17³Ō¹Ļ

Edmond installed as William E. Gordon Distinguished Professor

Neil Schoenherr
Health Equity and Justice; Mental Health and Wellness
Woman in glasses speaks at a wooden podium with a Washington University in St. Louis Brown School plaque, blue backdrop behind her.
Tonya Edmond presents her address ā€œHow Do We Do This Better?ā€ during her installation Feb. 9 as the William E. Gordon Distinguished Professor. (Photo: Dan Donovan/17³Ō¹Ļ)

Tonya Edmond, a professor at the 17³Ō¹Ļ, has been installed as the William E. Gordon Distinguished Professor. A ceremony took place Feb. 9 in Hillman Hallā€™s Clark-Fox Forum.

A nationally recognized expert on violence against women and children, Edmondā€™s research tests the effectiveness of trauma-focused interventions and the implementation of evidence-based treatments for survivors of sexual violence, intimate partner violence and childhood abuse.

Although Gordon was not a social worker, then-Dean Benjamin Youngdahl, a fellow University of Minnesota alumnus, recruited him in 1951 to establish one of the nationā€™s first doctoral programs in social work at the Brown School. Gordon awarded the schoolā€™s first doctorate in social work to Sidney E. Zimbalist in 1955.