Connections and Impact: Clark in the Community

Presented by

Shelly Tenenbaum

Professor of Sociology

Shelly Tenenbaum is co-chair of the Sociology Department and director of the Holocaust and Genocide Studies Concentration, and is affiliated with the programs in comparative race and ethnic studies, Jewish studies, Africana studies, and women’s and gender studies. As a faculty member in the Emerson Prison Initiative, she also teaches in the college-in-prison program at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution–Concord. Tenenbaum is co-editor, with Lynn Davidman, of “Feminist Perspectives on Jewish Studies,” and author of “A Credit to their Community: Jewish Loan Societies in the United States, 1880-1945,” as well as articles that have appeared in a range of journals including American Jewish History, The Sociological Quarterly, Teaching Sociology, Contemporary Jewry, and Social Science History.  Tenenbaum has received Clark’s Outstanding Teaching Award, Outstanding Adviser Award, and the Winston Napier Faculty Diversity Award.

Donald Spratt

Associate Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry

Donald Spratt was a 2021 Jack W. Lund Clark University Community Achievement Awardee for his initiative to make STEM education and laboratory research experience real for hundreds of high school students across the Worcester region. His NIH-funded research group at Clark focuses on the structural and mechanistic studies of the HECT E3 ubiquitin ligases using biophysical approaches including NMR spectroscopy. Prior to joining the Gustaf H. Carlson School of Chemistry and Biochemistry in 2015, Spratt was a postdoctoral fellow and research associate in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Western Ontario. He earned his Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Waterloo and his B.Sc. in biochemistry from Mount Allison University.

Eric DeMeulenaere

Associate Professor of Education

Eric DeMeulenaere’s research employs participatory action and narrative inquiry methods and draws extensively from critical theory to examine how to create more effective and liberatory learning spaces.  The founding director of Clark’s award-winning Community, Youth, and Education Studies major, which engages undergraduates in community-engaged research, DeMeulenaere co-founded an innovative public high school in Oakland, California, that focused on social justice and increased academic outcomes for youth of color. Prior to joining the Clark faculty, he taught social studies and English in Oakland and San Francisco, California. DeMeulenaere is the co-author of “Reflections from the Field: How Coaching Made Us Better Teachers” and “The Activist Academic: Engaged Scholarship for Resistance, Hope and Social Change.”  He earned his Ph.D. at U.C. Berkeley’s Graduate School of Education.

Laurie Ross

Associate Dean of the Faculty

Laurie Ross is professor of community development and planning in Clark’s International Development, Community, and Environment Department. She engages in community-based action research on youth and gang violence, early childhood trauma, youth and young adult homelessness, and youth worker professional education, and collaborates with partners such as Worcester’s City Manager, Juvenile Probation, the Boys and Girls Club, Legendary Legacies, and the Worcester Community Action Council. Since 2000, Ross has directed the HOPE Coalition, a youth-adult partnership to reduce youth violence and substance use and promote positive mental health and youth leadership. She also serves on the boards of directors of the Worcester Youth Center and the Pernet Family Health Service. Ross received her Ph.D. in public policy from the University of Massachusetts Boston.