https://www.fcd-us.org/children-of-immigrant-series-ii-webinar-i/
A Closer Look: The Unique Needs and Promise of Children of Black Immigrants and Refugee Children
CLICK HERE TO VIEW THIS WEBINAR (90 minutes)
DESCRIPTION: Children within immigrant families are often targets of discrimination and further marginalization, particularly within the current political context. Within this vulnerable and resilient population, children of black
immigrants and children in refugee families constitute a growing segment of children in our society. Black children of immigrants--most with parents from Africa and the Caribbean--and refugee youth from Muslim backgrounds can experience significant
health and economic disparities as they grow. This webinar will focus on the educational, health, and mental health outcomes of these two populations of children and include a discussion of research and policy recommendations on how to best serve
and support them.
PRESENTERS
Tiffany L. Green, Ph.D. - Assistant Professor,
Department of Health Behavior and Policy, Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine
Kevin J.A. Thomas, Ph.D. - Associate Professor
of Sociology, Demography, and African Studies, Pennsylvania State University
Selcuk R. Sirin, Ph.D. - Professor, Department of Applied Psychology, New York University
DISCUSSANT
Cecilia Ayón, Ph.D. - Associate Professor of Public Policy, University of California, Riverside
SPEAKER BIOS
Dr. Tiffany Green is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Health Behavior and Policy in the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine. She received her Ph.D. in economics from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2007 and received her BA in economics from Florida A&M University. As an economist and population health scientist, her goal is to understand the causes and consequences of racial/ethnic disparities in health, particularly among maternal, child, and immigrant populations. She applies methods from economics, demography, and health services research to document and unpack the sources of these disparities, and has published in a wide variety of peer-reviewed journals such as Economics and Human Biology, the Journal of Women’s Health and the American Journal of Public Health.
Dr. Kevin J.A. Thomas is an Associate Professor of Sociology, Demography and African Studies at the Pennsylvania State University, and a faculty affiliate of Penn State’s Global and International Affairs program. He obtained his Ph.D. in Demography at the University of Pennsylvania and has a Masters degree from the same institution. After completing his doctoral work, he served as a post-doctoral fellow at both the Harvard Center for Population and Development Studies and the Harvard Initiative for Global Health. Thomas’s research focuses on international migration, racial and ethnic inequality, children and families, as well as population and development issues in Africa. His work on these issues has appeared in several leading journals including Demography, International Migration Review, Journal of Marriage and Family, and Social Science Research. He served on the 2014 National Academy of Sciences panel on the integration of immigrants in the US, and on its 2015 panel on the educational success of young English language learners. He currently serves as a deputy editor of the journal Demography.
Dr. Selcuk R. Sirin is a Professor in the Department of Applied Psychology in New York University’s Steinhardt School. Dr. Sirin’s research primarily focuses on the lives of immigrant and minority children and their families and ways to increase professionals’ ability to better serve them. Dr. Sirin conducted a major meta-analytical review of research on socioeconomic status and he co-produced the Racial and Ethical Sensitivity Test (REST) and accompanying training program for school professionals. He is currently serving as the Research Coordinator for the Partnership for Teacher Excellence project at NYU in collaboration with New York City School of Education. His most recent research focuses on immigrant youth in general, Muslim American children and adolescents in particular.
Dr. Cecilia Ayón is an Associate Professor at the University of California, Riverside. Her research broadly examines factors that promote and hinder Latino immigrant families’ wellbeing, health disparities, and intervention development and evaluation. Her research has been founded by the Silberman Foundation and the Foundation for Child Development. Dr. Ayon is currently carrying out a large mixed methods study on the ethnic-racial socialization process among Latino immigrant families. The study examines the impact of restrictive state-level immigration policies and discrimination on parenting practices.