2026-09-24
- Prior to arriving at the Family Resiliency Center (FRC) as a Research Scientist in August 2026, Virnaliz Jimenez worked as a program evaluator for a private consulting group, where she began considering how to align her work more closely with her professional values.
“I knew that I wanted to do more community-engaged and participatory work,” Jimenez said. “Some folks in industry might be incorporating those approaches, but it’s still a business. It can feel extractive. In that sense, FRC is unique to me. I honestly...
2026-09-22 - Students in Illinois face a growing crisis of stress and mental health. Nearly 45% of children have experienced at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE), and 29% of high school students report poor mental health in the past 30 days. Yet schools have historically lacked evidence-based practices and programs to help students build positive coping skills, leaving children to navigate stress without the tools they need. In response, Illinois enacted S.B. 2872 (Public Act 103-0764; effective January 1, 2025). This bill allows school districts to set aside at least 20 minutes per week for...
2026-08-31 - Imagine you are angry or upset. Someone suggests you calm down and take a breath. How likely are you to follow their advice? According to Sarah Habib, founder and CEO of the Calm Caterpillar, a developer of mindfulness toys that teach children how to calm their bodies, telling someone to calm down is not effective—especially if you have not already been practicing breathing or other mindfulness techniques on a regular basis. Hearing “just take a breath” is even less likely to be effective with children, who lack the experience of managing their emotions that adults do. On...
2026-07-31 - On the evening of Tuesday, June 30, the Family Resiliency Center at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and collaborators from local chapters or sections of “Divine Nine” organizations—the nickname for the coalition of nine historically Black sororities and fraternities—as well as affiliated organizations like the National Council of Negro Women and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People hosted a video premiere event titled “Out of the Basement.” Attendees filled the...
2026-04-01 - Many early childhood educators use music in the classroom, but how do they know they are striking the right chord? Hong Li, a doctoral candidate in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies (HDFS) and with the Family Resiliency Center (FRC), hopes to shed light on this question. Li studies the contexts in which teachers bring music into early childhood education settings and the attitudes of those instructors toward music. "Unlike in elementary school, where there is often a dedicated music teacher leading the classroom according to a curriculum, the teacher’s...
2026-01-29 - The Family Resiliency Center (FRC) has been awarded a Healing Illinois grant to promote thriving among staff at community nonprofit organizations through storytelling. The project will engage with local agencies to create video shorts that encourage understanding of the successes and challenges they experience. "This project represents a needed opportunity for staff to tell the stories about their work that they want to tell in their own voices," said Jacinda Dariotis, director of FRC. "By recording and distributing these new...
2026-01-21 - How do you assess the health needs of an entire community, especially its most vulnerable members? It’s a huge logistical challenge for public health offices serving counties and states around the country, but an accurate view of community health is needed to guide the services they offer and to reach their intended audiences. The Champaign-Urbana Public Health District has embarked on community needs assessments, but past efforts require updating to represent populations currently at-risk, including unhoused individuals, people with disabilities,...
2025-12-04 - Art expression has always been important to Katie Shumway, the Senior Director of Engagement for the Illinois School of Social Work and FRC Collaboratory member. She brings this perspective to crafting community-university partnerships, which require a creativity facility for engendering productive relationships. "Art expression activates a part of my brain that might not otherwise be activated," she said. "It allows me to process thoughts and emotions in a different way, and it helps me learn things about myself that my everyday routine might not uncover." In her role...
2025-11-06 - FRC produced two more microlearning video trainings in October. These covered common issues in evaluation reporting practices—namely, how to avoid overwhelming a reader with irrelevant data and how to approach reporting on unexpected or surprising outcomes. The videos feature the example of a television weather news reporter who finds himself drawn toward leaning on these suboptimal reporting techniques. "I just love what you're doing," said Champaign County Developmental Disabilities Board member Susan Fowler at the October 22, 2025 meeting. "I taught research methodology for years at the...
2025-10-20 - Throughout her professional life, Beverley Baker's experiences have encouraged her to understand community from a systems perspective. Baker currently serves as the Chief Impact Officer at the United Way of Champaign County (UWCC) and will begin a new role in spring 2026 as that organization's President and Chief Executive Officer. She serves on the Family Resiliency Center (FRC)'s Steering Committee and is a member of the FRC Collaboratory. "What I have valued and enjoyed the most through my various roles here with United Way has been building bridges across our community...
2025-10-17 - Close your eyes. Take a deep breath. Count to ten. Although these strategies for calming down during a stressful situation might be familiar to you, children do not inherently know them. Rather, they need to learn how to regulate their emotions and rely heavily on others to help. Beyond this, children need to experience what self-regulation feels like—what it means to be able to shift from tense to tranquil. A new paper from the Family Resiliency Center (FRC) outlines how to implement a mindful movement program that promotes...
2025-08-01 - On July 31, 2025, Unit 4 Youth Employment Services (YES) Program students celebrated the successful completion of an eight-week Youth Participatory Action Research (YPAR) project at the University of Illinois Family Resiliency Center. The collaboration between Unit 4, the City of Champaign, and the University of Illinois provided students with invaluable career readiness skills and real-world research experience. Seven Unit 4 students from...
2025-07-31 - The COVID-19 pandemic upended life for individuals and communities worldwide. Social isolation, health mandates, illness, and economic hardships took a toll on the well-being of families and children, but there were also silver linings to people’s experiences. A new study from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign looks at impacts of the pandemic among youth and parents across the U.S. Midwest. Their findings...
2025-07-22 - Performing research at the Family Resiliency Center (FRC) was nothing like what Tarie Somsak expected. A rising junior studying neuroscience and cognitive sciences at Tulane University, Somsak spent her summer at FRC as part of the Research and Education for the Advancement of Compassionate Healthcare (REACH) program, which matches undergraduates interested in medical school with research opportunities across campus. At FRC, Somsak worked with data from a mindful movement...
2025-06-11 - Rachel Jackson-Gordon is a postdoctoral research associate at the Family Resiliency Center whose work focuses on violence prevention, program implementation and community-engaged research. She spoke with IGPA about the potential benefits and implications of Karina’s Law, an Illinois bill that requires local law enforcement to temporarily remove guns from a person who has an order of protection against them. How might Karina’s Law impact...