Marianne Farkas

Dr. Farkas has been and is currently the Co-Principal Investigator of the Research and Training Center and Professor in Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences at Boston University for over 25 years. She has authored and co-authored over 80 articles in professional journals, 4 textbooks, over a dozen book chapters and 6 multi-media training packages.

For more than 30 years, Dr. Farkas has worked in various capacities in the field of psychiatric rehabilitation, and recovery. Among her many roles providing training, research and consultation, Dr. Farkas was in charge of the World Health Organization Collaborating Center in Psychiatric Rehabilitation, providing training, consultation and research expertise to the W.H.O. network, serving as the Vice President of the World Association for Psychosocial Rehabilitation (WAPR) and President of the National Association of Rehabilitation Research and Training Centers (NARRTC). She has developed training, consultation and organizational change methodologies to support programs and integrative systems in their efforts to adopt psychiatric rehabilitation and recovery innovations around the globe. She is an Honorary Professor of Social Studies at Hanze University, Netherlands and among other duties, on a Research Advisory Committee at King’s College, London, England investigating methods facilitating the recovery of individuals with serious mental illnesses. Her past grant experiences have ranged from helping the core disciplines develop curriculum for pre service programs in Nursing, Psychiatry, Psychology and Social Work to co-leading an effort to create standards of evidence for disability research and a process for translating the research into practice tools across disability fields. She has served on Training Committees and Committees on Serious Mental Illnesses in both APA’s (i.e. American Psychological and American Psychiatric) and is currently working with APA to develop a curriculum on recovery for psychologists.

As an educator, Dr. Farkas received Boston University’s Award of Merit; the International Association of Psychosocial Rehabilitation Services John Beard Award for innovations in the field; the Lifetime Achievement Award ( NYAPRS) as well as the National Commendation Award from the National Association of Rehabilitation Research and Training Centers for “pioneering scientific advances that have helped transform research on mental health and rehabilitation systems and being at the forefront of a paradigm shift that has helped practitioners, families, and society, as a whole, to see capacity and potential in people who were once perceived to be beyond hope”.