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The Human Trafficking Research Lab (HTRL) at Millikin University was established in 2018 to transform undergraduate performance learning projects into cutting edge human trafficking research. The HTRL team at Millikin University conducts policy relevant research on human trafficking within the United States and internationally. We are the only undergraduate research lab focused on human trafficking in the state of Illinois and one of a handful in the entire United States, making this applied research experience truly unique for Millikin students. Through the  Human Trafficking Research Lab,  we formulate human trafficking research at Millikin by training students to collect, analyze, and write up data results and disseminate these findings to the academic and local community. At Millikin University, our mission is to prepare students for professional success, democratic citizenship in a global environment, and a personal life of meaning and value and the HTRL@Millikin builds on t
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HTRL Tote Bags

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Since our grant is ending this year, the students and I brainstormed a few fundraising ideas to be able to support paid research assistantships in the Human Trafficking Research Lab for future students. We thought tote bags would be a great way to achieve this and so the students and I designed an eye catching bag that would educate people wherever it went. If you donate more $30 to the Human Trafficking Research Lab at Millikin we will send you one of these tote bags that will support future undergraduate research in the lab and help you raise awareness to human trafficking everywhere you go!  The bags are 100% cotton and printed locally from Oakwood Screen Printing based right here in Decatur, Illinois.  If you would like to donate to the Human Trafficking Research Lab at Millikin University you can make a donation in three different ways: 1) Make a credit card/debit card/EFT gift online at www.millikin.edu/give . Choose the “Millikin Fund” icon box and write “Human Trafficking Resea
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HTRL Impact Report

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We wanted to show the impact of everything we have accomplished since the Human Trafficking Research Lab was established in 2018 in an effort to help us with donations for the lab. So the students and I set out to try and summarize all of the work we have done on various projects that can reveal the impact our work had had on Central Illinois. We started by highlighting our projects and outcomes. Then I wanted to try and quantify some of the work and created information so that people cold donate to support our undergraduate research. It was pretty amazing to see that over 27,000 people have visited our website to check out our work!
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Presenting at the Ukrainian Studies Conference

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This week I presented the research design for our NSF project at the Dmytro Shtohryn International Ukrainian Studies Conference at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The conference is a yearly conference in honor of Dr. Dmytro Shtohryn (1923 – 2019) who established the Ukrainian Studied program at the University of Illinois. The title of the presentation was "Designing Human Trafficking Prevention Approaches in Ukraine" and it was based on the research supported by the National Science Foundation D-ISN/RAPID: Data Collection for Human Trafficking Recruitment and Responses in Forced Migration and Operations Engineering grant (CMMI-2330311). Our research seeks to investigate human trafficking in real time between exploitation and identification evolving due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Ukraine is a fruitful crisis case for analysis because of the prevalent use of technology during the migration process which means that we as researchers can track human traffickin
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Meeting with the FBI

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Every once in a while I get emails from professionals working in the anti-trafficking field wanting to come to the Human Trafficking Research Lab to learn about our research and visit Millikin. This week we had the honor of welcoming the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Community Outreach team from the Springfield Office to the lab. They saw us on TV for our human trafficking awareness month panel discussion and wanted to learn more about our research and outreach work in Central Illinois. It is always great to share our research with people and we had an interesting conversation. I also learned how to steer my students in their direction for careers in the future. My students were really excited about the FBI swag!
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Human Trafficking shelter visit in Peoria

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My students and I hit the road again this week to attend the Central Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force meeting at the Center for Prevention of Abuse (CFPA) in Peoria and tour their shelter for survivors. This is a picture of us with Julisa Sierra the first student to work on the lab (Millikin class of 2019), who is a human trafficking case officer at CFPA and works to assist trafficking survivors within our community. Pretty great to see my former students out there doing amazing things in our community! We were able to tour the shelter at the Center for Prevention of Abuse and learn more about their work and facilities. The shelter also had a Ukrainian flag donated by a local artist to support Ukraine! The 1.5 hour drive across Central Illinois was really flat with lots of windmills.
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Statewide Human Trafficking Task Force Meeting

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The Statewide Human Trafficking Task Force met this week in-person in Champaign this week. There was a professional development portion of the meeting in the morning and then the meeting was in the afternoon. We heard updates from sub-committees and then read over Meaningful Engagement of People with Lived Experience  from the Global Fund to Combat Modern Slavery. I was particularly interested in the framework and assessment which measures and provides an outline for increasing lived experience leadership across the spectrum of engagement in the anti-trafficking movement. I am planning on having a panel discussion with survivors in January 2024 for human trafficking awareness month and so it was great to learn how to engage survivors of human trafficking. The meeting brought people from all around Illinois and it was nice to see a strong showing from my colleagues on the Centra Illinois Human Trafficking Task Force too!
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Big News in the HTRL!

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In May 2023 before taking students to the Baltic States a colleague and I put together a data collection project proposal for the National Science Foundation  D-ISN/RAPID  entitled "Data Collection for Human Trafficking Recruitment and Responses in Forced Migration" focusing on Ukraine . We found out this week that the grant was recommended and funded! The grant is a rapid grant which means we will spend the next year collecting, compiling, and analyzing time-sensitive data (online and interviews) along the entire trafficking cycle – from recruitment, transfer, exploitation, and exit in Ukraine. The full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 provides an example of crises where war, displacement, and economic crisis fuel inequalities and increase vulnerabilities to human trafficking with ripple effects around the world. The case of Ukraine is a fruitful crisis case for data compilation because of the prevalent use of technology during the migration process which means that
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