Mary Milnamow, MSS, is a PhD candidate in Social Welfare at the University at Buffalo School of Social Work, where she was awarded a Schomburg Fellowship. Her dissertation research focuses on the impact of flexible work policies on work productivity loss among employed family caregivers for persons living with dementia (PLwD). Using an intersectionality framework, her research emphasizes how individual, family, and system-level factors shape the experiences of care dyads. In 2024, she was selected for a national fellowship with the Chief Evaluation Office in the U.S. Department of Labor to advance her dissertation research. As a PhD student, she worked on multiple community-based research studies involving the use of virtual reality with caregivers and persons living with dementia. This research led to her first first-author published manuscript on the impact of a volunteer-led virtual reality intervention implemented at a drop-in respite program for PLwD. In addition, she taught graduate-level courses in the School of Social Work during her time at the University at Buffalo.
Mary serves as a member of the Board of Directors for the National Task Group on Intellectual Disabilities and Dementia Practices (NTG). NTG is a national nonprofit organization dedicated to ensuring the lives, needs, and interests of adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities who are also living with, or are at heightened risk for, dementia are recognized across health, social service, and policy sectors.
Prior to starting her PhD program, Mary worked for 20 years as a program evaluator at a public health institute in the research and evaluation area where she specialized in community-based behavioral health and substance use treatment programs. Mary holds a Master of Social Service from the Bryn Mawr College Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research with a concentration in Macro Practice: Communities, Organizations, Policy, and Advocacy. She found integrating her social work background within public health environments contributed to successful multidisciplinary collaborations and stakeholder engagement.
Her professional goal is to contribute to the development and implementation of accessible, relevant, and inclusive policies and practices for family caregivers for older adults, persons living with dementia, and individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
