About

Kathryn S. Collins is a Professor at the University of Maryland School of Social Work and Co-Principal Investigator of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network SAMHSA funded Family Informed Trauma Treatment Center and Principal Investigator of Trauma Education Connections Initiative.

The focus of her academic career centers on social justice, disparities in access to trauma-based mental health services, and developing trauma-focused social work interventions for vulnerable and oppressed populations such as minority children, women, and families surviving poverty and chronic violence in the inner city. Currently, she is the co-developer of Trauma Adapted Family Connections, a trauma-informed neglect prevention intervention. Her commitment to the field is long-standing with over 18 years of community-based clinical social work practice with children and families. She has numerous publications and has been the PI or Co-PI on state and nationally-funded research. She has earned an extramural research award in the NIH, National Center for Minority Health and Health Disparities for her research focusing on children from minority communities and their exposure to community violence. Further, she brings her research scholarship, practice and life experience to the classroom where she has received several teaching awards across three university settings.

Expertise & Interests

  • Violence Exposure and Trauma Symptomatology
  • Mental Health and Disability Policies
  • Cognitive/Narrative Evidence-Based Interventions in Social Work Education, Research, and Practice
  • Feminist Pedagogy
Education

BSW, Mars Hill College
MSW, Tulane University
PhD, University of South Carolina

Recent Publications

Collins, K.S., Bellin, M., Osteen, P., Bledsoe, S.E., Freeman, P. Burton, A. & Seen, H. (Under Review). The impact of violence and victimization exposure on caregivers living in extreme urban poverty: Attributions, posttraumatic stress and depressive symptoms. Submitted to Stress and Health.

Margolis, R., Bellin, M. H., Bookman, J, Collins, K.S., Bollinger, M.E., Land, C., & Butz, A. M. (2019). Fostering effective asthma self-management transfer in high-risk children: Gaps and opportunities for family engagement. Journal of Pediatric Health Care, 33(6), 684-693.

Rose, T., Leitch, J., Collins, K.S., Frey, J. J., & Osteen, P. J. (2019). Effectiveness of Youth Mental Health First Aid USA for Social Work Students. Research on Social Work Practice, 29(3), 291–302.

Collins, K. S., Freeman, P. A., Unick, G. J., Bellin, M. H., Reinicker, P., & Streider, F. (2017). Child attributions mediate relationships between violence exposure and trauma symptomatology. Advances in Social Work, 18, 284-299.