Research Advisory Group

Leading marriage experts, state government officials, and highly respected researchers from across the nation comprise the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative Research Advisory Group. The purpose of this group is to provide professional expertise to guide research efforts and to apply findings to the development of future programs and services. The annual meeting brings together some of the most exceptional thinkers in the fields of marriage education, family structure and dynamics, low-income families, and public policy. Members are professionally and personally enriched by their time together through discussions about innovative ideas and projects, policy, and research. The group was created in 2001 and has consisted of the same core members throughout the years.

OMI Research Advisory Group Members:

Paul Amato, PhD - Pennsylvania State University
Bill Coffin, MA – National Association for Relationship and Marriage Education
Ronald B. Cox, Jr., PhD, CFLE - Oklahoma State University
Kathryn Edin, PhD - Harvard University
David Fournier, PhD – Oklahoma State University, Emeritus
Sarah Halpern-Meekin, PhD - Bowling Green State University
Ron Haskins, PhD - Brookings Institution
Alan J. Hawkins, PhD – Brigham Young University
Christine Johnson, PhD - Oklahoma State University
Pamela Jordan, PhD, RN - University of Washington
Howard Markman, PhD - University of Denver
Theodora Ooms, MSW – Marriage and Family Policy Expert
Galena K. Rhoades, PhD - University of Denver
Scott Stanley, PhD - University of Denver

OMI Research Advisory Group Ex Officio Members:

Mary Myrick, APR - Public Strategies
Howard Hendrick, Former Director - Oklahoma Department of Human Services

Paul Amato, PhD – Pennsylvania State University

Paul R. Amato is the Arnold and Bette Hoffman Professor of Family Sociology and Demography at Pennsylvania State University. His research interests include the causes and consequences of divorce, marital quality, and psychological well-being over the life course. He has published numerous journal articles and book chapters, along with four books, including A Generation at Risk: Growing up in an Era of Family Upheaval (Harvard University Press, 1997) and Alone Together: How Marriage in America is Changing (Harvard University Press, 2007). He received the Reuben Hill Award from the National Council on Family Relations for the best published article on the family in 1993, 1999, 2001, and 2008. He also received the Distinguished Career Award from the Family Section of the American Sociological Association, the Stanley Cohen Distinguished Research Award from the American Association of Family and Conciliation Courts, the Ernest Burgess Distinguished Career Award from the National Council on Family Relations, and the Distinction in the Social Sciences Award from the Pennsylvania State University. In 2010 he was elected chair of the Family Section of the American Sociological Association, and in 2011 he was elected president of the National Council on Family Relations.
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Bill Coffin, MA – National Association for Relationship and Marriage Education (NARME)

Bill Coffin is a Senior Consultant working with the National Association for Relationship and Marriage Education (NARME) and the CA Healthy Marriages Coalition. Earlier in 2011 he was the Executive Director of a small nonprofit--IDEALS--the Institute for the Development of Emotional and Life Skills. From 2002-2010 Bill was the Special Assistant for Marriage Education at the Administration for Children and Families in HHS. He spent most of the previous 3 decades working for the Navy, initially on active duty and then as a civilian in the Navy's Family Support Program Headquarters in DC. Bill has served as the Marriage Preparation Coordinator for the Archdiocese of Washington and as a consultant to the U.S. Bishops Committee on Marriage and Family Life. He co-authored a book chapter on Preventive Interventions for Couples and now has a daily online newsletter http://scoop.it/narme. Bill is a 1968 graduate of Fairfield University in CT and has two master's degrees, one in Human Relations, the other in Counseling. .
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Ronald B. Cox, Jr., PhD, CFLE – Oklahoma State University

Dr. Cox is the Interim Director at the Center for Family Risk and Resilience at Oklahoma State University and an Assistant Professor/Family Science State Specialist at Oklahoma State University. His research focuses on high risk adolescent behavior, couple relationships, and Latino families. Dr. Cox’s areas of study include Family and Child Ecology, Marriage and Family Therapy, and Psychology. Cox’s work has been published in numerous peer-reviewed publications including the Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, BMC Pediatrics, the Journal of Relationship and Couple Therapy, the Journal of Feminist Family Therapy and Contemporary Family Therapy. He has delivered dozens of presentations for local, national and international audiences. Dr. Cox has also investigated and co-investigated a number of significant grants.
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Kathryn Edin, PhD - Harvard University

Dr. Edin is Professor of Public Policy and Management at Harvard University - John F Kennedy School of Government. Edin's research interests include urban poverty and family life, social welfare, housing policy, child support, non-marital childbearing, and the economic lives of the poor. She was Co-Principal Investigator for "Couple Dynamics and Father Involvement," a qualitative study of 75 low-income married and unmarried couples with young children in Chicago, Milwaukee, and New York City, an offshoot of the Fragile Families study. She authored “Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Put Motherhood Before Marriage in 2005 (with Maria Kefalas), and “Unmarried Couples with Children” in 2007 (with Paula England). Forthcoming work includes two new books, “Fragile Fatherhood: What Being a Daddy Means in the Lives of Low Income Men” (with Timothy Nelson), and “Marginal Men: Work, Policy, and Family Life among Poor Noncustodial Fathers” (with Timothy Nelson and Laura Lein). She has consulted with the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative on the development and implementation of the innovative Family Expectations program for new and expectant parents.
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David Fournier, PhD – Oklahoma State University, Emeritus

