The Rudd Adoption Research Program is pleased to announce the Rudd Family Visiting Professorship, made possible through the generosity of a new endowment created by Virginia and Andrew Rudd through the Rudd Family Foundation. Through this new Professorship, the Rudd Adoption Research Program will be able to bring internationally-recognized scholars with expertise in adoption research to UMass Amherst for meetings, talks, and consultations. Dr. Jean Rhodes, Frank L. Boyden Professor of Clinical Psychology and Director of the Center for Evidence-Based Mentoring at the University of Massachusetts Boston, has been appointed to the Rudd Family Visiting Professorship in its inaugural year. Dr. Rhodes will spend the week of February 3, 2020, on campus consulting with members of the Rudd team who are involved in the Adoption Mentoring Partnership, a collaboration between the Rudd Adoption Research Program and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Hampshire County. Those discussions will center around best practices in adoption mentoring, program evaluation, research, and future directions for the program and its research. She will also meet with regional chapters of Big Brothers Big Sisters for broader discussions about evidence-based trends in mentoring. Throughout her stay, discussions will focus on best opportunities for disseminating information on mentoring, with a focus on meeting the needs of adopted persons.
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Monday, February 3, 2020
4:00 pm | Old Chapel
"Older and Wiser: Rethinking Youth Mentoring for the 21st Century"
Dr. Jean Rhodes will give a public lecture based on research she and her colleagues have been conducting on mentoring. In this talk, she will draw on her three decades of research to provide an overview of youth mentoring. Rhodes will discuss the cultural assumptions and unique history that brought the mentoring field to this point, and detail new developments that position the field for an explosion of innovation. Pre-registration is suggested but not required, walk-ins are welcome!