Friday, April 7, 2023

Season 2, Episode 7:

Bringing the Couch to the Community

In today’s episode, we’re talking with Community Psychologist Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier about bringing the couch to the community in public health.

Season 2, Episode 7: Bringing the Couch to the Community

by Dr. Joyee Washington and Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier

Introduction

Welcome to the Public Health Joy podcast, the safe space for real and honest conversation about what building a public health research career is really like: the challenges, the triumphs, and all the lessons we learn along the way.

I’m your host, Dr. Joyee, a Public health researcher, PhD survivor, and entrepreneur. In today’s episode, we’re talking with Community Psychologist Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier about bringing the couch to the community in public health.

This is where research meets relationship and together, we will find our Public Health Joy!  

Notes

Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Health Policy and Behavioral Sciences in the School of Public Health at Georgia State University. His research and services incorporate community psychology and community-based participatory approaches to provide program development, implementation and evaluation strategies to organizations and agencies serving historically marginalized populations. He facilitates program evaluation trainings and academic-community collaborations to address social determinants of health, self-efficacy building, and cultural/emotional intelligence awareness. His partnerships have created opportunities to engage with a local grant foundation, various nonprofits across multiple states, and the CDC to produce sustainable deliverables. He brings joy to his classes by facilitating learning, program development and evaluation experience, leadership prowess, and community-based participatory research approach expertise.

To connect with Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier email jcormier1@gsu.edu.

Check out the book “Identity Orchestration: Black Lives, Balance and the Psychology of Self-Stories”

If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate and, leave a review! For more information on transforming public health research into positive community impact, visit https://joyeewashington.com

Timestamps

0:00 Introduction

2:00 Dr. Cormier’s background in public health

3:00 What is community psychology? What does it mean to bring the couch to the community?

13:00 Ten essential public health services

15:00 Decision makers and power dynamics

20:00 The problem with a deficit mindset in research

27:00 Putting the community first

32:00 What brings you joy  

TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:48] JW: All right, we’re going to go ahead and get started. I am super excited because on The Public Health Joy Podcast today, we have Dr. Cormier. Did I pronounce that correctly? Cormier?

 

[00:00:58] JCC: Yes, yes.

 

[00:00:59] JW: Okay. Because I know when we first met, and Dr. Cormier, for those who are listening, is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Public Health at Georgia State University and a Research Consultant. We first met – someone had referred me to speak to your class, right? So, we met and we talked a little bit, and being able to speak with your class, every email you’ve had at the end, how to pronounce your name, cor-mi-a, like the actual pronun – I was like, “You know what, I need to do that.” Because when people see J-O-Y-E-E, they’re like, “Did you mean to put a C there? Is it supposed to be Joyce?”

 

[00:01:42] JCC: Oh, no, they didn’t try you like that.

 

[00:01:45] JW: Supposed to be Joyce?

 

[00:01:45] JCC: I thought it was Joyee, so I’m part of the problem too, but I want to be part of the solution.

 

[00:01:50] JW: That’s fine. It’s fine. So, I appreciate it. Every time I say, Dr. Cormier, I’m like cor-mi-a, remember seeing the pronunciation. But that’s kind of a little bit about just how we met and being able to speak to your class was an absolute joy. I love being able to do that. We talked about public health careers. We talked about public health research. We talked about all the things. So, that was super cool to have that opportunity with you. Why don’t you go ahead and tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do?

 

[00:02:20] JCC: Yes, thank you so much, Dr. Washington for having me on this joyous day. Again, I’m Dr. Jacque-Corey Cormier, a clinical assistant professor at the School of Public Health. My background is and community psychology, earned my Ph.D. from Georgia State University, then community psychology. I earned my Master’s from Georgia Southern University, and I’m a Morehouse man. So, I did all psychology, all the way through which we are going to talk about things you would change. I bring that backup, but I was always public health adjacent. Though I didn’t use that term. I was always steering my practicums, my assignments to addressing individual or community health. Here I am now, in the School of Public Health, the same building as psychology, so I didn’t have to change buildings.

