SCRA Awards and Fellows

Congratulations to the 2023 SCRA Fellows

Vernita Perkins, PhD

Lead Researcher, AML Lab at Omnigi Research
Principal Consultant, Transformgi LLC

As a grassroots innovator, Dr. Perkins demonstrates individual courage by telling truth to leadership, often in the face of divisive power. From international decolonization and national mental health advocacy to origins
of human ranking research to clarifying racialized constructs, Dr. Perkins’ multidisciplinary research and practice combines the complementary principles of community psychology and industrial-organizational
psychology. Perkins’ practice frameworks address dismantling Anti-Blackness and Anti-Black Racism, and support EEDIAJR*-centered sustainability through organic community practice, psychological wholeness, and applied meaningful living. Dr. Perkins' research exposes unseen issues that further exacerbate civilizational injustice. In challenging human ranking, colonization, embedded bias, and peer review systems, Perkins contributes to eliminating human ranking, decolonizing DEI and psychological systems, exposing the root of unconscious bias and antiracism, and redefining peer review systems. Perkins’ courage addressing inequities, innovating new psychological approaches, and truth-telling to leadership despite formidable resistance makes Dr. Perkins an exemplary practitioner and contributor to the field.*EEDIAJR stands for Equality, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, Access, Justice, and Reparations. This acronym more accurately represents the way civilizational justice prioritizes Transformative Equity.

Tonya Hall, PhD

Dr Hall is Associate Professor, Chicago State University, Psychology & Counseling Department, College of Arts and Sciences. Tonya has a deep commitment to issues involving minority affairs. She has been a role model for students with interests in minority issues. Her academic research includes diversity, emotions, motivation and violence, and has investigated imaginative ways to help individuals from the criminal justice system return to the community. At a local and national level, she has been instrumental in developing networks of community psychologists in the Midwest and nationally. As an SCRA regional coordinator and then national coordinator, she worked tirelessly to promote involvement of multiple individuals in leadership roles in their regions. In 2021, she was awarded the distinguished title of Midwestern Psychological Association Fellow. Dr Hall was nominated to serve as SCRA President in December 2022.

Victoria Scott, PhD

Dr Scott is Associate Professor of Psychological Science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte (UNCC). Her contributions to the field include mechanisms for measuring and improving readiness to implement evidence-based practices in community settings. Her contributions to SCRA and the field of community psychology are longstanding and myriad. She supported the development of CP practitioners and researchers

through active engagement with both the Practice and Research Councils. From 2013-2016, she served as SCRA’s first Administration Director and lead a 10-month strategic planning effort. Two publications are noteworthy in advancing the field: In 2015, she co-authored the first ever textbook focused on community psychology practice competencies (Scott & Wolfe, 2015), recognized through the Don Klein Publication Award to Advance Community Psychology Practice. She also co-authored the 4th edition of Community Psychology: Linking Individuals and Communities(Kloos, Hill, Thomas, Case, Scott & Wandersman, 2020), a text used throughout the academic community.

Congratulations to the 2022 SCRA Fellows!

Chiara Sabina, PhD 

Associate Professor and the Chancellor’s Scholar for Inclusive Excellence in Interpersonal Violence Research, School of Social Work, Rutgers University

Dr. Sabina has demonstrated tremendous depth and breadth to her work, in particular her international contributions that have made a significant impact to our understanding of the processes and experiences of different types and forms of interpersonal violence affecting Latinas in the US and in Latin America. Critically, she has focused on the application of this work, including how her findings can guide practice and intervention. In turn,  her work has allowed us to understand with deeper knowledge victim needs, violence prevention, domestic violence services, and culturally-informed services. As one case in point, as a Fulbright Fellow, she conducted applied research in Ecuador, developed a directory of service providers for women survivors of interpersonal violence, and organized a conference for service providers in Quito. Overall, her contributions to the field of violence have impacted the ways in which violence against women in the United States and abroad is conceptualized. In addition, Dr. Sabina's service contributions to SCRA have also been substantive and significant (leading to the interest group on early career issues as well as the reinstitution of the Committee on Cultural, Racial, and Ethnic Affairs).

