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Developing Professional Identities in Legislative Advocacy and Leadership

Dr. Anatasia S. Kim is the 2015 recipient of the APAGS Guardian of Psychology Award.

Dr. Anatasia S. Kim, PhD is the 2015 recipient of the APAGS Guardian of Psychology Award.

By Anatasia S. Kim, PhD

What is the role of legislative advocacy and policy in my capacity as a clinical psychologist? The answer is found in my years of community-based work with children, adolescents, and families. As a graduate student at UCLA some 15 years ago, I never imagined one day lobbying in the Capitol on behalf of the profession and my clients. But this is exactly what brings tremendous excitement, passion, and hope for me today.

I started my clinical career working with at-risk youth in East Los Angeles using brief intervention models to treat behavioral, emotional, and academic problems. Back then I naively believed that therapy alone would be enough. I continued my work with this population and expanded to working with incarcerated youth and immigrant communities. While involved in research efforts in these areas, it became undeniably apparent that a significant, if not majority, of the psychological problems that challenged my clients were in fact a result not of some intrapsychic forces, but rather, a system failure.

As a graduate student at UCLA some 15 years ago, I never imagined one day lobbying in the Capitol on behalf of the profession and my clients. But this is exactly what brings tremendous excitement, passion, and hope for me today.

The disparities in mental health, access to and quality of care, and other resources ultimately reflect a broken system of socially unjust policies that impair the wellbeing of the communities we serve. Just as one cannot separate the mind from the body, we cannot separate people from their environment, which includes the social system in which they are inextricably embedded. The solution then rests in large part to our capacity and willingness to be personally and professionally accountable to the world around us. Ultimately, this means that we have to take responsibility for and develop solutions to social problems that plague our communities, particularly those that have and continue to be the most marginalized and oppressed.

As socially conscious and morally responsible professionals, we cannot simply spew out diagnoses and “fix” broken psyches. We can and must do much more. Indeed, we must fully acknowledge that social injustice, cultural apathy, and moral irresponsibility lead to and cause mental illness. We must acknowledge that mental illness is birthed from community violence, broken educational system, intergenerational poverty, and proliferating prisons. Mental illness is also perpetuated in our silence, when we don’t speak up or use our privilege to challenge the status quo.

My responsibilities as a legislative advocate are not only to the profession of psychology, but more importantly, to the clients I serve. The few letters that follow my name give me access and authority to places that my clients don’t have, including a seat at the table where discussions and ultimately decisions about policies can be influenced. In fact then, legislative advocacy is our ethical responsibility and a moral imperative not only as psychologists, but also as citizens who vote and can demand just polices that promote instead of inhibit mental health.

Psychologists have something critical to offer in the social and public policy discourse. Beyond the therapy and classrooms, our commitment to social justice must be earnest and unwavering. As such, we must get involved in our local, state, and national professional organizations and their growing efforts in governmental affairs including the California Psychological Association’s Leadership and Advocacy Conference.

What then is the role of legislative advocacy and leadership for psychologists? For me, it is ultimately about the courage to use my power and privilege to give voice to those without.

Editor’s note: Anatasia S. Kim, Ph.D., Associate Professor at The Wright Institute in Berkeley, CA, is the 2015 winner of the “Guardian of Psychology” award from the APAGS Advocacy Coordinating Team. She was nominated by Eric Samuels, a doctoral student from Wright currently interning at Indiana University, and the 2016 APAGS liaison to APA’s Committee on Disability Issues in Psychology. An earlier version of this article appeared in the newsletter of the Alameda County Psychological Association.

Author bio: Dr. Kim received her B.A. in Psychology from UC Berkeley and her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from UCLA. She is a National Ronald McNair Scholar, recipient of American Psychological Association Minority Fellowship as well as the Okura Mental Health Fellowship. In addition to teaching, she has a private practice in Berkeley specializing in treating adolescents/young adults with anxiety disorders, depression, and neurocognitive deficits using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. In recent years, she served as President of the Alameda County Psychological Association (ACPA), member of California Psychological Association’s (CPA) Governmental Affairs Steering Committee, Chair of CPA’s Immigration Task Force, and CPA’s state Diversity Delegate. In addition, she has served on various local boards including Ethnic Health Institute and Berkeley Alliance aimed at addressing educational and health disparities in Alameda County. Finally, recent her research and clinical projects include: program evaluation for school-based interventions; recruitment and retention of ethnic minority students in graduate training; pipeline for advanced degrees in psychology for historically underrepresented students; and cross-disciplinary approaches to working with systems-involved youth and families.

