Departmental honors student Faith Tipton successfully defended her honors thesis!
Her thesis is titled, Examining Co-Response Models: A Literature Review of Social Worker and Law Enforcement Perspectives, and her abstract reads as follows:
This literature review examines studies published between 2000 and 2024 on outcomes and perspectives emerging from law enforcement response teams working with mental health service calls. As police increasingly serve as the initial point of contact for mental health crises, co-response team (CRT) models, where mental health professionals and law enforcement collaborate, have gained attention as a promising approach. Through a systematic review and inductive thematic analysis of qualitative and quantitative studies, Faith synthesized findings across multiple stakeholders, including officers, service users, social workers, and community members. Results suggest CRTs can reduce arrests and offer more alternatives to hospitalization compared to traditional police responses, though findings also reveal variability in outcomes, limited standardized reporting, and ongoing concerns about response times and intervention scope. The study highlights both the promise and challenges of CRTs in reducing over-reliance on law enforcement for mental health crises and underscores the need for consistent evaluation and community-based alternatives.
Dr. Pete Fawson (social work) served as thesis chair, and Dr. Ben Alexander-Eitzman (social work) served as second reader.