Portland, OR. Portland State University (PSU) announced that Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger III, celebrated pilot and bestselling author of Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters, will be the keynote speaker for the 18th Annual Simon Benson Awards Dinner to be held on Thursday, November 9, 2017 at the Oregon Convention Center from 5:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. Named for one of Oregon’s first philanthropists, the Simon Benson Awards Dinner celebrates PSU alumni and philanthropists whose generosity and accomplishments have transformed the region. Since 1999, the gala has raised more than $10 million for PSU.
Sullenberger became internationally renowned on January 15, 2009 when he and his crew safely guided US Airways Flight 1549 to an emergency water landing in New York City’s Hudson River. The event inspired major motion picture Sully, directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Tom Hanks in the lead role as Sullenberger.
The 2017 Simon Benson Award for Alumni Achievement will be presented to Barre Stoll ’89, MSW ’92. A retired licensed clinical psychologist, Barre is a tireless community volunteer and has served on several boards in the region including St. Mary’s Home for Boys, Parents Anonymous of Oregon, Stand for Children and Waverly Children’s Home. Stoll currently serves on the PSU Foundation Board of Trustees as chair of the Philanthropy Committee.
Two Simon Benson Awards for Philanthropy will be presented this year, one of which will be given to honoree Dorothy Lemelson. Lemelson serves as chair of The Lemelson Foundation, continuing the direction she and her late husband, Jerome Lemelson, set to inspire future generations of inventors. The Lemelson Foundation has given over $2 million to various programs at Portland State University.
Philanthropy honoree Pete Nickerson is a global entrepreneur, former general manager of Nike in China and current chair of the PSU Board of Trustees. Nickerson has been a generous supporter and advocate for PSU for almost a decade.
The Simon Benson Awards Dinner is made possible by the generosity of its sponsors. Bank of America will be the presenting sponsor of the Simon Benson Awards Dinner for the sixth consecutive year. Bank of America’s substantial support of PSU’s signature event honors the spirit of giving and community involvement that defines Portland.
The Schlesinger Family Foundation, for the third consecutive year, will be the Keynote Speaker’s Reception Sponsor.
PSU Foundation Trustees Paul Schlesinger and Tom Fink ‘71 will serve as this year’s gala co-chairs, with PSU Trustee Peter W. Stott, H.D.’11 serving as honorary co-chair.
Money raised from the Simon Benson Awards Dinner benefit the Fund for PSU, providing support for promising and deserving students, exceptional faculty, and innovative programs at PSU, Oregon’s urban research university.
Portland, April 10th, 2013. The Portland State University Regional Research Institute for Human Services celebrated 40 years of collaboration with local, state and national partners. An Open House at the Institute was followed by a reception at the Native American Center, attended by 150 community partners, SW faculty. Partnership awards were presented to the Multnomah County Department of Human Services Child Welfare district, The Miracles Club, NAYA Youth and Family Center, and the National Indian Child Welfare Association.
RRI former staff members gather in the courtyard: Art Emlen, Diane Mikkelson, Joan Shireman, Bill Feyerherm, Heidi Herinckx, Herman Bryant, Dionne Preston, Tanya Ostrogorsky, Rosemary Ryan, Lyn Gordon, Kathy Seubert, Robert Bailey, Marilyn McManus.
RRI staff member Jen Williams helps young guest with food selection.
SSW Dean David Springer, with Laurie Powers (director) and PSU President Wim Wiewel.
Former director Art Emlen (3rd from left) with family members Elana Emlen, Andrew Emlen, and Bitsy Emlen.
SSW Associate Dean Vikki Vandiver, with Crystal Froembling, Katie Cagle.
Pathways Director Janet Walker (4th from left) with mental health team
RRI staff Danielle Droppers, with award recipients from The Miracles Club Herman Bryant and Dionne Preston.
RRI staff and event planners Jen Williams, Donna Fleming
RRI staff and event planners Jen Williams, Donna Fleming
Nancy Koroloff (former director), with former staff member Marilyn McManus.
Barbara Friesen, Andrew Emlen
About RRI
RRI is the research arm of the School of Social Work at PSU, with a 40 year history of conducting research dedicated to improving the design, management, practice and evaluation of human services and service delivery systems. RRI is the largest social and behavioral research institute on the PSU campus and is home to two large nationally funded Centers.
Community-engagedevaluation and capacity-building.
Historically, the heart of RRI’s work has focused on meeting the needs and addressing priorities of community partners through evaluation services. RRI faculty and staff help partners:
Develop and evaluate field-initiated demonstration projects in response to federal funding opportunities;
Conduct process studies of broad system-level initiatives; and
Undertake evaluations sponsored by state and local entities to understand and improve program effectiveness.
The work is always driven by partnership and collaboration, with RRI researchers helping to meet evaluation requirements that accompany grants and cooperative agreements, while also ensuring that local concerns are addressed. RRI faculty and staff work with partners on program design, facilitate the development of logic models, help identify intended outcomes, develop procedures to monitor fidelity, and create strategies to assess short- and long-term outcomes. Consumers, providers, and stakeholders play an important part in all these activities, and are critical to understanding, interpreting and disseminating results as well.
Investigator-initiated research
A growing portfolio of investigator-initiated studies, funded by the National Institutes for Health (NIH), the Institute foe Education Studies (IES), and other federal sources, focus on advancing knowledge. This portfolio currently includes seven randomized controlled trials (RCTs) testing the efficacy of interventions for youth and siblings in foster care, youth with disabilities, and services for transition-age youth. Research faculty at RRI are partnering on these studies with colleagues at PSU and other institutions around the country, utilizing interdisciplinary strengths and state-of-the art methods. In addition to RCTs, effectiveness research at RRI tests evidence-based practices (EBPs) in community settings, brings EBPs to scale in public systems, and adapts and tests culturally specific models.
Developmental or Systems Change Work: Making things happen.
RRI faculty and staff and their community partners frequently go beyond the boundaries of the traditional research roles to ‘translate’ learning into practice. This may involve development of new interventions in response to research findings, working with underserved populations to adapt or create practice based interventions, developing training programs, giving voice to consumers in advocacy leadership roles, providing consultation and technical assistance to programs and agencies, and convening partners and stakeholders at multiple levels across multiple systems to create or change public policy.
Size and Scope:
Annual external funding of more than $10 million supports research projects employing more than 100 faculty and staff, numerous doctoral, MSW and BSW students, as well as interns from other disciplines. At any given time, RRI is conducting as many as 65 projects in partnership with local organizations, county or state government entities, and/or partners all over the country. Projects may address outcomes anywhere from attendance at a single elementary school in a low-income community in the Portland metro area to HIV prevention in the Amazon.
Commitment to the educational mission of the School of Social Work and the university.
Research Services:
Research Services available at RRI encompass a broad range of activities related to the design, development, and implementation of qualitative, quantitive and mixed methods studies in collaboration with our community partners.
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