Selecting your graduate advisor and lab: Details matter

Which advisor is right for you? (Source: “Professor Fink” by Profound Whatever on Flickr. Some rights reserved.)

A previous blog post by Drs. Ameen and El-Ghoroury made some excellent points about the graduate school decision. In this post I will share a few in-depth strategies about selecting an advisor for a research-oriented doctoral program.

I was extremely lucky to find an advisor like Dr. Jennifer Vonk, but you probably want to minimize the influence of luck on your experience. After listening to many cases of relinquished doctoral students, I realized that in many ways, applying to work with your advisor is a gamble. Here is a person who is primarily responsible for your career, yet you know very little about them.

The points I mention here are based on my experiences and conversations with undergraduate students over the years.

First, the structure of admissions to a research-intensive graduate program is quite different from a typical undergraduate admissions process. Your standardized test scores and academic accomplishments are important, but what ultimately matters is what you are able to bring to the lab and to the program. Therefore, during your program research, it can be useful to consider where you would fit in the best based on your best qualities.

Second, shortlisting potential programs from a broad database like Graduate Study in Psychology is just the beginning. Be prepared to start focusing on the seemingly minute details – current and past research produced by your advisor’s lab, for example – which will make a huge impact on your experience. These details can be found by combing through the CVs and recent publications of prospective advisors. As you to do your homework, check on these particular variables:

How frequently they publish: If you are not fully aware of this factor, you may end up being surprised or disappointed after you join the lab. The publication frequency (along with the quality) usually indicates their general research activity level, and might provide hints in terms of what they expect from their students.
The quality of journals they usually publish in: Generally speaking, journals with higher impact-factors publish better research (details are a bit too complex for this post). APA has its own journal database where you can read more on each of their journals (and their impact factors). You can also gauge the impact of non-APA journals through some basic online research.
How often they include graduate students as co-authors: This is an important factor because to be a successful researcher you need to have something to show for your work. Advisors usually have their own criteria for authorship such as who came up with the most important idea, or who worked the most of the project, and so forth. In case you are not sure how authorship is decided, or how frequently their graduate students are publishing, these may be important questions to bring up during your interview.
The research interests of other students in the lab: Your lab-mates might be the ones you spend most of your time around. They can be quite influential in your work in terms of your class discussions, research collaborations and your lab’s focus. Reading about previous students in the lab, you can gauge what types of topics the lab usually handles and how flexible the research focus might be.
The thematic aspect of multiple research papers: If you really want to know what your advisor likes, dislikes, finds interesting, or is strongly opinionated about, you need to go through their research publications in detail. If you go through several of their papers, you can find out which theories they like or dislike, what arguments they find compelling or weak, and what are their general views on their subject of interest. While research papers won’t tell you everything you need to know about an advisor’s interpersonal qualities, doing this review might stave off a complete falling-out between student and advisor.

These are some (of the many) points that prospective applicants to research-oriented doctoral programs in psychology are often unaware of, but can have a huge impact on their academic careers. Taking these into consideration may significantly lower your likelihood of facing unwanted surprises or disappointments in your new program and lab.

Editor’s note: Chinmay Aradhye is a third-year student in the Experimental Psychology PhD. program, Department of Psychology, Oakland University. He is also the APAGS Michigan State Advocacy Coordinator. Contact him at caradhye@oakland.edu.

His Love of Advocacy Made Him a Guardian of Psychology

I am Gary Howell, an early career psychologist licensed in Florida and Illinois. I am truly honored to receive the inaugural “Guardian of Psychology” Award from the APAGS Advocacy Coordinating Team. While I have so many varied interests in our field, I have found my niche working with the LGBT community.

As an openly gay psychologist and professor, I have committed to making the world a better place for students, psychologists, community leaders, as well as clients who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.

