�鶹��Ʒ��Ƶ

At �鶹��Ʒ��Ƶ, we believe that no ZIP code should ever determine the economic destiny of its residents. The partnership between Palm Beach County and the Phyllis and Harvey Sandler School of Social Work has reached a new milestone. The school now has more than $1.25 million in active funding, powering a diverse portfolio of projects aimed at strengthening the region’s social fabric, as well as collaborative projects spanning behavioral health, housing, workforce development, and recovery research.

These initiatives represent one of the most significant partnerships between a local government and a university-based school of social work in the region, and they underscore a shared commitment to solving Palm Beach County’s most pressing human services challenges through research, professional development, and a well-prepared workforce.

“President Hasner has been clear that Florida Atlantic’s success is inseparable from the success of the communities we serve,” said Naelys Luna, Ph.D., MSW, founding dean of the College of Social Work and Criminal Justice. “Our partnership with Palm Beach County helps bring that vision to life by leveraging innovative translational research and emerging technologies while creating a direct pipeline from education to employment, ensuring our social work graduates are prepared to lead and serve our communities and make a measurable difference in people’s lives.”

A Palm Beach County native and product of the local public school system, President Hasner has emphasized strengthening the regional talent pipeline, supporting economic development, and expanding career opportunities for Florida Atlantic students across South Florida.

“Eighty percent of Florida Atlantic students remain in South Florida after graduation, meaning their success is directly tied to our local economy’s future,” said President Hasner in a recent article published by the Sun-Sentinel. When we invest in their professional development today, we are cultivating the executives, public servants and innovators who will lead our region tomorrow.”

��

From County Need to University Action

The collaboration between the Sandler School of Social Work and Palm Beach County began in earnest in 2023, when the county’s Community Services office approached Florida Atlantic about partnering to evaluate its behavioral health systems. What started as a single evaluation project has since grown into a multi-year, multi-initiative research and workforce development partnership touching the lives of thousands of county residents.

“We believe opportunity should not be limited by geography but designed into the very fabric of our community,” said James Green, Ph.D., director of the Palm Beach County Community Services Department. “Through our partnership with �鶹��Ʒ��Ƶ, we are building something bigger than programs; we are building a system of opportunity. By harnessing innovation and integrating technology with health and human services, we are expanding access, strengthening support, and creating real pathways to recovery and upward economic mobility.”

��

This work will live on through the forthcoming Center for Social and Economic Mobility, an engine for bold ideas, data-driven solutions, and measurable impact. Together with local government, this partnership will generate groundbreaking research, identify what works, and scale those solutions across Palm Beach County, throughout Florida, and across the nation.

“Because at the end of the day, this is about more than systems and strategies, it’s about people,” said Dr. Green. “And we believe every person, in every neighborhood, deserves a fair and fighting chance to achieve the American Dream.”

��

Building a Behavioral Health Workforce Pipeline

One of the partnership’s cornerstone projects is the Community Roots Program, a three-year initiative proposed by Michael A. Robinson, Ph.D., MSSW, CAADC, professor in the Sandler School of Social Work. Funded at $150,000 through August 2028, the program provides stipends for four Master of Social Work (MSW) interns to complete their clinical placements directly with Palm Beach County Community Services.

The program addresses a critical challenge facing behavioral health systems nationwide: the shortage of trained professionals prepared to serve in community-based settings. By embedding graduate students within county agencies, Community Roots gives MSW students hands-on clinical experience while providing Palm Beach County with immediate workforce capacity. Upon graduation, these students will be well-positioned to step into full-time roles in the county’s behavioral health infrastructure.

��

Technology and Innovation in Recovery Services

The Technology-Enabled Recovery Ready Initiative (TERRI) represents the partnership’s most ambitious research undertaking. Funded at $450,000 from June 2026 through June 2028, this pilot study is designed to evaluate a technologically-enabled intervention aimed at increasing engagement among individuals with substance use disorders, mental illness, and co-occurring conditions in Palm Beach County.

Led by Alan Kunz-Lomelin, Ph.D., LCSW, assistant professor, the TERRI project features a collaborative research team that includes Dr. Robinson as co-principal investigator and Precious Skinner-Osei, Ph.D., MSW, associate professor and interim school director, as an investigator. Together, they’re integrating data across behavioral health and housing systems to strengthen care coordination and identify predictive indicators of relapse.

Professor Kunz-Lomelin’s research sits at the intersection of technology, implementation science, mental health, and health disparities. His expertise in artificial intelligence and technological innovations positions the TERRI project to explore how emerging tools can be applied ethically and equitably to improve outcomes for some of the county’s most vulnerable residents.