 

[00:03:13] JW: You mentioned public health adjacent. I think that’s such an interesting term. Because in our field, we talk about how public health isn’t everything, right? So, just thinking about how public health is adjacent and related to everything. You talk about psychology, and can you tell us a little bit about – I read on your LinkedIn profile, that you’re in specifically, community psychology. So, for those of us who may not be as familiar with the term, what is community psychology, and how is that related to public health?

 

[00:03:45] JCC: Community psychology and public health are so much intertwined, that of course, they did it after I got my degree. But Georgia State University now has a dual program where you can earn your Master’s of Public Health degree, now that will be your master’s, and then you transition into the community psychology Ph.D. program.

 

So, there’s so much overlap. I mean, faculty know each other. I believe I took an urban health seminar when I was in grad school and community psychology. Fun way that like to say it is people think about clinical and counseling psychology, right? You’re sitting on someone’s couch, working through problems, you’re helping that person work through past, present, and future, and then you send them on their way. But that’s an individual model of addressing mental health.

 

Similar to how medicine is the individual and public health is the, well, community level. Community psychology came out of clinical psychology because in the late sixties, we have a lot of different social justice movements, civil rights movement, and people began to say, “Hey, yes, clinical psychology is awesome, but how can we address these higher level issues so that we don’t have a lot of these different individuals with the similar traumas.” So, I describe it as community psychology, instead of individuals coming into the shrink’s office and sitting on the couch and dealing with problems, we bring the couch to the community. We train individuals on how to listen to each other’s problems so that they can rotate who sits on the couch.

 

That’s all metaphorical. It’s not literal. Clinical. But community psychology is interested and focused on social interventions, advocacy, promoting, pro-social and positive health actions on a community level. So again, medicine, public health, clinical psychology, community psychology. So, when someone’s interested in program evaluations, they want to help create programs that are more efficient, are more culturally aligned. So, you just take your program from one community, and you modify it to be relevant to another community to increase its efficacy, that aspect are things one will learn in their community psychology program. Logic models, grant proposals, program development, implementation, evaluation, needs assessments for communities, working to mobilize and empower communities to enact change themselves.

 

A lot of it is rooted and recognizing the ecological model that an individual is more than just himself. The reason that person doesn’t jog every afternoon could be that they don’t have sidewalks. So, recognizing that there’s these larger levels of impact on an individual’s actions.

 

[00:06:42] JW: You just dropped a whole lot of stuff. In those few minutes, I know I just learned a whole bunch of stuff, because I was not familiar with community psychology until I met you. I think hearing that phrase of bringing the couch to the community, to me, as a health educator and as a public health researcher, kind of speaks to that phrase when we say we’re meeting people where they are. So, just thinking about how do we meet the needs of our communities, both in psychology, in mental health, in public health, and modifying like you say, meeting their needs, and building programs and evaluations, and all of those types of things across different communities is so important, and doing it from a psychological approach and public health, from a psychological perspective, and how we work in our communities.

 

So, how did you even get into communities? I know you talked about being in psychology kind of throughout your educational career, but how did you even get into psychology and even more specifically, community psychology?

 

[00:07:46] JCC: I was fortunate enough to be in a Scholars Program at Morehouse College called the John H. Hopps Juniors Scholars Program funded by the Department of Defense, and the goal was to increase the number of black men who pursue and receive degrees. So, that scholars program really carved out time and put me on the path to recognize, “Okay, you’re majoring in psychology, do you want to do counseling? Because if you don’t want to counseling in psychology, the other route is pretty much research, or at least going to grad school for research.” So, I grew up watching Frasier and then would see Cheers on Nick At Nite or whatnot, but I was really –

 

[00:08:32] JW: Wait. Wait. Wait. Some people might not know Nick At Nite. We might have to explain. We’re a little older.

 

[00:08:41] JCC: Come sit on grandpa’s lap, let me tell you. But Cheers and Frasier was this character, Frasier Crane, he was a psychiatrist. He was more in the Freudian sort of stuff. But the fact that he was diving into not only others but himself with regard to his behaviors, was really interesting to me. So, I knew I wanted to do maybe like social psychology. Recognizing how someone’s appearance background, attitudes, and all those features impacts how people interact with them. And that was just really interesting to me.

