Professor Simpkins named 2021 Society for Research in Child Development Mentor

The Society for Research in Child Development’s Towards 2044: Horowitz Early Career Scholar Program named Professor Sandra Simpkins a 2021 Horowitz Program Mentor. Simpkins is one of ten mentors to be selected nationwide to the program’s inaugural cohort.
 
As a mentor, Simpkins will provide educational and professional development for a scholar from an underrepresented group. The pair will engage in a series of monthly seminars and meet in one-on-one sessions through December 2021, giving the emerging scholar a launching point for a career in the field of child development.
 
“I am honored to support early career scholars,” Simpkins said. “It is one of the greatest joys of being a professor.”

​Simpkins is a developmental psychologist, studying child and adolescent development. She researches how families, friendships, and social position factors (such as ethnicity and culture) shape adolescents’ organized after-school activities and motivation. 

Sandra Simpkins

She is currently working on research focused on the positive outcomes of youth’s participation in activities as well as the predictors and correlates of high school students’ STEM motivational beliefs. ​She is PI on grants from the John Templeton Foundation and the National Science Foundation to support positive development from childhood through young adulthood. Simpkins directs the Center for After School and Summer Excellence (CASE) and Project REACH and co-directs the After School Activities Project.
 
The Frances Degan Horowitz Millennium Scholars Program (MSP), developed in 1999, encourages and supports scholars from under-represented ethnic/racial groups from North America in pursuing graduate work in developmental science. The program changed its name to Towards 2044: Horowitz Early Career Scholar Program in 2021. The updated name identifies the year when the adult population of the United States is estimated to become a diverse majority.