Hello! First off, I’m a very big fan of the profession of social work. My journey to becoming a social worker is, in my mind, an interesting story, but typing it on the internet feels a bit self-absorbed, right? In brief, I barely passed college having little direction and a poor sense of self. After experiencing Hurricane Katrina and subsequent family tragedy, I made a promise that I would try to do “good work”, whatever that meant. Five years later I enrolled in a joint MSW-MPH program at Tulane University.

Upon graduation I worked as a clinical social worker in acute psychiatric settings working with populations experiencing psychosis, suicidality, and just being at very challenging places in their lives. I later pursued my PhD at the Brown School at WashU in St. Louis, and am now working as an Assistant Professor at the University of Georgia School of Social Work. My work and research now revolve around rural mental health and examining how our changing climate and environment impacts our mental health and wellbeing. Below you can find more info on my research, teaching, and clinical work.

Research: This is very broad, and probably easier to discuss in person, but I use qualitative and participatory methods to map the impacts of climate/environmental change on mental health, mostly in rural populations. This includes farmers, migrant workers, and members of the military.

  • This is a very heated conversation which often understandably lands on partisan arguments rather than, you know, reducing suffering. I focus more on the latter, which means “climate change” as a topic is not always at the forefront. Which is more than fine. For instance, to address the very real and scary mental health crisis occurring in the agriculture community, farmers (who arguably know the most about what climate change looks like) would rather focus on input costs, labor, the succession crisis, and how it’s hilarious to consider a farmer actually has time to go see a doctor, let alone a therapist.

  • I also work on several other projects, including expanding the mental health component of the One Health Framework (link), farmworker mental health, and rural mental health disparities (link). conceptualizing and measuring animal mental health, and using art-based methods as a research analytic tool. More info on my research can be found here (link).

Clinical work: My clinical experience includes working in acute psychiatric settings like intensive outpatient, ER, and inpatient psych hospitals. This predominately entails working with populations with severe and persistent mental health concerns like psychosis, suicidality, bipolar, substance use, and complex trauma histories. There are many reasons why someone may reach the worst day of their life, and it’s my goal to best understand those stories.

  • More recently I’ve been working with Athens Parent Wellbeing supporting father mental health (link) and offering psychosocial and educational support for local educators who work with both children who are immigrants and children of immigrants.

Teaching: At UGA, I currently teach 3 courses for MSW students, including Advanced Social Work Practice with Individuals; Assessment and Psychopathology; and Power, Oppression, Social Justice and Evidence-informed Practice, Advocacy and Diversity in Social Work (aka PrOSEAD). I also teach on PhD course titled Social Work Education Practicum.

  • I also serve on the MSW and PhD committees at the UGA SSW, and am the SSW representative of UGA Interdisciplinary Sustainability Certificate Internal Advisory Board

MEDIA APPEARANCES

This Week in Public Health. A Conversation with Christopher Weatherly (that’s me!). Link

University of Tennessee One Health Initiative’s Lunch & Learn Seminar Series: Identifying, Strengthening, and Expanding the Mental Health Component within the One Health Framework. Link

AgArts from Horse and Buggy Land: Season #3, Episode #47: The Weight Farmers Carry. Link.

WORK EXPERIENCE

  • Assistant Professor → University of Georgia School of Social Work, Athens GA, 2023-Present

  • PhD Student → The Brown School at Washington University, St. Louis MO, 2017–2023

  • Lead Emergency Department Social Worker → IU Arnett, Lafayette IN, 2016–2017

  • Inpatient/ Intensive Outpatient/ Partial Hospitalization Mental Health Clinician → Greenbrier, GreaterNew Orleans Area, LA, 2012–2016

  • MSW/MPH Student→ Tulane University, New Orleans LA, 2010–2012

  • AmeriCorps VISTA Leader → RurAL CAP, Anchorage AK, 2009-2010

  • AmeriCorps VISTA Member → Camp Hope, St. Bernard LA, 2008-2009