Current Students
Jarrad D. Hodge works in Lion's Story Lab under the advisement of Dr. Michael Cunningham. With a background in education, his research interests has focused on identifying facilitators of academic achievement for ethnic minority youth, with additional focus on Black adolescent males. Additional interests include exploration of parental involvement, peer socialization, self-perception, and racial-identity development as they relate to upward mobility, academic achievement, and optimal developmental outcomes for adolescent Black youth samples.
E-mail: jhodge2@tulane.edu
Raquel Gutierrez, M.S., is a graduate student in the School Psychology Program at Tulane University. She uses participatory culture-specific intervention models in consultation to develop and evaluate culturally responsive programs and interventions in schools. She has partnered with New Orleans charter schools to consult on the development and implementation of social-emotional learning programming, discipline protocols and behavior interventions as well as school-wide bus-riding behavior interventions. Currently, she is collaborating with teachers to co-construct a shared definition of teacher well-being with the goal of implementing effective and sustainable system-wide teacher well-being interventions. Raquel is a founding member of TU Alianza Graduate Student Association which provides Latino graduate students with support, mentorship, resources, and networking opportunities at Tulane and in the community.
E-mail: rgutierrez@tulane.edu
Monica Daniels works with Dr. Stacy Overstreet and Dr. Courtney Baker. She is interested in developing key practices that help trauma-informed supports and services become more sustainable in schools. In order to maintain sustainability, Monica intends to examine clinical intervention implementation and parental empowerment during the clinical process. Monica's background includes working with various public education systems on the implementation of trauma-informed strategies through coaching and mentoring.
E-mail: mdaniels1@tulane.edu
Mariana Quinn works with Dr. Cunningham. She is interested in examining stress and resilience amongst students of color, particularly female students. More specifically, she would like to study students' transition from middle school to high school in order to understand how to promote positive academic, social, and behavioral outcomes during this time. She is also interested in studying the effectiveness of school interventions and the ways that they can be created to foster optimal social, emotional, and psychological development.
E-mail: mquinn6@tulane.edu
Andrew Orapallo works with Dr. Courtney Baker. His research interests focus on increasing access to evidence-based interventions for young children at risk for poor outcomes, including communities of color, those living in poverty, and children with histories of early adversity and trauma. He is particularly interested in developing and evaluating sustainable early intervention programs with an emphasis on promoting the social-emotional development and academic success of children by integrating dissemination and implementation science, trauma-informed care, and community-engaged approaches to research.
E-mail: aorapallo@tulane.edu
Stephanie Oshrin works with Dr. Bonnie Nastasi. Her background is in secondary education and school leadership in the New Orleans area. She is interested in the implementation of school-based mental health programs and trauma-informed practices. She plans to examine how factors such as teacher turnover and school governance influence academic outcomes and resilience in children who have experienced trauma.
E-mail: soshrin@tulane.edu
Renee is interested in understanding how early adversity influences social-emotional development in preschool-aged children. She graduated from Tufts University in 2015, worked in education policy research for three years, and then obtained her Ed.M. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education before coming to Tulane. She is passionate about studying how interventions like Mom Power can buffer the negative effects of trauma exposure for young children and their caregivers.
E-mail: rlamoreau@tulane.edu
Hilary is interested in understanding how biological and social factors influence children’s responses to potentially traumatic events, and how parent-child interactions can promote resilience to these stressors. Before joining the Child and Family Lab, she graduated from Emmanuel College in 2015, taught English in Semarang, Indonesia, and worked on research improving school- and clinic-based counseling for children and adolescents in Boston, MA.
E-mail: hskov@tulane.edu
Joseph is interested in understanding and developing programs that address relationship between community and school violence. He graduated from Louisiana State University in 2012. He then received his M.A.T. from the University of New Orleans in 2015 and his Ed.M. in Public School Building Leadership from Teachers College. He worked in public education as a teacher and academic dean for seven years. He is passionate about kids, trauma intervention, and community-based research.
E-mail: jhuynh2@tulane.edu
Deborah graduated from Macalester College with Bachelor degrees in Psychology and Educational Studies. From Denver, CO, Deborah works in the Project DIRECT Lab and is advised by Dr. Courtney Baker. She has research and practice interests in the prevention and intervention of externalizing behavioral disorders. She also has a particular interest in teacher wellbeing and retention.
E-mail: dpickford@tulane.edu
Allison is interested in how children living in poverty navigate the social world, and how caregivers, teachers and peers influence their social-cognitive development. She is also passionate about family resiliency processes in the face of adversity, and empowerment through self-identity, social support and community cohesion.
E-mail: apequet@tulane.edu
Svetha Mohan works with Dr. Julie Markant and Dr. Sarah Gray. Her research interests center around the development of executive functions, specifically focusing on attention control, in young children growing up in high-stress environments and the effects this has on children's learning and socio-emotional development.
E-mail: smohan4@tulane.edu
Ines Elena Martin works with Dr. Jeff Lockman at the Infant & Toddler Development Project. During her Master´s degree at Eastern Kentucky University she did extensive research on bilingual children and executive functioning in elementary schools. At Tulane she will be focusing her time on studying cognitive development and learning during infancy and childhood. Her research focuses on children’s early literacy skills, such as number recognition and handwriting.
E-mail: ielenamartin@tulane.edu
Maggie Tikka, M.A., works with Dr. Bonnie Nastasi. She is interested in using participatory action research to collaborate and consult with children and other stakeholders in schools to develop and implement culturally-specific interventions and policies which meaningful include child voice to increase school connectedness among culturally and linguistically diverse students, and ultimately all students. Currently, she is collaborating with teachers and researchers world wide to co-construct a definition of teacher well-being during COVID-19 with the goal of developing and implementing teacher well-being initiatives informed by teachers themselves. Maggie has worked with children in K-12 public schools in Chicago, IL and Denver, CO as well as in Lyon, France and Nakhon Nayok, Thailand. She also enjoys skiing, climbing, cooking, and crocheting.
E-mail: mtikka@tulane.edu
Sanshawanna Jones works with Dr. Courtney Baker. She is interested in the effects of trauma on academic and behavioral outcomes in marginalized communities and schools. She hopes to implement behavioral and trauma-informed interventions in settings serving youth at risk for poor outcomes. In addition, she seeks to examine research to practice barriers interfering with the fidelity of evidence-based interventions. She is also interested in psychological assessments and interventions for neurodevelopmental disorders.
E-mail: sjones44@tulane.edu
