The Cyril Franks Award
Since 1991, The Cyril M. Franks Award has celebrated the outstanding GSAPP doctoral dissertation of the year. This highly coveted award has provided recognition, encouragement, and support to our students who will advance knowledge, develop innovative programs, new agencies, and lead system change through state-of-the-art, evidence-based cutting-edge prevention and intervention psychological services for at- risk and underserved populations. The Franks Award is truly one of the highlights at our annual Commencement awards ceremony. Each awardee receives a framed certificate and a cash award.
List of Cyril Franks Award winners:
2021 - Christine Cho
Addressing Barriers to Mental Health Service Utilization Among Muslin Youth and Families Using a Community-Based Participatory Research Approach
2020 - Denise Guarino
Implementing a Dialectical Behavior Therapy Group Intervention in a Primary Care Setting: A Feasibility and Acceptability Study
2019 - Joshua Romero
Therapists' Experiences with Illness, Injury, and Disability: Effects on the Therapist's Subjectivitiy and the Therapeutic Relationship
2018 - Gabrielle Roberts-Young
"Does Race-Matching Matter? An Examination of the Links Between Teacher-Student Racial Match and the Quality of Relationships"
2017 - Carey Schwartz
"Development and Evaluation of Behavioral Activiation Guided Self-Help Treatment for Mild to Moderate Depression"
2016 - Joshua Korth
"Understanding Implementation of Restorative Practices in Low Income, Urban High Schools"
2015 - Traci Pacita Maynigo
Traci was awarded a research grant from the International Centre for Excellence in Emotionally Focused Therapy to conduct her dissertation and to receive training in Emotionally Focused Therapy. In addition to now becoming a psychologist, Traci has been a free-lance editor and writer.
2014 - Shoshana Friedman
“Teacher Emotional Intelligence and the Quality of their Interactions with Students”
2014 - Sam Klugman
“An Exploratory Study of the Experiences of Transgender and Gender-Nonconforming Students at Rutgers University”
2013 - Laurie Zandberg
Laurie Zandberg (clinical) is the recipient of this year’s award. Her dissertation is entitled “Train-The-Trainer: Implementation of Cognitive Behavioral Guided Self-Help For Eating Disorders In A University Setting.” Laurie’s research study served as a model for the training of staff in the counseling center. To quote Terry Wilson whose written remarks Dean Messer read at the GSAPP convocation on May 19: “Perhaps the most remarkable outcome was the following. The counseling center administration subsequently prevailed on me to train their staff in the guided self-help based on cognitive behavior therapy that Laurie had implemented. Last November Laurie received the Graduate Student Research Award at the annual Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies conference. A paper based on her dissertation has recently been published in an important international journal on eating disorders. For all of these reasons Laurie is richly deserving of the Cyril M. Franks award.
2012 - Nathan Lambright
“Using a Pairing Procedure to Develop Reinforcers for Children on the Autism Spectrum with a Restricted Range of Preferred Items"
2011 - Sarah Kowal
“An Exploration of the Impact of Social Institutions and Interpersonal Connections on the Sexual Expression and Identity of Dually Attracted and Bisexual Women”
2010 -Andrea Parent
"Effects of a comprehensive substance use prevention program with urban adolescents"
2008 - Jennifer Greenberg
"Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Body Dysmorphic Disorder in Adolescents: Development of a Treatment Protocol"