PhD Student Awarded Prestigious Research Grant From HUD

University of New Orleans doctoral student Kelly Owens has been awarded a dissertation research grant, worth up to $17,075, from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Owens is the first UNO student ever to receive the grant and one of only 17 recipients in 2011.

Owens is pursuing a doctorate in urban studies. Her dissertation is titled, “Examining Social Relations in a Mixed Income Development: An Analysis of the Individual Processes and Neighborhood Mechanisms That Shape Neighbor Interaction in River Garden, a New Orleans Hope VI Community.” She is analyzing neighbor relationships in a neighborhood that was formally a public housing project and has been redeveloped into a mixed income neighborhood under HUD’s HOPE VI revitalization program.

Owens, a native of Los Angeles, has a bachelor’s degree in education from LSU and a master’s degree in student personnel administration from Columbia University. Her advisor is Renia Ehrenfeucht, associate professor and coordinator of the MS and PhD in urban studies programs.

HUD’s doctoral dissertation research grant program is intended to stimulate policy-relevant urban research in several ways: by encouraging doctoral candidates to pursue research topics in community, housing and urban development; by assisting doctoral candidates in the timely completion of the dissertation research; and by providing an arena for new scholars to share their research findings.