Federal Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program research (YEDI Affiliated)
Hannah R. Thompson, Professor
Public Health
Applications for Fall 2025 are closed for this project.
The federal Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) is one of the nation’s most effective public health nutrition programs. It provides free, healthy foods and personalized nutrition education, breastfeeding support and referrals to other services for over 6.8 million low-income pregnant and postpartum women and their children up to age five. The purpose of the project is to survey and conduct focus groups with WIC participants in 20-30 states across the United States about their experience with WIC. Results from these surveys and interviews will be used to inform the United States Department of Agriculture and State efforts to increase participation and retention of women, infants and children on the program, including as it relates to WIC participants from different States, racial/ethnic groups, preferred language, and rural versus urban residences.
If you are selected for this research project, you will also be invited to join the Youth Equity Discovery Initiative (YEDI) Program, a research mentorship program that aims to build supportive pathways into research careers, service, and leadership addressing adolescent wellbeing. The year-long program provides weekly skill-building workshops, cascading mentorship, and professional development training to a cohort of 20-30 undergraduate scholars working on faculty-led youth equity research projects (like this one). Past scholars have benefitted from YEDI’s mentorship and professional development opportunities (including faculty and graduate student speakers). The program culminates in an end-of-year research poster symposium.
The 2025-2026 YEDI cohort will meet in BOTH fall and spring. For the Fall, the workshops will take place on Tuesdays, 2:00pm-3:30pm starting September 30th. In order to take part in the YEDI program, you MUST be able to attend the workshops at this time. As a YEDI scholar, you will sign up for a PH198 class and receive 1 unit. This is in addition to the units you receive for your URAP research project. For any questions about YEDI, please contact YEDI’s Director Marieka Schotland (mschotland@berkeley.edu) or visit the website. Participation in the YEDI Program is not required for this research project, but is strongly encouraged.
Role: The student will support quantitative and qualitative research tasks including: Generating survey progress report emails to WIC state agencies; reviewing various documents (including focus group guide, literature review, introduction and methods sections for final report); supporting preparation and review of survey results data tables; conducting reminder phone calls/text messages for focus group participants; co-facilitating and providing technical support for focus groups (Spanish-speaker preferred); creating and editing focus group transcripts and translations using transcription software (Notta.ai); possible qualitative analysis of focus group transcripts using Atlas.ti; if strong quantitative skills using R, could support secondary data analysis.
Learning outcomes include: 1) produce research communications, 2) critically review research materials, 3) prepare and interpret quantitative and/or qualitative research data, 4) communication with research participants, and 5) exposure to qualitative data collection.
Qualifications: oBilingual English & Spanish: Highly preferred
oProblem solving and organizational skills: Required
oExcellent writing and verbal communication skills: Required
oProficient use of Windows-based computer applications: Required
oProficient use of Zoom: Required
oProficient use of statistical software (such as R, SAS, SPSS, Stata, but with preference for R): Preferred
oProficient use of qualitative analysis software (such as Notta.ai, Atlas.ti, Dedoose, NVivo): Preferred
Day-to-day supervisor for this project: KC Fiedler, Staff Researcher
Hours: 6-8 hrs
Off-Campus Research Site: Remote
Related website: https://ucanr.edu/program/nutrition-policy-institute
Biological & Health Sciences Social Sciences