 

So, I’m doing the scholars program, I’m getting involved in research. We focus on personality psychology, so identity orchestration. And then, I go to Georgia, Southern, true blue. Hail southern, for my Master’s in Experimental Psychology. So, getting more experience, setting up experiments, right? Student comes in. One student sees this situation, and you’re asked questions on the survey, and now the student sees another situation.

 

When I was working on my master’s thesis, I still remember that moment. When you’re working with real data, it wasn’t my first time, but it was my thesis so it felt really big. And that time, when you enter in the data, and you see that P equals R less than 0.05. For those don’t know, that means that the conditions you looked at were actually a different outcome. I was looking at how the physical appearance of a black male impacts people’s opinions regarding how he should be treated in the legal system.

 

So, when I’m running this data, and I see that P less than 0.05, I literally, “Yes”, in this sterile, cold, computer lab. I remember thinking, “Yeah, this is great. I did find that these differences exist.” But I was really thinking after you present it at a conference, or write up an article, how is that helping the individuals whose faces I was using for this study? I remember I took Intro to Community Psychology class at Morehouse College, and I didn’t remember much. But I started looking into it, because some of the articles that I was looking for, for my thesis, were faculty who were in community psych programs, and applied to Georgia State for their community psych program.

 

I did get accepted to a Social Psychology Ph.D. program and other institution, but really weighing out what do I want for my career, because I’m a service-oriented person grew up, doing food pantry, doing community service in our community, and seeing people as people, and recognizing hard times fall on everybody. So, I was going to do service anyway. But if I can incorporate these elements of service, but at a higher level, so instead of passing out food. I’m now doing the evaluation of that program. I am mobilizing communities to partner with the Atlanta Community Food Bank or something like that. Maybe that’s what I want to do for my career.

 

So, I made a decision to go into community psychology. While I was here, I was very public health adjacent with regards to some of the practicums and experiences I created for myself, and here I am.

 

[00:12:04] JW: Yes. I think, one of the things that you stated there resonated with me, it was like being excited in the lab and getting that significance value. I think being in the lab for me, and I came from a background of biomedical sciences. So, doing experiments, and like I said, the lab is cool, but it’s cold. It’s very objective, like you’re looking for specific things. You are focused on doing things in a very particular way and there’s something that happens, I think, for a lot of us. I don’t know if there’s a moment of enlightenment or awakening, but you’re like, “Yo, this is cool. But who is this really helping? And who is going to really benefit?”

 

I know, I had that kind of point as well. Looking at diabetes, we were learning about diabetes, and I was like, “Okay, well, who’s going to benefit from all this great information? Are we going to help people who are living with diabetes with this information? Or Are we just going to let it stay in the lab? What’s happening?” So, that gets into what do we do with our research? How do we help communities with our research? And where does it go? I know we talked a little bit about or a lot about, really, about community empowerment. When we’re talking about public health, when we’re talking about community psychology, and all of the things. So, what does it really look like to nurture and foster community empowerment through research?

 

[00:13:31] JCC: With ten 10 essential public health services, they’re broken up into three core functions. Assessment, policy development, and assurance. They’ve been recently revised in 2020 to have equity as the center of the pinwheel so that equity touches in all of the essential services. But nonetheless, there’s two parts of those essential services. And I’m going to still reach for my intro book, because we just talked about it, but I’m going to say it now and then get clarity in a second. But part of the policy development core function, there is empowering communities, mobilizing communities. So, championing and empowering communities and mobilizing communities. Those are 2 of the 10 essential public health functions and yes, strengthen, support, and mobilize communities in partnerships. That’s one central function by itself. And then the other one is create, champion, and implement policy plans and laws.

