Team and Partners

Mobile Voice Project Team Members 

The Mobile Voice Team is led by Dr. Amanda Matson, a graduate of the North Carolina State University (NCSU) Psychology in the Public Interest Program, and composed of undergraduate research assistants from NCSU.  Our primary community partner is the Women's Center of Wake County whose staff and clients we work with daily as part of our project.  We also worked with women from the Helen Wright Center for Women and Healing Place of Wake County.  We are a member of the Capital Area Friends of Transit.  MVP is always reaching out to other local organizations and local government agencies to work on ways we can improve the mobility experiences of all citizens in Raleigh, NC and the surrounding area.

MVP Team Members  

Matson

  Amanda Matson, PhD, Primary Investigator.  Amanda became passionate about transportation equity as a result of years of working with low-income women and personal experiences as a pedestrian and transit-rider. She created the Mobile Voice Project for her dissertation research in the Psychology in the Public Interest Program at North Carolina State University. The idea for the need for the Mobile Voice intervention grew out of what she learned from the experiences of the clients and staff at the Women’s Center of Wake County. The intervention itself is based upon several different areas of research and advocacy, including research on: factors affecting transportation access, the value of using photography to stimulate critical discussion, and the use of feminist interventions geared toward empowering women through supportive relationships with one another. Amanda hopes that the Mobile Voice Project will empower groups of women to change their circumstances through action efforts at the individual, group, organizational, and community-wide levels!

Williams

Teshanee Williams, Research Assistant.  Teshanee is a senior majoring in Psychology at NC State.  She works on-site at the Women's Center leading sessions, recruiting, and receiving materials as well as many hours doing data entry and study reminders.  She decided to get involved in the Mobile Voice project to gain hands on experience while making a difference. She is particularly interested in research related to substance abuse treatment and habit forming behavior. She plans to apply to grad school for the fall of 2014 to study Community Psychology.

Churchill

  Mary Churchill, Research Assistant.  Mary is a junior in Psychology at N.C. State. She works on-site at the Women's Center leading sessions, recruiting and receiving materials.  She became interested in women’s issues from her volunteer work at Interact and was interested in expanding her knowledge regarding women’s transportation. She has used public transportation since she was sixteen and felt as though Raleigh’s public transit system has been been in need of additional resources. She hopes that through work with the MVP project, the transportation in Raleigh can be altered to help women travel around the city with less obstacles.




MVP Partners

The Women's Center of Wake County

The participants of the study are primarily recruited from The Women's Center of Wake County. The group intervention takes place on site. The Women's Center of Wake County provides services to women in the surrounding community, addressing the critical needs of homeless single women and those with children. The center seeks to help clients through a strengths-based approach to well-being (not dissimilar to MVP's intervention approach). The underlying goals of the agency include:

• Increased housing stability for clients
• Decreased substance and alcohol abuse and/or dependency
• Improved functioning of parental roles
• Increased community resources
• Decreased psychological stress and/or trauma.

Helen Wright Center for Women

Participants are also recruited from the Helen Wright Center for Women, and sessions are sometimes conducted there as well.  The Helen Wright Center for Women (HWCW), an arm of the Urban Ministries of Wake County, works to reduce homelessness by providing temporary housing and support services to promote independence. This includes:

• transitional shelter for about 300 homeless women annually
• offering basic needs and case management to help homeless women move toward independence and permanent housing
• special programs such as yoga, women’s support group, game nights and workshops for life skills, job readiness, home ownership, self-esteem and health-related issues
• providing a safe and supportive environment for women in crisis

Member:

Capital Area Friends of Transit

The Capital Area Friends of Transit (CAFT) is a Wake County based alliance of over 40 local and state organizations, more than 100 civic leaders and thousands of citizens who support a plan for regional public transit in the Triangle.  CAFT supports the Wake County Transit Plan as it is the final component of the regional vision for expanded, enhanced multi-modal transportation system.
CAFT supports public education about transit and encourages civic engagement in promoting plans for regional and local transit.