Julie Tippens

Julie Tippens is a community-engaged researcher specializing in global health and an assistant professor in the Department of Child, Youth and Family Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Her work broadly focuses on the intersections of migration, resilience and structural vulnerability. Specifically, Tippens examines how refugees build psychosocial and emotional resilience in the context of forced migration.

She has spent more than a decade working as a practitioner and researcher with refugees in both the United States and Kenya. She is interested in the translation of research findings to improve refugees’ well-being both locally and globally.

Prior to joining UNL, Tippens completed her doctoral training in maternal and child health and medical anthropology at the University of Arizona. She uses this interdisciplinary background to blend qualitative inquiry with quantitative measures in her research.

Her most recent project centered on how Congolese refugees coped with sociopolitical violence in Nairobi, Kenya. She was funded by the David L. Boren Fellowship. Tippens retains close contacts in Kenya, and she is in the process of expanding her work to include additional locations and refugee populations in the United States and East Africa. She is particularly interested in research that explores intergenerational resilience in conflict-affected families, households, and communities.

In her spare time, Tippens can be found drinking coffee, traveling, taking photographs and spending time with her spouse, Mohamed, and dog, Desmond.

D.P.H. in Maternal and Child Health, University of Arizona, 2016
M.P.H. in Social and Behavioral Health, Temple University, 2008
M.A. in International Peace and Conflict Resolution, Arcadia University, 2006
B.A. in English Literature, Fordham University, 2001