 

So, when we think about community psych and doing work in the community, this is essential to what public health is, as a service, and is part of the functions of policy development, because we can’t create effective policies if we don’t have the input of the community. That’s the only way it becomes effective. Just metaphorically speaking, prohibition happened and then you have rumrunners. And then that made the whole underground criminal enterprise that we know from Al Capone and all that type of folks. But did they really have input from the community regarding prohibition to make sure that it will be effective laws, right? And then we struck it down afterwards.

 

So, really thinking about – and you can even do this within your community, within your household, within your PTSAs, or whatnot. Yes, it’s great to say you want to ban X, Y, and Z from schools, or you want to ban X, Y, and Z within your district. But is that you and people on your side of it? Or are you actually talking to everyday community members in a diverse range of those community members?

 

[00:15:45] JW: It’s really getting to a point of looking at who are the decision makers, and who’s in power. Who has the power to make the decisions? I think when it comes to public health research, we have to get to a point where we recognize that, of course, research traditionally, has put communities at a disadvantage when it comes to power. But that doesn’t mean that power doesn’t exist in our communities. It is there. But it’s a matter of putting ourselves in a position where we put our communities at the forefront, and we prioritize them, and we make sure that not only are they decision makers, but they are actively engaging, leading, and driving whatever these initiatives are, and taking ownership of these problems, and the solutions, and being creative, and being brought into the process.

 

[00:16:40] JCC: Yes, definitely. Even in disenfranchised or underserved communities, our communities that have been historically marginalized and stigmatized, they might not have the financial means to open a new rec center, or to literally pave their own roads. But there are still resources and assets in those communities. A lot of times, it’s the people. It might be religious institutions. You partner with the church, and that’s how you first get input on what kind of data we need to collect. And then we have participants and contributors to that research.

 

I use the example sometimes with my public health classes with regards to community based and community-oriented research, “Hey, at Georgia State, I could say that I really want to get more bike racks, and I wanted to do research to show that there’s a need for more bike racks.” But if you survey students, it might be that it’s not bike racks they need, they might want more parking options, or more shallow transportation between the parking lots because some of our parking lots are a good walk away from main campus.

 

So, when you have input from those people who you plan to collect information from, now you have a better understanding. A lot of times, if someone were to look at community-based research articles, they’ll highlight that they came in thinking they were going to talk about depression. But really, the big issue is diabetes, or after school programs, or you want to come in and do bullying because it’s a hot topic for you. But really, what they want to address is gang violence or awareness of drug use and alcohol use or something like that.

 

So, a community researcher, a community psychologist has to come in and say, “Hey, I don’t know everything.” Sometimes it is beneficial to already have, this is what I want to do. Can I partner with you and create some sort of agreement with that? But then on the more community, participatory side of spectrum, that’s when you’re really seeing what people want, right? So, as a personal trainer, I was a fitness instructor with the gym during grad school. I did group fitness classes. So, I created those move sets, and they come in and do what I instructed because it’s a group fitness class.

 

Now, if I was doing personal training, more individual fitness, then I would want to know, “Hey, what are you interested in doing? Are you trying to build stamina? You want to build muscle mass? Are you trying to get faster? Is there some sort of goal you want to reach? Maybe you’re training for a 5k or something like that?” Then we get more individualized. So, when we think about if you’re trying to do community oriented or engaged research, then we want to make sure that we’re treating it more like a personal trainer, versus group fitness instruction.

 

[MESSAGE]

 

[00:19:44] JW: Building a public health research career can be tough, especially when you are trying to figure it out all on your own. I know firsthand how overwhelming that can be. That’s why I have put together this free guide that highlights the top five public health research careers that you never knew existed. Whether you are a student and recent grad, or even someone who’s looking to switch careers, this guide will give you a glimpse into some of the most rewarding, fulfilling, and interesting jobs in public health research.

 

To get your hands on this free guide, all you need to do is head over to my Instagram, @joyeewashington, click on the link in my bio, and click the button that says “get your freebie.” Make sure you enter your email address and I will send you an instant download link.

 

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[INTERVIEW CONTINUED]

 

[00:20:43] JW: The other thing that you mentioned is as researchers, and especially if you’ve been trying particularly in the hard sciences, before any realm of research, you get trained with such a deficit mindset and looking for what’s the problem? What is the problem that needs to be solved?

