SSW student awarded Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship

Social Work doctoral candidate Molly C. Driessen was awarded the prestigious Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship for 2020-2021 by the University of Minnesota Graduate School.

The fellowship allows the University’s most accomplished PhD candidates to devote full-time effort to finalizing and writing their dissertations during the fellowship year.

The title of Molly’s study is “Student Stories of Resilience After Campus Sexual Assault.” The topic has impacted her personally and has steered her practice and research on issues pertaining to sexual violence, violence against women, and trauma.

“There is a lot of research on the negative consequences of campus sexual assaults,” Molly says, “but there is not a lot of information about the strength and resilience of students as they stay on campus and continue to navigate student life post assault.”

Molly is conducting a qualitative study drawing on the methods of Post-Intentional Phenomenology and plans to interview 15 to 20 undergraduate student victim-survivors of campus sexual assault. She believes that students’ stories of how they are navigating campus life post-assault and what they want to see changed will help influence campus environments, policies, and improve the lives of all students.

She is grateful for the support of her advisor, Lynette M. Renner, and her dissertation committee members, and is excited to continue to focus on her dissertation in the upcoming school year.