Hyojin Im, a School of Social Work Ph.D. student has been awarded a $25,000 Annie E. Casey Foundation Innovations Award for her dissertation project, “A socio-ecological model of refugee mental health and housing insecurity: With a focus on roles of social capital and acculturation.”

Im, with support from refugee resettlement agencies and refugee communities, will conduct individual and focus-group interviews with homeless refugee families and refugee community leaders in Minnesota. Her goal is to identify cultural barriers to housing stability and to proper health and social services, and to explore the interplay between mental health and housing experiences. The project also received a $4,000 grant from the Minnesota Family Housing Fund.

In another honor, Im received the Best Student Abstract Award from Hong Kong University at the 2010 Joint World Conference on Social Work and Social Development. Her paper is titled, “Role of social capital and help-seeking in refugee resettlement: Toward housing stability.” The conference was held in Hong Kong in June.