Melissa Jenkins

Melissa Jenkins is a doctoral student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Social Work. She holds a Bachelor of Social Work degree from Meredith College and earned her Master of Social Work with a concentration in Community, Management, and Policy Practice from UNC-Chapel Hill in 2018. Melissa found her passion in working with children with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities (IDD) and their parents through her BSW field placement with the North Carolina Down Syndrome Alliance. During her time in the MSW program, Melissa worked with Project NO REST, a statewide project to increase awareness and prevention around human trafficking by training local service providers to administer Project NO REST’s screening tool. She is currently a research assistant for Dr. Cindy-Fraga Rizo with Teach2Reach and previously worked on a collaborative reading intervention to increase reading comprehension and social interaction skills in middle school students with autism. Melissa’s substantive research areas include: (a) evidence-based school social work practices in the context of special education services; (b) social support of culturally and linguistically diverse parents of children with IDD; and (c) trauma-informed interventions for individuals with IDD. Recognizing the complexity of culture and neurodivergent identities in help-seeking behavior and accessibility to resources, Melissa will explore the individual and environmental factors that contribute to an increase risk of commercial sexual exploitation and the role of social workers in prevention efforts in her dissertation.