My love of advocacy began as a college student in a very rural town north of Dallas. I attended an honor society convention and saw Jeanne White deliver a touching keynote address highlighting her pain and loss of her young son, Ryan White, who died while battling HIV/AIDS following a blood transfusion. Her story hooked me in and led me to volunteer at a local AIDS Service Organization that served 7,000 square miles in Texas. I served as president of a student HIV/AIDS advocacy group on the Austin College campus around the time Matthew Shepard was beaten to death. The anger and pain we all felt as we huddled around the television in the Student Union building to hear if he survived or not ignited my passion for social justice.

The path to graduate school

Prior to entering graduate school, I spent two years teaching at a therapeutic day school. I was settled in and comfortable with my job, but I felt as though a significant part of me was fading away. I was informally looking at graduate schools and was scheduled to interview at one in NYC around the time of the 9/11 tragedy. As I sat helplessly in Dallas trying to help my young students make sense of the tragedy, I knew it was time to make a change in my life and find a way to reconnect with advocacy. I interviewed at the Adler School of Professional Psychology in Chicago and knew it was a perfect fit for me.

I was settled in and comfortable, but I felt a significant part of me fading away.

By the time I left graduate school, Adler began to infuse diversity and social justice throughout the program. I found my footing again and quickly got as involved as I could in all things related to advocacy, social change, and public policy – a course I later taught at Adler. My mentor Dr. Gregory Sarlo urged me to get involved with the Illinois Psychological Association, so I did. It changed my life, gave me a new platform, and truly catapulted my career in ways I had not imagined for an early career psychologist. I served two elected terms as the chair of IPA’s Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity section. I was able to advocate and secure support of IPA to publicly endorse the removal of Gender Identity Disorder and Gender Incongruence from the DSM-5 in its early stages of development. I am very grateful that Drs. Armand Cerbone and Randy Georgemiller also noticed my passion for advocacy. Their mentoring was and continues to play an integral role in my pursuit of leadership within Division 44 and other divisions.

Organizing for psychology and LGBTQ youth

While serving this role, the entire country began to see the ugly face of homophobia, bullying and suicide surface with the September Kids in 2010. I could not sit by and watch our community wait for others to take the lead again. I organized an emergency call to action and town hall discussion for psychologists, graduate students, religious leaders, and community organizers. I took the talking points from the evening and organized a full-day symposium on anti-gay bullying, homophobia, and suicide among the gay youth population, and created the LGBTQ Youth Taskforce to begin a grassroots initiative to make the journey from the schoolyard to home safer for gay youth.

Teaching and leading by example

I moved to Tampa, Florida in 2011 to begin teaching as a core faculty member at the Florida School of Professional Psychology at Argosy University. I am proud of our accredited program because we keep it relatively small, with great student-faculty ratios for all courses. I am able to mentor students, get involved with extracurricular research projects with my students, and share my passion for advocacy. My students and colleagues know that I will do all I can to recruit others in supporting advocacy. I convinced a group of students to do the Smart Ride from Miami to Key West last November, and we are doing it again this year. I ride for those I have lost to HIV/AIDS, for those who are still very much living the reality of HIV/AIDS, and to prevent some from having to live with HIV/AIDS. I aim to lead by example and wholeheartedly believe all psychologists should.

We can do so much more than just provide psychotherapy and assessment services. Graduate students have the world ahead of them to create their own path in our field. There is a look I see in my students’ eyes, one that truly warms my heart, when they connect the importance of advocacy and the opportunities it affords us as clinicians. I see in them a sudden desire to ‘do’ or be a catalyst for social and systemic change.

Graduate students have the world ahead of them to create their own path. There is a look I see in my students’ eyes when they connect the importance of advocacy and the opportunities it affords us as clinicians.

I am terrified when I occasionally encounter ignorance and intolerance among psychologists — especially their lack of awareness regarding diversity and its pervasive impact on clients they see in practice. Sometimes we have to make easy choices, but many times we have to make difficult choices in our profession. For me, sitting silently by and watching opportunities to affect broken systems disappear is not an option.

Editor’s note: This is an invited blog post. Before Dr. Howell knew he had received the Guardian of Psychology award from the APAGS Advocacy Coordinating Team, he appointed his advisee Krista Kovatch to a leadership role in the Bay Chapter of the Florida Psychological Association, where she will serve as the Social Responsibility Chair. Dr. Howell noted, “This same talented clinician and student nominated me for this amazing award.”