 

[00:21:02] JCC: What’s the differences between groups, right? We have to see that there’s a difference between white and black, or men and women, people who are on Medicaid, Medicare, versus private insurers, right?

 

[00:21:13] JW: That deficit mindset doesn’t work when you’re working with communities. It just doesn’t. So, you have to be a lot more open and a lot more humble in the process, and a lot more exploratory in saying, “Hey, I’m going in this community. Number one, I may not be a member of this community. I may not understand the things that this community understands. These community members are the experts, and I’m going to have to put myself in a position to listen.” As researchers, we’re trying to go look at the literature, right? Go look at the literature, go look at the data, that’s going to tell you most of what you need to know. But it’s a difference in what’s in the literature and living it, and what people are living with and living through.

 

So, we have to make sure that we don’t put the literature as a priority over what the people in that community are saying. Because every community is different, and just because the literature says that, like you said, bullying is the major problem across the nation, it doesn’t mean that that particular community is facing a problem with bullying. It may be something completely different.

 

[00:22:18] JCC: Oh, yes. You really touched on it. But even if you are, same demographics, “Oh, yeah, these are my people. I know what’s up.” It’s like, “Well, no.” I grew up in DeKalb County. I didn’t grew up in Fulton County. I APS. I didn’t grew up in South Atlanta. So, when I would partner with South Atlanta organizations, there is, of course, cultural tie ends and very similar and such. But like you said, the actual historical context. Turner Field that he built during the Olympics, and how a lot of things were built during the Olympics. But what that mean, for the people who are already in those spaces? You might not be from the areas that the Beltline has touched, but you live in similar communities. But again, you might not be privy to that history, and also communities relationships with higher education, and institutions.

 

I’ve had people say, “Hey, this other institution, they came, they saw, they conquered, and they’re presenting research at conferences, and we don’t know about it. They published and they just said it was some South Atlanta community and gave the income bracket or something like that and we were just data points.”

 

[00:23:34] JW: That is super harmful, and that creates barriers and breaks trust. And when you are a new researcher coming into their community, and they’re like, “Nah. Uh-uh. We’re not going for any of that, because we’ve already been through it.” So, when you are a new researcher coming into a new community, you have to spend time, building relationships with that community. And building relationships may look different, depending on who the community is. I know as researchers, we’re not usually trained in the field of building relationships with other people. We’re just like, get the data, get done, and go. But we have got to start changing the narrative on how we do things. Because I know in my experience, doing community-based participatory research, building relationships means going to the kids’ basketball games, or volleyball games, or showing up at church, or going to the cookout. That is your job as a researcher. You have to build those relationships.

 

[00:24:43] JCC: When I was doing practicums in grad school, I was doing things with the South Atlantic community. I went to the school bash for APS schools. I went to a couple events at the local rec center when I started forming a relationship with the YMCA, myself, and my cadre of student researchers. Our first couple of days we came, he was like, “Hey, we’re going to do PhotoVoice training, but not today. We’re just hanging out.” For me, I’m more of an extrovert, and I don’t mind being a stranger in the room.

 

So, I can see how for some people, especially those who lean into data, because they purposely don’t want to have to deal with people. I can see how that can seem pretty daunting. But it’s really about that angle. Again, there’s some research and for people who are more into the blood sample kind of research, or mouth swabs, or survey-based research, we’re not slamming those techniques. But even with survey based, mouth swabs, and blood samples, you probably want to build a relationship so that you don’t come off as bloodsuckers, right? You can have a lot more buy-in. I’ve been to after church service at some churches, and different community organizations during their after-school programs and such. Being a face that they recognize, you’re a newcomer, you don’t know this, you don’t know that. But even just being there and trying.

