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Graduate School
The University of Mississippi

SREB Program—Meet Some Of Our Newest Scholars

The Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) Doctoral Scholars Program is an academic program focused on encouraging a doctoral level education for students who want to continue their education and pursue careers as full-time faculty at universities.

The SREB Doctoral Scholars Program was founded in 1993 with the goal to increase racial minority faculty percentages across college campuses nationwide. Since its founding, over 1,100 graduates have come through the program. Key components of the program are mentoring and allocating resources intended to develop students into doctorate level scholars.

For almost 30 years, the SREB Institute on Teaching and Mentoring has provided resources to cultivate Ph.D. students with the various skills needed to be successful at institutions of higher learning. The Institute offers workshops, networking, and recruitment opportunities to prepare scholars for their careers after graduate school. Another goal is to host professional settings for doctoral scholars to share advice for success at the graduate level. The opportunities are aligned with different developmental stages and areas of competence to help students in their respective career track.

At the University of Mississippi, we have an institutionally funded SREB Program. With the program, we aim to fulfill the goal of making the cost of a doctoral education affordable via collaboration between the Graduate School and the current academic department of the doctoral student.

In 2020, our new SREB Program Scholars were Kenneth Estrada and Bianca Lewis. Kenneth Estrada is currently a Ph.D. student in the English department and is accomplishing great things for the program and the University of Mississippi.

Bianca Lewis is a first-year doctoral student in the Clinical Psychology program. Lewis’ coursework assesses psychopathology with evidence-based practices.

“It was such an honor to receive a scholarship [for] SREB, not only for the funding opportunity it provided, but for the community, social support, and opportunities for mentorship that came with it.” said Lewis. “SREB genuinely desires to support its students, from matriculation, to degree conferral and beyond.”

Lewis’ research has an emphasis on the concerns and impacts of social support on health outcomes in patients who have chronic conditions.

“My most recent analyses demonstrated the ability of harmful involvement from friends and family to predict acute service use in adults with type 2 diabetes, and the curvilinear relationship between social support and number of supporters,” said Lewis. “This research was accepted for presentation at annual conferences for the Society of Behavioral Medicine and the American Diabetes Association, respectively.”

Academic research during a pandemic is a challenge for students across the nation. The University of Mississippi is home to great scholars, but the abnormal semester has created challenging environments for graduate students who are trying to focus on research projects. For future work, Lewis reflected on possible outcomes for her research.

Lewis explained: “One of the challenges I anticipate for my research will be recruiting research participants from the neighboring areas of Oxford. Mississippi has some of the highest prevalence of chronic health conditions, in addition to factors like poverty and obesity that worsen risk for chronic health conditions. This makes it especially important to use participants from the community in my research, but recruitment of these participants can be difficult.”

Networking is a priority of the SREB Scholars Program, and Bianca is ready to take advantage of the opportunity to continue her education.

“I’m excited to network with current SREB scholars and alumni, in addition to networking with recruiting institutions. I look forward to attending workshops and expanding my knowledge base at SREB’s annual Institute for Teaching and Mentoring each year.”

The University of Mississippi looks forward to watching how the SREB Scholars will continue to impact the university.

 

 

Newsletter Spring/Summer 2021 Articles

   
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