My life as a grad student with a chronic illness

APAGS recently spoke with Stacey Feuer, a fourth-year clinical psychology doctoral student, about her experiences of living for the past 17 years with Gaucher disease, an often invisible chronic, genetic illness characterized by its numerous effects on the body’s organs and systems.

Stacey Feuer.

APAGS: Stacey, please tell us a little about yourself.

SF: I am currently at NOVA Southeastern University in South Florida and my focus is on health psychology, specifically the psychological impact of people living with chronic medical illnesses. Next month, I will be working with people living with HIV/AIDS during a service trip to Swaziland in Africa. I am excited to present a paper at the annual APA convention in August with Dr. Barry Nierenberg and fellow student Sarah Cooper on an integrative model we are developing to evaluate and treat medical patients. I am also involved in other research projects — one involving cognitive contributors to pain, and another on applying positive psychology to individuals living with spinal cord injury. My future plans are to continue working with people living with chronic medical illnesses as both a therapist and advocate.

APAGS: What are some of the challenges of having Gaucher as a grad student?

SF: It has been challenging in many ways. Many people, including faculty members, have difficulty understanding how this illness has impacted me because even at my sickest points I have looked perfectly healthy from the outside. As with any chronic illness that has exacerbations and remissions, it is sometimes difficult to make short- and long-term commitments with friends when your health may change from one day to the next. I have been very fortunate, however, to have some wonderful people in my life.

Even at my sickest points I looked perfectly healthy from the outside.

Returning to school as a full-time student has only been possible because of certain accommodations. This has been essential to keeping up with all of my required coursework and commitments by helping to reserve my energy and pain levels as much as possible. Since my treatments take approximately half a day at a doctor’s office, it has been necessary for me to not schedule other commitments on those days. I have learned to tell others that I am simply unavailable.

APAGS: Have any positives come from this experience?

SF: The biggest positive has been the opportunity to use my experiences to help others in similar circumstances. Isolation is one of the biggest contributing factors to depression and anxiety in people living with chronic illnesses. It is very rewarding to be able to have a positive impact on the lives of individuals who are living with ongoing negative circumstances.

It is very rewarding to have a positive impact on individuals living with ongoing negative circumstances.

APAGS: How has Gaucher shaped your decision to study psychology?

SF: Being diagnosed with Gaucher 17 years ago has had a huge impact on my decision to pursue my doctorate in clinical psychology. In my twenties, there were several years in which I was very sick, requiring several surgeries and being essentially bed-bound. During this time, I was never able to find a therapist who understood chronic medical illness. I eventually went back to school for my master’s degree in leadership development and healthcare; however, I realized that I wanted to have a more personal impact in the lives of people. This realization encouraged me to pursue my doctorate in clinical psychology and to concentrate on health psychology.

APAGS: How did Gaucher inform your decision to find the right graduate program for you?

SF: I chose NOVA because it met two basic criteria (besides academic ones) — the warm weather and proximity to a Gaucher specialist. Due to the Gaucher, I have significant bone damage. These bone issues are the primary source of my chronic pain and are exacerbated by cold, damp weather. In addition, I knew there was a Gaucher specialist 30 minutes from Nova. Most doctors are unfamiliar with rare diseases and this can make communicating with them about your needs very difficult. Knowing that I would be able to have regular access to someone very familiar with Gaucher was key.

APAGS: Thank you, Stacey. Finally, is there something you want to pass on to fellow graduate students who may have similar health challenges?

SF: I have met many students in my program who are also balancing a demanding doctoral program with chronic medical problems. We have been able to support each other most importantly by reducing that sense of isolation and validating each other’s experiences. We also swap “war stories” and share tips on how to get through the program (like discussing which professors are most likely to work with you), and remind each other to take care of ourselves.

We support each other by reducing that sense of isolation and validating each other’s experiences. We swap “war stories” and remind each other to take care of ourselves.

Recently, I decided to take an extra year to complete my coursework due to my health and general burnout. I learned that several others have made this same decision for similar reasons. There can be so much pressure to complete these programs in their prescribed timelines which often do not work for someone with ongoing health issues. I would strongly encourage other graduate students with similar health challenges to seek out peers, faculty and staff with whom they can talk about their challenges and who will help them complete their education in a way that best fits their situation. Having that support is so important and can make all the difference.