����

Strengthening Housing and Homelessness Leadership

Like other communities across Florida and the nation, Palm Beach County faces persistent challenges with homelessness and housing affordability. The Housing Leadership Academy Consultation and Evaluation addresses these challenges at the systems level, investing $163,000 in a nine-month professional development program designed to build the capacity of leaders working in housing and homelessness service systems.

Danielle Groton, Ph.D., associate professor and DSW program coordinator; Kristen Gurdak, Ph.D., LCSW, assistant professor; Marianna L. Colvin, Ph.D., associate professor and co-director of the Child Welfare Institute, and Kaila Witkowski, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Schmidt College of Arts and Letters, provide consultation and evaluation services to assess the program’s outcomes and broader system impact. Dr. Groton is a recognized expert in homelessness and housing research, and Dr. Colvin brings deep expertise in mixed-methods research, child welfare, and inter-organizational service delivery systems.

��

Center for Integrated Recovery and Wellness Studies

One of the partnership’s most consequential outcomes has been the establishment of The Center for Integrated Recovery and Wellness Studies (CIRWS) at Florida Atlantic. Supported by $175,000 in Palm Beach County funding through an amendment to the interlocal agreement between the county and the university, the center promotes multidisciplinary research and community collaboration to improve recovery outcomes for individuals experiencing substance use and mental health challenges.

Dr. Skinner-Osei serves as the director of the Center, which is designed to close the gap between research and practice, ensuring that evidence-based findings are translated into policies and services that make a measurable difference in the community. The center also creates research workshops and interprofessional opportunities for community partners, graduate students, and faculty across Florida Atlantic’s colleges.

Precision in Practice: Developing a Regional Standard for Sustained Impact

The current slate of projects builds on a foundation of evaluation work the Sandler School has conducted for Palm Beach County since 2023.

Heather Howard, Ph.D., MSW, former associate professor and now active community partner, led the initial Florida Atlantic Process and Outcomes Evaluations Research Initiative, funded at $144,000, in 2023-2024, which established the evaluation framework for Palm Beach County's Behavioral Health Strategic Plan. That work included process and outcome measures designed to assess implementation progress and system-level impact across the county’s behavioral health continuum of care.

In 2024-2025, Skinner-Osei took the lead on the next phase, a minimum $175,000 mixed-methods evaluation of the county’s Behavioral Health, Substance Use, and Co-Occurring Disorders Strategic Plan and related recovery-oriented systems of care initiatives.��

This longitudinal partnership gives Palm Beach County something few municipalities possess: a sustained, high-level research collaborator capable of bridging the gap between ambitious policy and measurable human impact. It’s a model of ongoing accountability that ensures the county’s behavioral health roadmap produces the intended outcomes over time.

“What makes this collaboration distinctive is its commitment to accountability and continuous learning,” said Dr. Skinner-Osei. “We’re not just evaluating programs. We’re helping the county understand what works, for whom, and under what conditions, so policies and services can evolve alongside community needs.”

What Comes Next

The partnership continues to grow. Palm Beach County has approached the Sandler School regarding potential initiatives for January 2027, including a Social Behavioral Leadership Academy with considerable funding and a continuation of the Housing Leadership Academy at the same level. These proposed projects would bring the partnership's total investment to over $1.5 million.

Partnership with Palm Beach County has also been expanded through a meaningful dialogue sparked during a recent roundtable with Sarah Wartell, CEO of the Urban Institute. Drs. Luna and Skinner-Osei participated in this dialogue with a clear commitment to advancing upward economic mobility through collaboration, data-informed strategy, and collective impact. The conversation reinforced our shared opportunity to move from fragmented efforts to a coordinated, countywide approach—co-creating an Economic Mobility Dashboard, GIS Opportunity Mapping system, and research framework that aligns policy, practice, and community investment. Through this partnership, Palm Beach County and our College are working side by side to translate research into action, strengthen decision-making, and expand opportunity for residents across the county.

A Model for University-Community Partnership

Taken together, these projects and initiatives reflect an integrated approach to community-university collaboration in which research, professional development, workforce training, and systems evaluation reinforce one another.

For students at Florida Atlantic, these projects create pathways from the classroom to the real-world experience, placing them in county agencies where they build the skills and professional connections that lead to careers in South Florida's human services sector. For Palm Beach County, they provide rigorous, evidence-based guidance for how to invest public dollars in behavioral health, housing, and recovery systems that work.

For the Sandler School, these projects affirm a mission that Dean Luna and the faculty have pursued since the College of Social Work and Criminal Justice was founded in 2020: to prepare social work professionals who are not only skilled clinicians and researchers, but engaged community partners and leaders committed to creating meaningful, lasting change in the communities they serve.

“Our projects with Palm Beach County reflect how a public research university should serve its community – by listening first, responding with rigor, and staying engaged for the long term,” said Dr. Luna. “We are working together to translate research into real-world systems change that strengthens the region’s behavioral health, housing, and workforce infrastructure.”

��