Faculty & Staff

Peter’s teaching focuses on assessment issues in social work, including families, as well as child and adolescent mental health. He has served in a variety of administrative positions at MRU including practicum field director and program coordinator. He is a chair of the university’s Academic Program and Curriculum Committee as well as a councilor on General Faculties Council and a member of its Executive Committee. He is a member of the Program Planning Committee of the 9th International Conference of Adolescents and Adults with FASD to be held in Seattle, WA. In April 2024. He is a member of the Planning Committee and Editorial Committee of the Prairie Child Welfare Consortium. He serves as an expert witness in child protection. Peter uses the pronouns he/him. 

Areas of Instruction

• Child and Adolescent Mental Health
• Child Intervention
• Assessment in Social Work
• Interpersonal Violence 
• Mental Health and Addictions

Areas of Scholarship

• Assessment of parents within child protection systems including systemic bias issues
• Practice errors in child protection linked to serious injury and death
• Indigenous children and family intersection with child protection
• Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder, Stigma and implications for front line practice
• Implementation of Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action within the practice of social work

Selected Publications

Hargrove, E., Lutke, C.J., Griffin, K., Himmelreich, M., Mitchell, J.  Lutke, A., & Choate, P.  FASD: The living experience -considering equality v equity. Disabilities. 4(2), 332-347; https://doi.org/10.3390/disabilities4020022

Choate, P., Briegel, M., Mann-Johnson, M. & Tortorelli, C. (2024), Do children matter? The politics of child protection. Align. Pp. 4-23

Tortorelli, C., Choate, P. & Badry, D. (2023) Disrupted life narratives of children in care with neurodevelopmental disabilities: Whose story is it? (Invited Book Chapter) Published https://doi.org/10.1016/bs.dnb.2023.05.006  

Choate, P. & Engstrom, S. (2023). Decolonization has thus far mostly failed – drawing from Canadian lessons. In Press. Palgrave Macmillan Handbook on Social Issues.

Orton, S., Mills, K., & Choate, P. (2023). Epigenetics of Trauma Transmission and Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: What Does the Evidence Support? International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20, 6706. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20176706

Badry, D., Dearman, A.H., Choate, P., Marcellus, L., Tortorelli, C. & Williams, R.(2023). FASD and child welfare. In, A.A. Abdul-Rahman & C.L. Peterenko (Eds.) Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: A multidisciplinary approach. Pp. 385-404. Spring Nature. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3- 031-32386-7_15

C. Tortorelli, D. Badry, P. Choate & K. Bagely.(2023). Ethical and social issues in FASD. In, A.A. Abdul-Rahman & C.L. Peterenko (Eds.) Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: A multidisciplinary approach. Springer Nature. Pp. 363-384.

Selected Presentations

Choate, P. W., LaRochelle, T., Tortorelli, C. D., & Spicer, K. (2024). Life course solutions - not episodic approaches - in child welfare and family. Pre-Conference Law - 9th International Conference of Adolescents and Adults with FASD (Seattle, WA).

Choate, P.(2023). Assessment, Testimony, and the Place of Expert Witnesses. King’s Bench Judicial Conference, National Judicial Institute, Winnipeg, MB.

Tortorelli, C.& Choate, P. (2023).Preparing Social Work Students for Impactful Relational and Ethical Child Protection Careers. Kempe 2023 Conference – A call to action to change child welfare. Denver, CO.

Choate, P., Tortorelli, C., Borg, I & Dickens, C. (2023). Inter-professional simulation leading to excellence in social work practice. Kempe 2023 Conference – A call to action to change child welfare. Denver, CO.

Choate, P.W. & Warthe, D.G. (2023). Impact of Family Violence on Children. Judging in the First Five Years. Montreal, PQ: National Judicial Institute.

Choate, P., Bear Chief, R & Lindstrom, G. (2023). Reconsidering Maslow and the Hierarchy of Needs from an Indigenous Perspective. Canadian Association of Social Work Educators / Congress on the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Relevant Community Service

• Program Planning Committee of the 9th International Conference of Adolescents and Adults with FASD
• Member of the Planning Committee for the Prairie Child Welfare Consortium Conference