Mentorship networks: What they are, what they are good for, and how they are built.

Mentorship is a term that psychologists of all stripes often use when having conversations about their professional development. It refers to a special formative relationship between a mentee (i.e., a person who is in the process of learning) and a mentor (i.e., a person qualified to teach). In such conversations, it is not infrequent to hear psychologists (and psychologists in training) refer to their mentor or –more importantly for the purposes of this blog- their mentors.

In this blog entry I would like to present you with an idea, self-evident to some but unknown to others, that a psychologist’s professional development is best served when mentoring occurs in the context of a mentee having a network of mentors rather than a singular person who serves in that capacity.

Why have mentors?

1. Beyond justification implicit in popular folk sayings (i.e., “two heads are better than one”), there are several reasons to ensure that your professional development is guided by more than one qualified person. Perhaps foremost among these is the simple fact that –barring conditions of divinity that are at the moment outside of the realm of empirical confirmation- no one person can know everything there is to know about every domain of your professional development. Having a network of mentors raises the possibility that the guidance you will receive in any one professional decision or domain is being provided by the most qualified person you know in that area.

For example, in my own career this has meant relying on relatively recent job applicants to provide me with practical guidance when looking for a job and on more experienced faculty members when looking to avoid common mistakes that job applicants make. Having access to both groups of mentors allows for a more complete picture of the job search process, and ultimately a better and more successful search. The same principle applies to most domains of professional development in both research and practice.

2. Another reason to make sure and develop multiple mentorship relationships is that –like most other relationships among human beings- each of these will wax and wane repeatedly over time, and sometimes because of factors outside of your control. Having multiple mentors raises the possibility of accessing someone who is ideally motivated to support you exactly at the time you need it.

The most poignant example from my own career came when a mentor that I most often rely on for advice on publishing and writing was faced with an unfortunate series of severe health and family problems. Demanding that mentor’s time and resources under those conditions would have been selfish and indelicate. Having other mentors to rely on in that area allowed me to receive the guidance I needed in order to continue meeting demands of my chosen career as an academic. It also freed my time so that my conversations with the burdened mentor were spent honoring and supporting her through difficult times.

3. Having multiple mentors can also allow you greater freedom and independence. I run into colleagues, both practitioners and scholars, whose reliance on one or only a few mentors has limited –rather than enhanced- their professional choices (e.g., “I wish I could apply for that job, but I don’t know anyone in that system” or “I can’t publish this, it goes directly against what X has been saying for years.”). I’ve had only a few experiences where I have felt as they do. It is -to say the least- unpleasant to feel that after all the work you’ve put into experiencing success in your field, your growth is now inordinately affected by the whims of a person who you have little influence upon.

Whenever I’ve discovered that my professional development environments make success contingent on unfailing alliance to one particular person or set of ideas, I have immediately begun looking elsewhere (a decision most always supported by the mentors in my network).

4. This brings me to a final benefit of mentorship networks, support. Given your condition as a human being developing a career, it is possible –if not likely- that despite the availability of an ample number of fantastic mentors you will make one or more mistakes regarding your professional development. At those times, it is wonderful to have available to you a number of qualified people who are not within your immediate professional context that can help you navigate back to a sound professional course.

In the midst of my worst professional decisions, it has been my mentors who have helped me plot the course out of those decisions, and whose support has led me to believe a successful resolution is possible.

I’m sold, how do I build a mentorship network?
Before discussing specific tactics, I’d like to present you with a thought regarding the attitudinal predisposition that might facilitate your success in this endeavor: “It is difficult, if not impossible, to be mentored without being humble.” Mentorship relations are premised on the fact that a person has something to provide you that you do not have. Valued mentors are often willing to give you that something (e.g., knowledge, a skill, experience, a professional contact, etc.) in exchange for nothing other than the satisfaction of seeing you avoid a pitfall they encountered or watching you develop. Demanding and entitled attitudes on the part of mentees (often soon to be “former mentees”) certainly seem to be antithetical to fostering a mentor’s willingness to continue to assist you. Humility, appreciativeness, and graciousness seem to best honor the benefits received from your mentors.