Noelle Hurd, PhD

Scully Family Discovery Associate Professor at the University of Virginia and is an affiliate in the Department of Psychology

Dr. Hurd is an exceptional scholar who has made multiple significant contributions to community psychology and psychology in general, including her nuanced and contextually-grounded research regarding the natural mentoring relationships experienced by Black youth and her efforts to draw from this research to inform interventions, large-scale mentoring programs, and policy.  In addition to salient contributions to the field such as her service on the editorial boards of both the American Journal of Community Psychology (AJCP) and the Journal of Community Psychology (JCP), Dr. Hurd has been a scholar activist. For instance, nationally, Dr. Hurd has participated in Congressional briefings around Diversity Equity and Inclusion, and natural mentoring relationships for youth of color. Moreover, her research-guided advocacy efforts to advance social justice, such as multiple op-ed pieces in high profile outlets such as the New York Times and the Washington Post provide evidence of her work at the national level.  Dr. Hurd has also played a significant role in community psychology training at the University of Virginia and successfully mentored many early career scholars and advocated for and supported the work of scholars engaged in equity- and justice-focused research. 

Olya Glantsman, PhD 

Senior Professional Lecturer – Psychology Department, DePaul University

Dr. Glantsman’s contributions to education, training, and the visibility of our field are outstanding and substantial.  She has brought to this work considerable originality and skill and has had a significant impact. Dr. Glantsman’s primary strength areas include education and training, and she shines in these domains. Her key contributions to SCRA and CP more broadly include: (1) program development and leadership – e.g., developing and running a  BA CP concentration on her campus (directing/coordinating it since 2006) and, more recently, helping create and lead an MS and BA/MS in CP; (2) substantive CP teaching, particularly of undergraduates; (3) meaningful service roles in SCRA and in her region, many focused on education, training, and dissemination of CP (co-Chair of the CP Practice Council for 4 years; editor of Theory into Action; 5 years as Midwest regional coordinator; co-chair of Undergraduate Interest Group and the Grad/Undergrad Mentoring Initiative; Biennial 2021 Conference Program Committee, editing  The Community Practitioner column in TCP.); and (4) serving as co-editor of “Diverse Career Opportunities in Community Psychology” as well as an open access introductory CP  text.

Rhonda Lewis, PhD 

Professor and Chair, Department of Psychology, Wichita State University, Wichita, KS

Dr. Lewis has made sustained and long-standing contributions to community psychology. Her research on health disparities, substance use prevention, and the mental health/health and positive development of youth and emerging adults of color has made national contributions to the ways in which we contextualize health for youth of color. In addition to exemplary mentoring of students, she has sought to diversify and expand the reach of community psychology and STEM nationwide. Dr. Lewis has had a number of meaningful service roles within SCRA, such as chairing the Ethnic and Racial Affairs Committee (prior to this committee becoming a council), planning multiple biennial conferences, and most notably, contributing to the  design of the community psychology practice competencies. She is currently the lead editor of the Journal of Community Psychology Special issue on “COVID and vulnerable populations.” She is also a co-editor for the Special Issue of AJCP entitled “Racial reckoning, resistance, and the revolution: A call to community psychology to move forward.” Her contributions to so many community psychology contemporary critical issues related to the health of youth of color are not just significant to our field but are also important contributions nationwide.  

Urmatapa Dutta,PhD

Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Massachusetts Lowell

Dr. Dutta is an exemplary scholar with a global focus. Her contributions to the development of critical ethnography are highly significant. Dr. Dutta has made multiple meaningful  contributions, including her action and activist research focusing on structural and cultural violence. She has co-edited a special issue of Community Psychology in Global Perspectives entitled: “Situating Structural and Cultural Violence in Community Research and Action.” She has also advanced critical qualitative research for which she has been honored with the Distinguished Early Career Contributions in Qualitative Inquiry Award of Division 5 of APA, and elevated anti-racist and decolonial processes and practices.  She has made empirical and theoretical/conceptual contributions using a foundation of collaborative, participatory practices. These contributions have been recognized, as indicated by her editorial contributions for multiple journals (e.g., Associate Editor of Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology; Editorial Board member for Community Psychology in Global Perspective and Qualitative Psychology) and her invitations to give multiple plenary/ keynote presentations. She has received the Outstanding Educator Award from SCRA 2021 and a UMass-Lowell outstanding teaching award in 2015 and 2021