Student Affiliates of Seventeen – Summer 2015

Greetings SCP Members!

As the Co-Chairs of SAS, we are pleased to share with the SCP membership our past activities and future initiatives.

Since our Spring 2015 contribution, SAS has been busy disseminating our annual SAS Awards, developing SAS programming hours for the Annual APA Convention, coordinating a E-Mentoring program, participating in advocacy efforts regarding race relations in the U.S., and helping to create workgroups to address educational issues affecting SCP students.

The SAS Awards Committee Co-Chairs, Sneha Pitre, M.A. and Brian Fitts, M.A. (Cleveland State University) along with the SAS Awards Review Committee, Stephanie Carrera, M.S. (Iowa State University), Ellie Castine, M.S. (Boston University), Ingrid Hogge, M.A. (Southern Illinois University Carbondale), Tiffany Chang, M.S. (Indiana University Bloomington), and Cecile Gadson, M.A. (University of Tennessee) have been carefully working on selecting the winners for the annual SAS Awards. The SAS Awards consists of Practice, Social Justice, Research, and Travel Awards. To congratulate the hard work and distinction of awardees, an awards ceremony will be held at the 2015 American Psychological Association Annual Convention during the SAS Business Meeting and Social Hour (August 7th from 2:00 PM-3:50 PM) in the Northern Lights Ballroom. Furthermore, the SCP Science Advisory Board, along with SAS Co-Chair, Brittan Davis, M.Ed. and SAS Awards Committee Co-Chair, Brian Fitts, M.A. (Cleveland State University) have also been working on selecting the winner for the SCP Student Science Award. Stay tuned for the forthcoming announcement of the winners!

Programming Co-Chairs, Erica Wiley Whiteman, M.A. and Lela Pickett, M.A., (Cleveland State University) have been diligently working on student programming to take place at the 2015 Annual APA Convention. SAS will host three different discussion and mentoring sessions titled, Difficult Dialogue: Conversations About Privilege, Oppression, and Microaggressions (Thursday, August 6th, 10:00 – 10:50 AM, Aurora Room), How To Get What You Want Out of Graduate School: Discussion and Mentoring Hour (Friday, August 7th, 12:00 – 12:50 PM, Raptor Room) and Combining Our Professional and Personal Identities through Work-Life Balance: Discussion and Mentoring Hour (Friday, August 7th, 1:00 – 1:50 PM, Blue Jays Room). These sessions will support the professional development of graduate students through the facilitation of conversations on systemic and institutional oppression; work-life balance in relation to diverse personal and social identities; and how to be successful in ones’ graduate training. There will be a Call for Proposals for student co-facilitators distributed through the SAS and SCP listservs.

Erica Wiley Whiteman, M.A. and Lela Pickett, M.A., also developed and distributed a Call for Proposals for a SAS Symposium titled, Social Identities and Intersectionality: Social Justice Perspectives (Sunday, August 9th, 11:00 – 11:50 AM, Convention Center Room 202B), which has been accepted for the 2015 APA Convention in Toronto. We are thrilled to announce that we have selected the following three proposals: Transforming the Acronym: How the Development of Intersecting Identities is Socially Experienced by: Rebecca Shoemaker, M.A., Sarah Rich, B.A., Catherine Coppola, B.S., Rachel Neff, M.A. and Ciera Payne, M.S. (Chatham University); Dynamics in Multicultural Counseling Skill Development: Social Interaction Model by: Stephanie Paulk, M.A., and Janet Helms, Ph.D. from Boston College; and Keep On Keeping On: A Qualitative Investigation of Diverse College Student Social Justice Advocates by Pauline Venieris, M.A. (Arizona State University). Dr. Rebecca Toporek (San Francisco State University) will serve as the discussant for the SAS symposium. Dr. Toporek is one of the editors of the Handbook for Social Justice in Counseling Psychology: Leadership, Vision, and Action and The Journal for Social Action in Counseling and Psychology. Please be sure to add this symposium to your APA schedules!

Furthermore, we recognize that some minority students (e.g., racial, sexual, gender-transgressive, ethnic, religious minorities) do not always have faculty and students with like identities who are accessible within their program and they may not have the same mentoring experiences and opportunities as their more socially privileged counterparts. Therefore, SAS Mentoring Co-Chairs, Sneha Pitre, M.A. and Ashley Poklar, M.Ed. (Cleveland State University), have steered the SAS E-Mentoring Initiative, which will provide a space to address unique challenges experienced by minority students and the intersection of personal and professional identities. The Call for Mentors and Mentees will commence summer 2015!

SAS has continued to collaborate with the APAGS Advocacy Coordinating Team, APAGS Diversity and Education Members-At-Large, Committee for the Advancement of Racial and Ethnic Diversity, and the National Multicultural Conference and Summit Student Planning Committee to host a second call for the difficult dialogue series, Grad Students Talk: Processing Events Including Ferguson and Staten Island, which took place on April 17, 2015. These calls have provided an environment for psychology students in all Divisions to discuss and process their reactions to oppression experienced by people of color within the United States. Through this collaboration, SCP students have been recognized as leaders in multicultural issues.

SAS has partnered with the SCP Vice President for Education and Training, Dr. Marie Miville (Teachers College, Columbia University), and the student leader of the currently unaffiliated student alliance for all counselors, Katy Shaffer, M.A. (University at Albany) to address critical issues related Council for Accreditation of Counseling & Related Educational Programs (CACREP) policies that could affect the professional future of SCP students. Katy Shaffer, along with Dr. Rachael Goodman (George Mason University) and Dr. Jason Gallo (University at Albany) have been working with Dr. Miville to develop ideas to help inform and engage students within SCP. The student alliance aims to create a website and listserv, as well as utilize social media (Facebook and LinkedIn), to provide information regarding masters’ level training issues including accreditation. SAS will distribute the student alliance for all counselors website information when it becomes available.

As we near our third year as the SAS Host Institution, we have developed a Call for Proposals for the next SAS Host Institution for the 2016-2019 term. The Call will be distributed via SAS and SCP listservs and social media, and will have an application deadline of Tuesday, November 3, 2015 by 11:59 PM EST. Becoming the next SAS Host Institution affords students with the opportunity to develop leadership skills at the national level, as well as provide students the opportunity to network and establish connections within SAS, SCP, APAGS, and APA. We look forward to selecting the next SAS Host Institution in January 2016!

To become a member of SAS, students must first become a student affiliate of APA and then join Division 17 as a student affiliate, to automatically become a member of SAS. Join the SAS listserv, SCP listserv, and SAS social media sites for news on upcoming SAS activities during the 2015 – 2016 academic year.

We look forward to seeing you in Toronto!

Brittan Davis

&

Ashley Oliver

Co-Chairs, Student Affiliates of Seventeen

Cleveland State University

[email protected]