The KU Work Group is an interdisciplinary team devoted to a common purpose: promoting community health and development through collaborative research, teaching, and service. Formed in 1975, our work is in three domains: community and public health, child and youth health & development, and community and capacity development.

Our disciplinary backgrounds include applied behavioral science, community psychology, anthropology, education, law, child development, urban planning, and public health. Team members have experience addressing a variety of issues facing communities including health promotion, substance abuse, adolescent pregnancy, education, child and youth development, rural health, child well-being, systems change, and neighborhood development in urban communities.

Our multi-generational team includes Ph.D-level researchers, professional staff, graduate students, and undergraduate interns. We learn through relationships with collaborative partners locally, nationally, and globally.

Research Associate

Vicki Collie-Akers, M.P.H., Ph. D. is a research associate at the KU Work Group. Vicki was previously involved with the Work Group as an Undergraduate Research Fellow while she completed her Bachelor of Social Work at KU. During that time, she worked on the Bronzeville and Kauffman neighborhood development projects. She was also a member of the Kansas Community Leadership Corps.

Vicki completed her Masters in Public Health, with a concentration in Behavioral Science and Health Education, at Saint Louis University, in St. Louis, MO. While there, she was involved in research that studied the coverage of prevention research in small market media and environmental assessments of walkability for children. After receiving her M.P.H., she worked as an initiative coordinator for the Kansas City- Chronic Disease Coalition, a REACH 2010 project evaluated by the KU Work Group. There she worked with neighborhood and faith organizations to implement environmental change and health programming. This experience led to the development of her primary research interest: understanding how communities can have a role in changing behaviors that prevent chronic diseases. She is currently working on the Kansas City Chronic Disease Coalition and Healthy STEPS Projects.

Stephen B. Fawcett, Ph.D.

Director, KU Work for Community Health and Development, a World Health Organization Collaborating Centre

Kansas Health Foundation Distinguished Professor,
Department of Applied Behavioral Science,
University of Kansas

Professor Fawcett uses methods of behavioral science and community development to help understand and improve how communities create conditions that promote health and development. A former VISTA volunteer, he worked as a community organizer in public housing and low-income neighborhoods. Dr. Fawcett has been honored as a Fellow in both Division 27 (Community Psychology) and Division 25 (Experimental Analysis of Behavior) of the American Psychological Association. He received the Distinguished Practice Award of the Society for Community Research and Action and the Higuchi/Endowment Award for Applied Sciences. He is co-author of nearly 200 articles and book chapters and several books in the areas of community/public health, child/youth health and development, and community development. Dr. Fawcett has been a Scholar-in-Residence at the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and member of the Board on Population Health and Public Health Practice. He has consulted with a number of private foundations and national organizations, including the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, the California Wellness Foundation, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. He has also served as a visiting scholar at the World Health Organization in Geneva.

Dr. Fawcett serves as an advisor for most KU Work Group projects. This includes:

1. Research into factors that affect how communities create conditions that promote health and development,
2. Undergraduate teaching and graduate training in behavioral science, applied research, and community health and development, and
3. Public service and consultation with local and national organizations, governmental organizations, and foundations.

Cesareo Fernandez Gomez, Ph.D.

Post-Doctoral Researcher
Grant provided by the Researchers Training Program of the Basque Government (Spain)

Cesáreo Fernández, PhD, and Master in Addictions, is a Spanish psychologist (in Industrial and Clinical Psychology). During the last 15 years, he has been a researcher and scientific research assistant for several European and national associations working in mental health and substance abuse. He is author and co-author for more than 50 articles in peer-reviewed journals, books, and chapters on mental health and substance abuse prevention and treatment. His work for the KU Work Group on Health Promotion and Community Development involves translating the Community Tool Box into Spanish, and adapting the Community Tool Box to European contexts.

Christina Holt, M.A.

Associate Director for Community Tool Box Services

Christina M. Holt, MA, is Associate Director for Community Tool Box Services at the Work Group for Health Promotion and Community Development. She holds a master's degree in Human Development (Child and Developmental Psychology) at the University of Kansas. Ms. Holt also received her undergraduate degrees at the University of Kansas in American Studies and in Human Development and Family Life (with an emphasis in Community Leadership and Development). The behavioral science training that Ms. Holt has received undergirds her work to help communities make a difference on socially important issues. Ms. Holt has extensive experience in various leadership capacities, coordinating and conducting training, coordinating community projects, overseeing development projects, and developing data collection systems. Ms. Holt's experience includes acting as Director of Behavioral Services and Family Enhancement at Community Living Opportunities, serving as a Research Associate at the Work Group for Health Promotion and Community Development, and serving as the Co-Director of KU's Center for Community Outreach. Ms. Holt is currently the Director of Training and Technical Support at the Work Group for Community Health and Development.

Ms. Holt has educational training and experience in designing data collection and management systems and using data to guide the work. Ms. Holt has experience helping others design such systems and helping them make sense of their data. Ms. Holt has over five years of experience helping communities collect, analyze, and make sense of their community change data.

Ms. Holt served as a Kansas Health Foundation and Senior Undergraduate Fellow at the KU Work Group. Trained by the Foundation's Master Facilitator Program, she is currently a Kansas Health Foundation Ambassador.

Ms. Holt coordinates the work of the Community Tool Box in an effort to give people tools to address socially important issues in their communities. This includes overseeing the CTB's development, disseminating the CTB, and providing technical assistance and coordinating related training. Ms. Holt also helps with various other grants and research projects at the Work Group.