 

So, even if you’re thinking about collecting survey data, instead of just talking to the executive director, put as part of your plan that, “Oh, when we’re about to wrap it up when I’m about to give you this executive report, I wonder if you can make sure you schedule me in to give a presentation to the participants or people that your organization serves. I want them to see what it is we’re doing.” It doesn’t have to be a big bunch of data and p values on the screen. But really telling you about the process that happens because then you build people who feel empowered, they feel included, they feel heard, and they be more likely to take another survey, to engage in research, and then I start asking questions about you. So, where’s your IRB? I heard about this thing called the IRB, Institutional Review Board. Who’s the primary investigator? What do we get out of it besides the little $10 gift card?

 

[00:27:18] JW: Right. And it’s so important to put people first. Even though you’re doing research, even though you got to do this survey, they respond so much better when they know that you care. I’ve been on the phone, having to do surveys and call them Miss Suzy or whoever. And they say, “Oh, well, my daughter’s got surgery.” Or, “This thing is going on.” Or, “There’s a storm coming.” “Okay, well, we want you to be safe. We want you to – if this is a bad time, don’t worry about it. We’ll call you back later.”

 

But being in a position to put the people first, and when you’re in a position where you’re trying to get the surveys, you’re trying to get the data collected, you’re just trying to meet the deadlines, just trying to get the thing done. It’s like, “No people are more important than your deadlines. The grant will be okay. The deadlines will be okay. You will get it done.” But you have to spend the time to put the people and the relationships first and make that a priority.

 

[00:28:18] JCC: Yes, because just when you’re dealing with people, it’s one thing to run a bunch of iterations into a computer, fine. I’d say that some might feel that online surveys, maybe you have a thing on Facebook, where you find people in that demographic, and, “Hey, I’m giving them 20 bucks or $50 for their time”, there’s a reason why we have a pilot study sort of format. A lot of times with survey research, right? We’re not just trying to figure out how long it takes the survey, or the typos, or whatever. You should be really looking for feedback from these people to say, “Hey, based on how these questions are worded, what do you think we’re looking for? By taking the survey, did you think about other more pressing or salient problems, or concerns, or strengths in your community?” That can be worthwhile. So, I’d say especially for public health professionals, whether you’re an epidemiologist, you’re a bio statistician or health promoter, you have to make those numbers be what they really are, which are people. Representations of people.

 

[00:29:26] JW: Right. There is always meaning behind the data. And we never want to just stop at the numbers. We always want to take it further, and think about what does this really mean? What is this going to mean for the people, for this community? And then take it even further and say, “What does this mean for solutions? What does this mean for creating sustainable solutions in our community so that we can build healthier generations, and change the landscape of what we have known before? And make sure that communities are in a position that they won’t necessarily need us. They won’t necessarily need academia, or researchers, or the university there, they can be in a position to take care of some of these things on their own.” So, I think that’s important.

 

[00:30:14] JCC: Yes. Were you in the community psych program, because it’s funny you say the –

 

[00:30:22] JW: Not in community psych.

 

[00:30:23] JCC: When you said the, “Don’t need us anymore”, I remember distinctly, we had one of the classes, and it was an alumni panel. I remember how I felt when I heard it, because I was like, “What?” Because it sounds a little weird. But when people did say, you’re kind of trying to work yourself out of a job, because again, when you bring the metaphorical couch to the community, and you empower them with the tools, and resources and self-efficacy, to be able to address each other’s not only problems but to recognize and maintain the strengths and assets of a community and learn how to wield those to their benefit, what do they need you for? But then they followed it up by saying, “The good thing is that when you do a good job like that, there’s always something else on the horizon that they want to get you involved with.”

 

What I found in my personal experience of my practicums, which are for those who don’t know, they’re unpaid, intern work opportunities that you do to complete your Ph.D. But those things turned into consulting opportunities. They blossomed and transformed into different networking opportunities, where I would get an email, say, “Hey, such and such mentioned that you do these youth engage focus groups, and we have a youth-serving organization, can you come do that?” So, that was how I got my name around, and then that turned more into qualitative research approaches. And then that turned more into conducting PhotoVoice training. And now, being more into research, management training, where we’re talking about PhotoVoice, as not only a data collection tool but also its way for marketing and communication.

