'Rising stars' focus research on underrepresented and low-income groups.
Five Johns Hopkins School of Nursing (JHSON) faculty members whose research focuses on underrepresented and lower-income groups will be able to grow their research after being named as the inaugural holders of the Baltimore-based university’s newly established Term Professorship for Rising Faculty (Rising Professorship).
The Rising Professorship is a three-year period of funding to support faculty members in research, collaboration, policy involvement, and leadership within nursing and beyond.
“This significant investment in faculty underscores our commitment to offering rising stars a place where they can both succeed in their careers and build the science, research, and networks needed to further nursing and improve health,” said Sarah Szanton, PhD, RN, FAAN, dean of the school of nursing.
The rising stars are:
Kamila Alexander, PhD, MSN/MPH, RN
Alexander examines such complex issues as intimate partner violence (IPV) that leads to sexual health outcome inequities in marginalized communities, HIV resilience, and societal gender expectations.
Alexander is inaugural chair of the Nursing Initiative of the Mid-Atlantic Center for AIDS Research (CFAR) Consortium, lead faculty for the Violence Working Group at the Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy, and chair of the HIV/STI Committee of the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine.
Kamila Alexander, PhD, MSN/MPH, RN
Alexander has been honored with the 2020 Johns Hopkins School of Nursing Dean’s Award for Outstanding Nurse Researcher, the 2020 Betty Irene Moore Fellowship for Nurse Leaders and Innovators, and the 2018 Johns Hopkins University Catalyst Award, Office of the Provost.
Long-term goals for her research are to “develop and implement new conceptual frameworks across national and international settings that prevent IPV and promote sexual well-being among women and their emotional partners,” according to Alexander.
Teresa Brockie, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN
Brockie seeks to achieve health equity through community-based prevention and intervention of suicide, trauma, and adverse childhood experiences among vulnerable populations.
Teresa Brockie, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN
Brockie, a member of the White Clay (A'aninin) Nation from Fort Belknap, Montana, is a leader of the Young Medicine Movement, which introduces Native youth to health science careers and provides mentorship by Indigenous researchers and clinicians to Fort Belknap scholars.
Her intervention called Little Holy One is rooted in understanding that high rates of historical and current trauma in Native communities compromise caregivers' mental health and parenting, which in turn affect early childhood behavior problems and adverse events that increase children's risk for suicide and substance use in adolescent and young adulthood.
In 2020, she received the Brilliant New Investigator Award, Council for the Advancement of Nursing Science-American Academy of Nursing and received the RADM Faye G. Abdellah Award for Nursing Research, The United States Public Health Service (USPHS) in 2016.
Yvonne Commodore-Mensah, PhD, MHS, RN, FAHA, FPCNA, FAAN
Commodore-Mensah is looking to reduce cardiovascular disease risk among Africans in the United States and in sub-Saharan Africa through community-engaged research and implementation.
She is a cardiovascular nurse epidemiologist and co-founder and president of the Ghanaian-Diaspora Nursing Alliance, a nonprofit organization that advances nursing education in Ghana. Her research expertise includes immigrant health, global health, cardiovascular disease epidemiology, and social determinants of health.
Yvonne Commodore-Mensah, PhD, MHS, RN, FAHA, FPCNA, FAAN
Commodore-Mensah is CEO of the African Research Academies for Women, a nonprofit seeking to address gender disparities in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in Africa. She also is principal investigator of the LINKED-BP and LINKED-HEARTS programs, two trials aimed to improve hypertension control and management of chronic conditions in community health centers.
Commodore-Mensah, who was named to the 2020 World Heart Federation Salim Yusuf Emerging Leaders Programme, is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing as well as the American Heart Association, Council on Cardiovascular Nursing.
Laura Samuel, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN
Samuel addresses socioeconomic disparities by advancing health equity for individuals and families with low incomes. Her current research examines the pathways that link low income and financial strain to physiologic aging.
This includes investigating the health impact of policies and programs related to economic well-being for low-income households. Samuel’s research also looks at aspects of neighborhood and household environments that may influence health disparities.
Laura Samuel, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN
Samuel also evaluates the health impact of programs and policies intended to improve economic well-being for low-income households and her research has shown that greater participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and higher benefit amounts are associated with improved health outcomes for low-income adults.
Her research interests stem from her clinical experience as a family nurse practitioner where she regularly witnessed the myriad of ways that a lack of financial resources can be detrimental to health.
Janiece Taylor, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN
Taylor identifies and addresses pain disparities with older women from underrepresented racial ethnic groups and helps individuals with disabilities increase social participation and independence.
Taylor, whose research is strongly connected to her 10 years of clinical practice in long-term care and women’s health settings, is principal investigator of a study that addresses unmet needs of caregivers aging with and into disabilities.
Janiece Taylor, PhD, MSN, RN, FAAN
She is co-associate director of JHSON’s RESILIENCE Center, designed to improve the health and function of people with disabilities and their caregivers by adapting and scaling two award winning evidence-based programs for children and older adults with disabilities—Chicago Parent Program and CAPABLE—and is principal faculty of the school of nursing’s Center for Equity in Aging.
Taylor was selected as the first nurse in the Robert Wood Johnson Harold Amos Fellowship Program and throughout her career, has received funding from the John A. Hartford Foundation, National Institute of Nursing Research, Mayday Foundation, and more.
“This significant investment in faculty underscores our commitment to offering rising stars a place where they can both succeed in their careers and build the science, research, and networks needed to further nursing and improve health.”
— Sarah Szanton, PhD, RN, FAAN, dean, Johns Hopkins School of Nursing
Carol Davis is the Nursing Editor at HealthLeaders, an HCPro brand.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
The Rising Professorship funds faculty members for three years in research, collaboration, policy involvement, and leadership.
The first five recipients are from the university’s School of Nursing.
Research projects in the inaugural class include societal gender expectations, advancing health equity for those with low incomes, and pain disparity.