TCNJ

13 SUPPORTING SURVIVORS Sexual assault affects millions of people, primarily women, and survivors frequently struggle with feelings of fear, worthlessness, helplessness, and guilt. The impact of sexual assault on an individual's mental health is significant, often resulting in depression, anxiety, decreased self-efficacy, and post- traumatic stress. Assistant Professor of Counselor Education Jill Schwarz's research, in conjunction with Womanspace, the Mercer County agency dedicated to helping survivors of sexual assault and domestic violence, focuses on supporting survivors so that they may heal and feel whole and strong again. "We have been working to investigate which types of approaches best support survivors in their healing from trauma. We know that traditional counseling itself is helpful, but what we have been learning is that innovative therapeutic approaches are helping women to make even more accelerated and lasting gains in their healing," she says. One of these approaches, equine-assisted psychotherapy, utilizes horses in the therapeutic process and another, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing, a treatment method successfully used to help veterans with PTSD from combat, involves bilateral stimulation of the brain. "Our research of these innovative approaches has demonstrated promising results, including significant improvements in depression, anxiety, hope, and healing for women who have been in their own kind of war — the one rarely acknowledged by so many until now," says Schwarz. DEPARTMENTS Counselor education Educational administration and secondary education Elementary and early childhood education Special education, language, and literacy MAJORS Early childhood education Education of the deaf and hard of hearing* Elementary education Secondary education: biology, chemistry, English, history, mathematics, and physics Special education* Speech pathology and audiology Urban education* * Combined 5-year bachelor's and master's program with initial certification in elementary or early childhood education EXTRA CREDIT POINTS: Middle school specialization Minor in communication disorders Minor in deaf studies Minor in environmental sustainability education STUDENT ENROLLMENT 806 CLASS OF 2017 AVERAGE STARTING SALARY $ 54,702 TOP SCHOOL DISTRICTS Freehold Jackson Livingston Medford Newark New Brunswick Randolph Secaucus Toms River Voorhees West Windsor-Plainsboro SKILLS FOR LIFE At the annual TASH Conference in Atlanta, Georgia, Jennifer Pagliaro '18 and Ashley Taconet '18, along with Sarah Monaco, assistant professor of special education, language, and literacy, presented their research on using an Apple watch to increase the daily living skills of students with autism spectrum disorders. In their study, students use the smart watch to view short clips of someone modeling how to perform a daily living skill — doing laundry, washing dishes, shopping for groceries, for example. "As technology advances, our hope would be that these prompts could be delivered automatically using GPS services," says Monaco. "For example, a student would receive videos for how to check out at the grocery store when their watch identifies the GPS coordinates for that location." TASH is the leading professional organization for supporting individuals with significant disabilities. GLOBAL EDUCATION BY THE NUMBERS 38 number of foreign countries in which TCNJ graduate students teach or administer school 41 number of undergraduates doing their student teaching abroad 300+ number of graduate students participating in international off-site programs

• Cover