 

[00:32:15] JW: Speaking of that, and the transition of that work, I’m going to kind of wrap up and ask you this question. What brings you joy in the work that you do?

 

[00:32:26] JCC: I see what you did there. All right, so let’s talk my teaching first because I enjoy my engagement of community research. But there’s a reason I chose clinical professorship route is because I still get to teach. I’ve always loved the idea of providing people with not just knowledge, but application of that knowledge and opportunities to engage with the larger community. So, what brings me joy, is when I get emails from my community partners, or even from my students, and they say, “Thank you so much for these two students that had this semester. They really helped us out with X, Y, and Z. They’re really great. I look forward to another semester of getting students from Georgia State.” We haven’t had a relationship with Georgia State before, and to know that my students are getting real-world experience for their resume, but also, they’re contributing to an organization that now has a better rapport with Georgia State as a whole. And then, the people that they’re serving, the most important part. Either they’re helping out with the programs that are going on, or the services being provided, are they helping with the communication side of the organization, or helping them prepare for grants.

 

So, I had a couple students, my graduate students who helped a community organization get a somewhat large grant. So, to know that their work is going to have this ripple effect for people who they might not meet that aspect, that what brings me joy in my work, is knowing that at the root of it, it’s service, service for a higher purpose. I serve a higher power myself. But it’s more than showing up on volunteer day for me, which is something that I do anyway. So, to be able to incorporate that aspect into my work, it brings me joy, true joy.

 

[00:34:36] JW: I love that. If there are any students listening, I want you to hear application based, like we are looking for a program, we are going to grad school. If you’re interested in research and community based research, look for those programs and those opportunities that are going to allow you to get their real-world application, in a real world hands on experience because there’s nothing like it. There’s nothing like being able to work and engage with communities through research, and be able to experience what it’s like to do it.

 

[00:35:09] JCC: Because you’re on the find out that, yes, it looks great in the book, to say that this is how things are supposed to go, and these are the processes. But when you get into the real world, it’s not like that.

 

[00:35:21] JW: It’s not like that. Everything can go wrong at any time. Nothing goes the way you planned.

 

[00:35:31] JCC: No. Even just life happens. I mean, how many research projects were derailed by the endemic now of COVID-19? How many projects are derailed because the community they had, “We can’t meet with you today. We’re doing a candlelight vigil for someone in community who was tragically taken away from us. Our people’s heart on start.” There’s celebrations for different cultures and religions. So, just recognizing that it won’t be this perfect, “Okay, I come in the first day, I’m going to give out the surveys, and then I’m going to go back into the lab and analyze all this data.” There’s so much in between that.

 

[00:36:11] JW: Absolutely. Well, we appreciate you for talking with us today. And if people wanted to get in touch with you or talk more with you, get more information about Georgia State, how did they contact you?

 

[00:36:25] JCC: My double-edged sword about my name, honestly, Google me. I’ll pop. My Georgia State stuff will pop up. So, jcormier1@gsu.edu. That’s my current email. You can see my email online. Now, pet peeve, when you email me, make your subject line meaningful. Say kind of what you want, when. So, when I just looked at my phone, I can know kind of you want to talk about professional development, or community consulting, PhotoVoice process, anything like that.

 

I also – shameless plug – when I was talking about identity orchestration with my mentor at Morehouse College, Dr. David Wall Rice. This is his book, and I have a book chapter in it about self-efficacy and songwriting, how it ties into hip-hop artists identity expression, and it also includes a little activity to get your bar game up. So, check out this book. Identity Orchestration: Black Lives, Balance and the Psychology of Self-Stories.

 

[00:37:37] JW: Awesome. So, definitely go check out the book. Check out, Dr. Cormier. And this is going to wrap up The Public Health Joy Podcast.

 

[OUTRO]

 

[00:37:50] JW: I am so grateful for this time we got to spend together. If you enjoyed this episode, I need you to subscribe, rate, and leave a review. For more information on transforming public health research into positive community impact, visit www.joyeewashington.com. This is where research meets relationship. I’ll see you next time on The Public Health Joy Podcast.

 

[END]

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