Michelle Kampfer

Business and Finance Manager

Michelle Kampfer has worked for the Work Group since May 2001 as the Financial Manager and is now the Business Manager for the office. She worked for the federal government for 12 years prior to coming to the Work Group. She enjoys the paper shuffle in an office setting along with being the person in charge.

Michelle enjoys working with people, teaching people and just conversing with people. She also enjoys young children and watching them grow, hence the reason for leading girls through the Girl Scout program. Michelle shines when she volunteers for the Wellsville Schools. She is an active member of the Parent/Teachers Organization for the Elementary and Middle School, a member of the Site Council for the Middle School and the President for the Site Council for the Elementary School. Her special interests include baking, photography, and scrap-booking.

Nikki Keene

Graduate Research Assistant

Nikki Keene is a Graduate Research Assistant for the KU Work Group on Health Promotion and Community Development. In August 2007, Ms. Keene became affiliated with the Work Group. She joined the work group as a recent graduate from the Health Services Management and Community Health and Development program at Wichita State University. Her past research experience was primarily focused on the prevention and cessation of tobacco use among college-aged populations in Kansas.

Ms. Keene is currently a graduate student in the Joint Ph.D. /M.P.H. program in Applied Behavioral Science and Public Health. Her research interests include building community capacity to bring about change and improvement related to socially important problems and goals. Currently, she is engaged in a wide variety of community health related research projects. Some of the current projects are focused on the prevention of youth substance abuse in communities across Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Iowa and also improving the quality of healthcare in Kansas communities.

William Kennedy

Graduate Research Assistant

William Kennedy joined the KU Work Group for Community Health and Development in February 2009 as a Graduate Research Assistant. William earned his BA from the University of Kansas in East Asian Languages and Cultures in 1993. He lived in Japan for five years. William also worked in information systems analysis, development, and support for seven years before pursuing graduate studies. His prior studies and experiences led to a deep interest in organizational management and sustainable community development.

William entered graduate studies in the Ph.D. program of Behavioral Science specializing in Community Health and Development in fall of 2008. His research interests include sustainability of community-based initiatives and organizational factors facilitating systems change. William is also interested in examining the relationship between systems theory and community & organizational sustainability. His current projects focus on the prevention of youth substance abuse and addressing social determinants of health through medical-legal partnerships.

Zora Pace, M.A.

Graduate Research Assistant

Zora received her masters from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County and is currently enrolled in the joint Ph.D. /M.P.H. program in Applied Behavioral Science and Public Health at the University of Kansas. She joined the KU Work Group as a Graduate Research Assistant in August of 2008 where she is working on substance abuse prevention and reducing health disparities in minority communities.

Zora’s research interests include: the evaluation of evidence-based practices to create healthy communities, targeting behaviors and environmental conditions which lead to pediatric obesity, the examination of comorbities (such as rates of HIV/AIDS when individuals abstain from drug abuse), and the dissemination of behavior analysis in the field of public health.

Dan Schober

Graduate Research Assistant

Dan Schober joined the KU Work Group as a Graduate Research and Teaching Assistant in August of 2006. Dan’s work is in youth substance abuse prevention in Kansas and the prevention of violence (child sexual abuse, youth and adolescent violence, and intimate partner violence) in multiple states. Dan provides training and technical support to practitioners documenting and evaluating community-level interventions. He also contributes to diverse research initiatives with the Work Group.

Mr. Schober is a graduate student in the Joint Ph.D. /M.P.H. program in Applied Behavioral Science and Public Health. His research interests are in scientific discovery of societal conditions that contribute to community health and development, as well as understanding how changes in programs, policies, and practices can lead to population-level behavior change.

Jerry A. Schultz, Ph.D.

Co-Director of the KU Work Group

Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Preventive Medicine, Courtesy Assistant Professor, Department of Applied Behavioral Science, Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology

Dr. Schultz holds a Ph.D. in anthropology and an M.A. in medical anthropology from the University of Kansas. He works primarily with issues involving building capacity of urban neighborhoods to solve local problems, understanding systems change, evaluating community health and development initiatives, and qualitative methodologies. He is part of the Community Tool Box (CTB) development team, a global online resource for community building. His responsibility includes both content and design development for the CTB. Dr. Schultz has co-authored numerous articles on evaluation, empowerment, and community development. He has been a consultant to several foundations, community coalitions, and state agencies. In addition to his work in community health and development, Dr. Schultz has studied East Asian and Native American culture and history, producing several documentaries on these subjects. Dr. Schultz is a Fellow of the Society for Applied Anthropology and a member of the Society for Community Research and Action, and the American Public Health Association. He received the Distinguished Practice Award form the Society for Community Research and Action.

• Community Tool Box
• STEPS to a Healthier Austin
• Kansas City-Chronic Disease Coalition - A REACH 2010 Project
• Supporting Documentation of Substance Abuse Prevention Efforts in Kansas

Jomella Thompson, Ph. D.

Associate Director for Research

Jomella Thompson, M.U.P., is a Research Assistant for the KU Work Group on Health Promotion and Community Development. In 2001, Ms. Thompson became affiliated with the Work Group while completing her Masters in Urban Planning at the University of Kansas. Her work involves providing training, technical assistance, and supports of an online documentation system that tracks community and systems change for users such as community-based organizations and governmental initiatives. She has worked on various projects including the Kauffman Neighborhood Initiative and the Kansas Juvenile Justice Authority project.

Ms. Thompson is currently a doctoral candidate in Behavioral Psychology in the Department of Applied Behavioral Science. Her research interests are focused on increasing community capacity of neighborhood residents, especially youth, and participatory research in neighborhood and community development. She obtained a B.A. in Urban Studies with an emphasis in Community Development from Jackson State University, Jackson, Mississippi in December 2000.