American Journal of Community Psychology. 63, 88-98. doi: 10.1002/ajcp.12283

The Young women leaders program (ywlp)

YWLP is school-based mentoring program jointly run by the School of Education and Human Development along with the Maxine Platzer Women’s Center. YWLP matches college women with middle school girls for an academic year of mentoring focused on promoting the leadership skills in both groups. We are particularly interested in the ways that mentor training and support influences the formation of the mentoring relationship and how this impacts youth’s mental and academic outcomes.

Below are a sample of publications describe our research with YWLP in greater detail:

  • Williamson, S., Lawrence, E., Lyons, M.D., & Deutsch, N. (2020) What Mentees Bring: Relationship Characteristics Pre-mentoring and Mentoring Relationship Satisfaction. Journal of Early Adolescence. https://doi.org/10.1177/0272431619891251

  • Spiekermann, L., Lyons, M., & Lawrence, E. (2020). The Ups and Downs of Mentoring Relationship Formation: What to Expect. Children and Youth Services Review, 188. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.childyouth.2020.105413

 
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Virginia partnership for School mental health

National shortages of qualified school mental health providers (i.e., school psychologists, school counselors, school social workers, and school nurses) mean that fewer students have access to mental health supports. The Virginia Partnership for School Mental Health is funded by the US Department of Education in 2019 and is a collaboration with the Virginia Department of Education and UVa’s School of Education and Human Development. The partnership aims to increase the number of SMH professionals working in Virginia by pairing school divisions in need of additional school mental health providers with universities training future school mental health providers.

This project aims to:

  • Develop online training modules for current school mental health providers focused on common challenges facing schools. In collaboration with year one school division partners, the partnership has developed online modules related to 1) evidence-based mental health interventions; 2) supervising graduate student trainees; 3) interprofessional collaboration.

  • Increase the capacity of current school mental health professionals by using a case consultation, called Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes), in which university faculty partner with local practitioners to consult on problems related to providing school mental health services.

  • Increase the pipeline of SMH trainees working in high-need LEAs through incentives for field-placements and full-time employment in high-need LEAs.

Primary research questions relate to the acceptability and use of the web-based training modules as well as the “added value” of employing the ProjectECHO framework to traditional professional development training.