Management Team

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Jody Clay-Warner, Ph.D.

Director, Owens Institute for Behavioral Research
Meigs Distinguished Professor, Sociology
website  |  jclayw@uga.edu
255A Brooks Hall  |  706-542-6094

Jody Clay-Warner is a Meigs Professor of Sociology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences. She received a Ph.D. in sociology from Emory University and has been at UGA since 1998, where she previously served as director of the Criminal Justice Studies Program and as head of the Department of Sociology. She has been involved with OIBR since 2000, when as an assistant professor she participated in the grant mentoring program. In 2019, Clay-Warner was appointed associate director of the Institute.

Named director in August 2022, she provides strategic direction for the Institute, advocates for social and behavioral science research at UGA and externally she implements innovative programs to enhance grants administration and interdisciplinary research at UGA. She also oversees the OIBR Grant Development Program, leads faculty retreats, chairs the OIBR Executive Committee, interfaces with the Vice President for Research, Deans, Department Heads, and Faculty, and serves as an advocate for faculty affiliated with OIBR.

Clay-Warner’s research focuses on understanding responses to injustice. She uses laboratory experiments to understand the underlying processes that shape these responses, and she uses survey techniques to study the implications of these basic processes for reactions to real-world experiences of injustice, such as labor exploitation and criminal victimization. Her research has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of State.

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Jennifer McDowell, Ph.D.

Associate Director, Owens Institute for Behavioral Research
Professor, Psychology
website | jemcd@uga.edu
255G Brooks Hall   |   706-542-7906

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Kimberly Silvis Cherewick

Assistant Director, Owens Institute for Behavioral Research
ksilvis@uga.edu
255D Brooks Hall   |   706-542-6078

Kim serves as Assistant Director of the Owens Institute for Behavioral Research and as a signatory for the University of Georgia Research Foundation. A Certified Research Administrator (CRA), she assists the Director in overseeing the Institute’s research administration, personnel and financial operations, strategic planning, and faculty development initiatives.

Kim leads OIBR’s pre- and post-award activities and works closely with the Institute’s team to provide thoughtful, proactive support throughout the life cycle of sponsored projects. She enjoys helping UGA faculty—from emerging investigators to eminent scholars—advance their research programs. Through this work, she supports OIBR’s mission to facilitate scholarly inquiry and external funding, foster interdisciplinary connections, and champion the social and behavioral sciences across UGA and beyond.

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Jenny Claire Carey

Post Award Operations Manager
jccarey@uga.edu
252B Brooks Hall   |   706-542-6027

As Post Award Operations Manager, Jenny Claire’s primary responsibilities include oversight of a complex grant management caseload, overseeing departmental operating budgets, annual budget development, internally funded seed grants, and pilot grants, as well as serving on the OIBR Management Team.

Jenny Claire graduated from Emmanuel College in 2007 with a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration. She joined OIBR in April 2018, and she has been with UGA since September 2015.