As for where to begin, I would suggest the best place to begin building mentorship relationships is in your natural environment. Among graduate students perhaps the most natural mentors in this environment are faculty and other advanced students. For lack of humility, I’ve seen younger students ignore incredibly helpful information provided to them by more advanced students. For lack of appreciation, I’ve seen advanced students and faculty stop sharing helpful information with “could have been mentees.” The medieval philosopher Dominic of Guzman is said to have written “appreciate all the wisdom you encounter, regardless of its source.” That is perhaps the attitude most productive to developing mentors. I’ve received incredible advice from people who I’ve not expected it from, often ones who I am not particularly personally drawn to. Making sure to note the appreciation I have for that wisdom (e.g., through written or verbal comments) has ensured more wisdom in the future.

A second natural place to seek mentoring is through programs and structures developed specifically for it. Many educational institutions, programs, and professional societies have formal mentoring or professional development programs. If you find one that works for you, you’ve found a rare commodity that you should not undervalue. (This blog I hope is one example).

Professional societies provide one final place to identify potential mentors and build mentorship relationships. The more you interact with people who share your interests, the more you are likely to find some among them who are willing to guide you. When you find these people, honor and appreciate them. I’ve met some of my most valued mentors and mentees (some of whom in turn have mentored me in specific domains) sitting in the audience of a professional presentation or over lunch at a workshop.

Some final observations
Here are some things I’ve learned in the road to developing and maintaining my own mentorship networks.

1. I repeat, and will repeat it again and again, humility and appreciation go a long way. If a person is helpful to you, let them know it. A doctoral student recently came into my office frustrated that I had stopped giving her direction as I did before. Her frustration was surprise to me as I had scaled down my advice based on the lack of feedback from her about it. It is my job to teach all students at my institution. It is my pleasure and privilege to be able to mentor some. I am more likely to mentor students from whom I get a sense my mentorship is valued.

2. Initiative can work miracles. I once wondered out loud why a friend of mine got advice from one of our mentors that I –despite having more contact with this mentor- did not get. Her answer: I ask. Lesson learned, I now ask. I don’t always get an answer (or the answer I want), but –unsurprisingly- the net amount of times I do get an answer has increased exponentially.

3. Not everyone can be a mentor to everyone else. There are several professionals that I respect and admire who I’ve hoped to develop mentorship relationships with, but these have never materialized. While the reasons for this may be varied (e.g., lack of time, lack of personal compatibility. etc.), one thing I’ve learned is not to take it personally. Sometimes the inability to form a mentorship relationship has stemmed from an identifiable reason that helps me grow, others it has not. In either case, it is good self-care practice to learn as much as you can from that event and then proceed to move on with your life and professional development.

In my own life, I often refer students and more junior colleagues who seek advice or consultation from me to someone else. It is not because I do not like or value these people. Much to the contrary, it is because I value them that I refer them to someone who can serve them better than I can at the time.

4. The way you make mentors will likely match your personality. I have a colleague (that is at times a mentor to me) who has the enviable ability to walk up to seemingly anyone and enlist their help. Although I am sure that the process is at times effortful for her, observed from the outside it seems graceful and uncomplicated. As much as I’ve tried to develop that skill and will continue to work at it, it is still something that does not come naturally to me. However, for reasons I don’t fully understand I seem to do well at being an effective contributor to committees, workforces, and other such groups. It is in the context of these that I have forged many of my mentoring relationships. I have other colleagues who develop mentoring networks through social engagements at conferences such as informal lunches, tours, etc.

While it is likely wise for all professionals to take advantages of as many opportunities to develop mentoring relationships as they are afforded, my point is that not everyone will excel at the same types of opportunities. Find your strength and exploit it.

Best of luck building your mentorship network, managing it is a whole different issue (and perhaps the subject of a future blog entry).

Editor’s note: This post was written by I. David Acevedo-Polakovich, PhD; Assistant Professor; Central Michigan University. It originally appeared on the Multicultural Mentoring blog by the Society of Clinical Psychology’s Section on the Clinical Psychology of Ethnic Minorities. (APA Division 12, Section 6). It is reposted here with generous permission. Over time, you will see all eight original posts on gradPSYCH Blog.