Assistant Professor
Virginia Commonwealth University
Dr. Mer Francis, MSW, Ph.D. (pronouns: they / them), is a queer, disabled assistant professor with the VCU School of Social Work. Mer has 11+ years of licensed clinical practice experience in community mental and behavioral health, and this clinical work is the foundation for their research, activism, and teaching practice. Their research focuses on how people use their social networks to support their recovery from substance use disorders, and they are particularly interested in how people balance the complex factors of trauma, family history, and social networks as they navigate their recovery process. Mer also engages in community organizing and activism around harm reduction, housing access, and civil rights to improve how our system serves the needs of people who use drugs and alcohol. Mer is committed to educating the next generation of social work practitioners and scholars. They ground their teaching in trauma-informed practice in their classroom structure and teaching approach. Mer brings their clinical experience and extensive research experience into the classroom to help students connect complex theoretical and clinical concepts to real-world applications. Mer is a clinician and community organizer at heart, and continually seeks to bridge between research, teaching, clinical applications, and community needs in their work. Their work is strengths-based, trauma-responsive, and focused on anti-racism and social justice. They believe that radical, transformative change happens when we create spaces where we can be our authentic, whole selves in our work, and they are dedicated to creating those spaces in all of their work.
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