Dr. Fournier recently retired as Professor of Family Science and Marriage and Family Therapy at Oklahoma State University, where he developed expertise in areas of marriage preparation, premarital relationships, marital conflict, early marital adjustment, systems theory applied to family dynamics, marriage and family assessment and therapy. He is co-author of PREPARE/ENRICH, an assessment tool for couples, and through that work he has trained hundreds of professionals to deliver marriage education services. He regularly lends his expertise in the ENRICH inventory to the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative’s “Thriving Marriages” retreats for high-need couples.
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Sarah Halpern-Meekin, PhD – University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee

Sarah Halpern-Meekin, an assistant professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, earned her doctorate in sociology and social policy at Harvard University. Her dissertation research examined the relationship views and skills of high school students, specifically focusing on the ability of high school-based relationship and marriage education courses to affect those attitudes and abilities. Her additional areas of research focus on family structure, adolescence, and government assistance programs, such as the Earned Income Tax Credit. She received the Best Graduate Student Paper Award in the Family Section of the American Sociological Association. She earned her undergraduate degree at Brandeis University.
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Ron Haskins, PhD - Brookings Institution

Dr. Haskins is a Senior Fellow of Economic Studies and Co-Director of the Welfare Reform and Beyond Initiative at the Brookings Institution. He is also a Senior Consultant at the Annie E. Casey Foundation in Baltimore, MD. From February 2002, Ron was the Senior Advisor to the President for Welfare Policy at the White House. Prior to joining Brookings and Casey, he spent 14 years on the staff of the House Ways and Means Human Resources Subcommittee, first as welfare counsel to the Republican staff, then as the subcommittee's staff director. In addition, Ron has authored many books and articles on the subject of welfare and welfare reform. Previously Ron served as a Research Professor at the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Center at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
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Alan J. Hawkins, PhD – Brigham Young University

Alan J. Hawkins is a professor of Family Life at Brigham University in Provo, Utah. He earned a PhD in Human Development and Family Studies at Pennsylvania State University in 1990. Professor Hawkins’ scholarship and outreach focuses on educational and policy interventions to help couples form and sustain healthy marriages and relationships. He is widely cited for his work that examines the overall effectiveness of marriage and relationship education. In 2002-2003, he was a visiting scholar with the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families (U.S. Department of Health & Human Services), working on the Federal Healthy Marriage Initiative. He was the Research Director of the National Healthy Marriage Resource Center from 2004-2006. He currently serves as Chair of the Utah Healthy Marriage Initiative. He is a member of the Texas Healthy Marriage Initiative, the National Advisory Committee for the National Center for Families and Marriage Research at Bowling Green State University, and the National Center for African American Marriages and Families at Hampton University.
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Howard Hendrick, Former Director - Oklahoma Department of Human Services

Howard H. Hendrick was the director of the Oklahoma Department of Human Services from July 1, 1998 to February 29th, 2012. With offices in all 77 counties, Director Hendrick led a staff of 7,500 employees and administered a $1.6 billion budget. Hundreds of thousands of Oklahomans are touched daily by more than 40 state and federal human services programs administered under his leadership. Director Hendrick has previously served as Cabinet Secretary for Human Services for former Democratic Governor Brad Henry as well Cabinet Secretary for Health and Human Services for former Republican Governor Frank Keating. Before being named Director, Hendrick served 12 years as a member of the Oklahoma State Senate, representing parts of northwest Oklahoma City, Bethany, Yukon and Warr Acres. During his tenure, he amassed a career roll-call voting record in excess of 99 percent.
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Christine Johnson, PhD - Oklahoma State University

Dr. Johnson is the Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Studies in the College of Human Environmental Sciences at Oklahoma State University and Associate Professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Science. She specializes in research methodology and design, including program evaluation and needs assessment. Her research interests include marital relations, adolescent adjustment, and research methodologies. In this capacity Johnson has designed and implemented several studies on marriage and romantic relationships. Examples of such projects include the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative “Statewide Baseline Survey on Marriage and Divorce in Oklahoma”, “Marriage and Divorce in Utah – Statewide Survey”, and “Transition to Parenthood: Oklahoma Couples Having a Baby Funded by Medicaid”. She was awarded the 2002 Excellence in Program Evaluation Award by the American Evaluation Association (Extension Education Evaluation Group). Dr. Johnson was the founding Director of the OSU Bureau for Social Research which provides resources and technical services for facilitating social and behavioral science studies sponsored by public and private organizations, as well as the OSU community.
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Pamela Jordan, PhD, RN -University of Washington

Dr. Jordan is an Associate Professor of Family and Child Nursing at the University of Washington and developer of the Becoming Parents Program. Her research focuses on the transition to parenthood and supporting individuals and couples as they become parents. She has developed a middle range theory of the experience of expectant and new fatherhood, and her work with fathers continues to inform the care of men as they become parents. The Becoming Parents Program, for couples becoming parents for the first time, teaches knowledge and survival skills for taking care of their couple relationship, taking care of themselves, relating to their baby, and dealing with the many ways becoming parents impacts their lives.
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Howard Markman, PhD - University of Denver

