Paula Allen-Meares is currently Chancellor and John Corbally Presidential Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Dean Emeritus/Professor Emeritus of Social Work and Education at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Her research interests include school social work, the tasks and functions of social workers employed in educational settings and other organizational variables that influence service delivery; improving the mental health/health of poor children and adolescents of color; adolescent pregnancy, including repeat births among adolescents and young adults; health care utilization, and social integration factors which influence sexual behavior and parenthood; and maternal psychiatric disorders and their direct and indirect effects on parenting skills and developmental outcomes of offspring. In addition, she has published on such topics as conceptual framework for social work and research methodologies. She has served as Principal Investigator on a W.K. Kellogg Foundation Grant, entitled Global Program for Youth, and was Co-Principal Investigator of the NIMH Center on Poverty, Risk, and Mental Health. Dr. Allen-Meares serves as a board member of the New York Academy of Medicine and is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies (IOM).