The National Council on Family Relations (NCFR) has conferred its prestigious fellow status on Jodi B. Dworkin, Ph.D., professor and extension specialist in the Department of Family Social Science at the University of Minnesota.

Dr. Dworkin has made exceptional contributions to Family Science as a scholar, educator, and leader. Her early research on youth and family development contributed to understanding risk-taking behaviors. More recently, her scholarship has positioned her as a national leader on parent engagement and families and technology. As an extension specialist, she has made innovate contributions through an intervention program she developed to support youth engagement with school and learning. Her integration of teaching, research, and outreach has meaningfully impacted youth and families. Her contributions to NCFR include multiple elected and appointed positions, in addition to sustained involvement in the annual conference program.

Dr. Dworkin earned her master's and doctorate degrees in human development and family studies from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She has served as a faculty member at the University of Minnesota since 2002 and her roles have included director of graduate studies and interim department head.

Her research and outreach focuses on parenting adolescents and college students, and the role of technology in these relationships. One of Dr. Dworkin’s many research projects includes a series of studies designed to gain a better understanding of the ways, and the reasons that parents use technology and to better understand the outcomes from technology use. In addition, Dr. Dworkin has been collecting data from parents of college students to understand how COVID-19 has differentially impacted family stress, students' experiences, and time to degree and graduation. She has also collaborated with colleagues to start a participatory action research project where parents and youth have been trained to interview other parents and youth to better understand how we might reimagine family-school-youth partnerships.

NCFR Fellows are nominated by their peers and are selected by the NCFR Fellows Committee. Dr. Dworkin will be recognized as a new fellow at the 2022 NCFR Annual Conference, Nov. 16-19 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The National Council on Family Relations is the premier professional association for the multidisciplinary understanding of families. NCFR has a membership of nearly 3,000 family researchers, practitioners and educators. For more information on the National Council on Family Relations or its scholarly publications, contact NCFR at 1-888-781-9331 or visit its website at www.ncfr.org.