University at Buffalo - The State University of New York

Published: February 8, 2007

By KEVIN FRYLING
Reporter Staff Writer

Although she traveled across the country to join the UB social work faculty this fall, Adjoa Robinson has not left behind the influential lessons she learned as a researcher and instructor at Portland State University.

New social work faculty member Adjoa Robinson says she sees herself fitting in well with the school’s "reputation in the community for serving the community."
PHOTO: NANCY J. PARISI

Her time spent on the West Coast with the families of children with serious emotional disturbance—not to mention other experiences, such as working with African-American families in St. Louis and as a case manager at a women's shelter in Washington, D.C.—taught her about the significant results that come from treating as partners those who receive social services and ensuring that their voices are heard in the creation of policies that affect them, says Robinson, assistant professor in the School of Social Work.

"My experiences at Portland State at the Regional Research Institute for Human Services (RRI) married my interest in research with making a difference in people's lives," she says, "which is the original reason I went into social work."

As a project manager and research assistant at RRI, Robinson says she took great satisfaction from the work she performed, using information collected from the families of children with serious emotional disturbance to improve national regulations in residential treatment facilities.

"We found kids or parents had to earn the right to see each other based on their behavior," she says, noting that "there were group consequences in which someone else could do something that broke the rules and everyone's privileges were taken away."

The practice was "a direct contradiction of the standard of individualized treatment," says Robinson, who not only managed the team that compiled the information submitted to the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Health Care Organizations, but also played a role in conference calls that encouraged national officials to implement changes as part of their standards review process at the time.

The subsequent elimination of restrictions on parent-child contact as a form of group punishment—an unfair but formerly common practice—impacted the lives of thousands of families.

"We really did make a difference," she says. "It is pretty rare for you to see policy change in such a short span of time."

The information that made the case for regulators, she notes, came from the actual families who were affected. In fact, Robinson points out, the families of children with serious emotional disturbance were active participants in research at RRI and often were consulted on the content of questionnaires, data interpretation and abstracts considered for conference presentation—all part of the culture of consumer participation that left such a deep impression on her.

Robinson also is interested in efforts that create a "positive ripple effect" and empower communities to help themselves, which means benefits persist after outside funds come to an end. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention sponsored a project she managed in Portland to overcome the failure of traditional efforts to affect health disparities in African-Americans by training beauty and barbershop operators to talk about nutrition, exercise and healthy lifestyle practices.

"People spend a lot of time interacting with their beauty and barbershop operators, so this information comes from a trusted person seen over an extended period of time," explains Robinson, noting the shops often act as an unofficial "hub" in urban communities.

Robinson trained operators in-house and consulted at their places of business—one of whom, she says, started carrying nutritious snacks to encourage customers to make healthier choices. She collected data from operators and helped them target their message to specific clients. "After that project's not funded any more," she says, "all of those operators still have that knowledge."

As she worked on these and other initiatives in Portland, Robinson earned a doctorate in social work in 2005 from Washington University in St. Louis. She received a bachelor's degree in psychology from the University of Maryland-College Park, and a master's degree in social work from Howard University in her hometown of Washington, D.C.

Robinson plans to put her experiences with families of children with serious emotional disturbance to use in Buffalo. One project under consideration is the creation of support services for parents of troubled students involved in the VISA (Vision Integrity Strategy Achievement) Center, which UB has established at Academy School @ 44, the new alternative school for the Buffalo public school district.

"The process of reducing strain and providing resources can have a positive impact on not just the parent, but on the child," she says. "As their strain goes down, caregivers view their child in a different light."

UB 2020 and the mission of the School of Social Work are "right in concert," adds Robinson, noting a strong commitment to local schools and neighborhoods is "right up my alley."

"I heard the school had a good reputation in the community for serving the community," she says. "I saw myself fitting in."

A resident of Buffalo since August, Robinson lives near Forest Lawn cemetery with her partner, Christy Castner, program coordinator at Gilda's Club Western New York, and their border collie-Australian shepherd mix, Ruby.

"I've seen some of the sights around town," notes Robinson, who's gone on a self-guided tour of the Underground Railroad stops in Buffalo and taken in local cultural events, such as the Elmwood Arts Festival, Shakespeare in the Park and "Gusto at the Gallery."

There was one sight she expected to see in December, however. "I wanted some snow for Christmas," she says. "A person comes to Buffalo expecting some snow."