Dr. Markman is a professor of Psychology and Co-Director of the Center for Marital and Family Studies at the University of Denver in Colorado. He is internationally known for his work on the prediction and prevention of divorce and the effects of destructive conflict, healthy marriages and relationship distress on mental health and well-being. He has published numerous scholarly articles, books and chapters on his work, including the book, "Fighting for Your Marriage: Positive Steps for Preventing Divorce and Preserving a Lasting Love." As a Co-Founder of the research-based PREP approach he has appeared nationally on many network programs. Howard and his colleagues are evaluating adaptations of the PREP program in Norway and the US Army and are engaged in a study examining the circumstances in which cohabitation is a risk factor for future relationship problems.
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Mary Myrick, APR - Public Strategies

Ms. Myrick is the President of Public Strategies, an Oklahoma-based firm, and Project Manager for the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative (OMI). The OMI is widely recognized as the country's first statewide, comprehensive program model for changing a state's relationship culture and creating/providing services to reflect a broad-based commitment to family formation and marriage and relationship education. Under Myrick's leadership the OMI recruited a highly-distinguished Research Advisory Board consisting of state and national experts on marriage, divorce, and low-income families; developed and implemented the first comprehensive statewide survey to assess marriage/divorce values and demographics; is implementing a multi-sector and statewide service strategy, collaborating with multiple state agencies and private providers, and utilizing the research-based PREP as its core curriculum. Myrick speaks nationally about the successful OMI model and has provided technical assistance to numerous states and communities committed to implementing their own marriage initiatives.
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Theodora Ooms, MSW – Marriage and Family Policy Expert

Ms. Ooms has served as a consultant to numerous programs in areas of understanding family policy and strategic outreach to policymakers. From 1999-2007 she was a senior policy analyst at the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP), where she worked on couples and marriage policy, with a special focus on low-income families, and twice testified before the U.S. Congress. Between 1981 and 1999 she was the executive director of the Family Impact Seminar (FIS), a nonpartisan policy research institute based in Washington, DC. Prior to 1976, Ooms worked as a clinical social worker, family therapist, and program administrator in New Haven and Philadelphia. Ms. Ooms has conducted studies on teenage pregnancy and parenthood, unwed fathers, family involvement in schools, and couples and marriage. In 1998 Ooms launched a new program of activities designed to identify strategies to strengthen marriage and held a national roundtable meeting on this topic. Since 1999, as an independent consultant, Ms. Ooms has provided technical assistance to community and state marriage initiatives in Greater Grand Rapids, Baltimore, Louisiana, and Oklahoma.
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Galena K. Rhoades, PhD - University of Denver

Ms. Rhoades is a Senior Researcher for the Center for Marital and Family Studies in the Psychology Department at the University of Denver. Her research on romantic relationship development and functioning, and the related implications for children and adults, includes studies of cohabitation, mechanisms of change in couple interventions, infidelity, spouses’ perceptions of one another, relationship processes and psychopathology, as well as adolescent adjustment. A practicing psychologist, she collaborates with PREP, Inc., in the development of relationship education curricula (e.g., Within My Reach and Within Our Reach), teaching graduate courses and supervising doctoral students on their therapy cases in the Psychology Department.
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Scott Stanley, PhD - University of Denver

Dr. Stanley is arguably the nation’s leading research expert in areas of commitment, communication, conflict, confidence, risk factors of divorce, couple development, and the prevention of marital distress. He is a research professor and co-director of the Center for Marital and Family Studies at the University of Denver, and has published widely in terms of journal articles and book chapters, including numerous studies and publications on the subject of cohabitation. Stanley has authored or co-authored various books including “Fighting for Your Marriage,” “The Power of Commitment,” and “The Heart of Commitment.” He is co-author of widely used and highly researched curriculum products for both couples and individuals, including PREP®, Within My Reach, Within Our Reach and On My Shoulders. Scott is a marriage expert for www.twoofus.org, a consumer website providing relevant resources to providers of marriage and relationship education services. He is also a Senior Program Advisor to the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative.
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Notes About the Group:

In addition to the core members of the group, other experts participate due to our affiliation with two federal evaluation studies, Building Strong Families (BSF) and Supporting Healthy Marriage (SHM). We have added to the group representatives of the firms tasked with providing the evaluation, including Robin Dion, MA, and Alan Hershey, MPA, of Mathematica Policy Research have provided insights from the BSF study, while Ginger Knox, Ph.D., and Barb Goldman, Ph.D. of MDRC have represented SHM. Further, each year additional experts and scholars are invited to participate based on research trends and identified areas of programmatic improvement.
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A special tribute to Norval Glenn and Steve Nock for their significant contributions to the field and lasting imprints on the groundbreaking work in Oklahoma. Though each has passed away, he will be remembered as an irreplaceable member of the Research Advisory Group. We are thankful to have shared in their knowledge and life for many years.