We are pleased to announce that CSDE Director, Sara Curran, has been elected to serve as the North America Representative on the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population (IUSSP) Council for the 2026–2029 term. In this role, she will help guide IUSSP’s scientific agenda, foster collaboration among population researchers, and represent the interests of members across North America.

CSDE Affiliate Kristian Jones (Social Work) just published a new article, “Friends in Our Lives: Perspectives of Young People Who Participated in a Professional Mentoring Program,” in the Journal of Applied Youth Studies. Despite the emerging utilization of professional mentoring programs, little is known about the ideal characteristics of a professional mentor and young people’s experiences in these professional mentoring programs. Jones and co-authors interviewed 12 young people who participated in the same professional mentoring program in different regions of the United States.

CSDE Affiliate Mia M. Bennett (Geography) has released a new book, Unfrozen: The Fight for the Future of the Arctic, published by Yale University Press. Together with co-author Klaus Dodds, Bennett examines the state of the Arctic today–emphasizing the twin dangers of climate change and geopolitical competition. Unfrozen reveals how the region is becoming a space of experimentation for everything from Indigenous governance to subsea technologies.

CSDE Affiliate Maria Bleil (Child, Family, and Population Health Nursing) has been awarded an NIH grant “Improving health among disadvantaged girls to slow pubertal onset and reduce long-term health risks”, which tests whether positive health behavior change among prepubertal girls may lesson risk for earlier pubertal onset and associated cardiometabolic outcomes. Dr. Bleil has also been awarded, along with Dr. Rui Li (PI), an NIH grant “Understanding the role of early life social determinants and sex-specific pubertal pathways in the development of adolescent chronic pain”,

The Population Research Center at Portland State University, directed by CSDE External Affiliate Ethan Sharygin (Portland State University), has published a resource guide for finding federal data during the shutdown. These sources include Census Reporter, Esri, PolicyMap, IPUMS, NHGIS, and the Data Rescue Project Portal.

CSDE Affiliates Hyun-Jun Kim (Social Work) and Karen Fredriksen-Goldsen (Social Work), along with co-authors Hailey H. Jung and Austin Oswald, published an article in Social Science & Medicine, on “Intersectional Health Disparities Among U.S. Midlife and Older Adults Focusing on Sexual Orientation and Race and Ethnicity: Evidence from a Population-Based Study.” The authors examined health disparities by race, gender, and sexual orientation using the 2013-2023 National Health Interview Survey data and tested for synergistic effects,

CSDE Affiliate Meghan Romanelli (Social Work) and co-authors recently published an article titled, “Intersectional Disparities in Digital Health and Mental Health Service Use Among US Youth During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Cross-Sectional Analysis of a National Survey” in the Journal of Medical Internet Research. Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, and Asian or Pacific Islander participants had lower prevalence of digital mental health use than White peers overall and among sexual minority youth.

CSDE Affiliate Theresa Rocha Beardall (Sociology) recently published an article on “Indigenous Data Inclusion and the Colonial Politics of Recognition“, in Native American and Indigenous Studies. Rocha Beardall and co-author Meredith Alberta Palmer explore two consequences that arise from data inclusion within the context of Indigenous peoples’ relationship with the U.S. colonial state. First, the authors assert that data demands often lack direct collaboration with Indigenous nations and agencies,

CSDE External Affiliate Taylor Okonek (Macalester College), CSDE Affiliate and Executive Committee Member Jon Wakefield (Statistics and Biostatistics), and co-author Katie Wilson just published an article in Demographic Research, titled “A parametric survival model for child mortality using complex survey data.” Modern demographic methods for estimating a full mortality schedule for children have been developed for countries with good vital registration and reliable census data but perform poorly in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).

CSDE Affiliate Adrian Raftery (Statistics) spoke to UW News to share insights from a recent paper, “Mitigation efforts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and meet the Paris Agreement have been offset by economic growth,” published in Communications Earth & Environment. Raftery and co-authors used data from 2015–2024 to probabilistically assess the changes in climate change prospects associated with emissions since the Paris climate agreement was signed in 2015.