Areas of research
Identity, Immigration & Racism
SP2 Faculty exhibit the School’s understanding of how personal, cultural, and social factors impact important issues concerning inclusion, economic injustices, and policy within marginalized communities.
FEATURED FACULTY
Amy Hillier, MSW, PhD
Associate Professor; PhD, University of Pennsylvania, 1991. Youth gender identity; parents of transgender children; WEB Du Bois and The Philadelphia Negro; food access; outdoor advertising.
FEATURED FACULTY
Yoosun Park, MSW, PhD
Associate Professor; PhD, University of Washington. Critical history of social work; historical and contemporary immigration; discourse analysis; critical theories and methodologies for social work research and education.
FEATURED FACULTY
Joretha N. Bourjolly, MSW, PhD
Associate Professor and Associate Dean, Community Cultivation & Engagement; PhD, Bryn Mawr, 1996. Management of multicultural conflict; effects of chronic illness on individuals and family members; impact of racial and economic factors on the delivery of health care.
FEATURED FACULTY
Noor Toraif, PhD, MA
Assistant Professor; PhD, Boston University. The intersection of the child welfare and juvenile legal systems, crossover youth, criminal legal system, youth and emerging adult reentry, youth-engaged research.
FEATURED FACULTY
DeMarcus A. Jenkins, PhD
Assistant Professor; PhD, University of California, Los Angeles. Education policy, housing policy, criminal/juvenile justice, school safety & discipline, gentrification, anti-Black racism, Critical Race Theory, social movements.
FEATURED FACULTY
Alice Xu, PhD
Assistant Professor; PhD, Harvard University. Inequality and social policy, urban and distributive politics, environmental politics, quantitative and spatial methods, Latin America, Global South.
Related News
Faculty & Research
02/03
SP2 faculty among “World’s Top 2% Scientists”
Nine SP2 faculty are listed among the Stanford University-Elsevier World’s Top 2% Scientists for the past two years or on the basis of career-long data. The ranking is calculated with data representing academic citations and peer-reviewed journal publications.
Faculty & Research
06/21
DeMarcus Jenkins to explore links between housing policies and school integration and desegregation
SP2 Assistant Professor DeMarcus A. Jenkins will serve as co-principal investigator of a $442,340 grant from the American Institutes for Research Equity Initiative in the Behavioral Sciences for the project “Moving in Motown: Examining Promise of Integrated Neighborhoods and Schools Through Detroit’s Choice Neighborhood Initiative.”
Faculty & Research
08/04
Researchers: Social scientists must address ChatGPT’s ethical challenges before using it for research
A new paper by researchers at Penn’s School of Social Policy & Practice (SP2) and Penn’s Annenberg School for Communication offers recommendations to ensure the ethical use of artificial intelligence resources such as ChatGPT by social work scientists.