Brooks Zitzmann, Ph.D., LCSW, joined the NCSSS faculty full time in 2018 and is currently an Assistant Professor. She has direct micro practice experience in young adult mental health counseling including individual therapy, group therapy, and crisis intervention, and she maintains her clinical license in Louisiana. In addition, she has direct community practice experience as chair of Take Back the Night New Orleans, organizing local university and city constituents to raise awareness of and call for an end to sexual violence. In addition to social work, Dr. Zitzmann holds degrees in biology, religious studies, and the philosophical intersections of science and religion. These diverse backgrounds inform her research interests in spirituality, Catholic social teachings, and environmental justice. Her doctoral research conceptually linked social work's core value of social justice to climate change mitigation and then explored “ecological conversion,” a concept drawn from Catholic social teachings through which individuals holistically reorient themselves toward enduring and integral care for creation and for marginalized peoples. She has also conducted qualitative research on community resilience in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.