Candidates for member at large for diversity

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Meet the candidates for Div. 54 member at large for diversity.

Jessica Valenzuela is a pediatric psychologist and faculty at Nova Southeastern University (NSU). She completed her internship at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded fellowship at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. Prior to joining NSU, she was a member of the faculty in the University of Cincinnati’s Clinical and Translational Science and Training Community Engagement Core. 

Valenzuela is a NIH NRSA minority fellow for her research examining prescription practices in minority youth with diabetes. She has published and presented on her work related to underserved minority youth diagnosed with diabetes, HIV, sickle cell disease and obesity. Her current research focuses on health disparities and community-based participatory research paradigms. 

Valenzuela is active in training doctoral students in the child and health concentrations at NSU through her courses and seminars, clinical supervision and research mentorship.

She has been a member of the Div. 54 Diversity Committee since 2008 and has served as the Diversity SIG chair since 2012. She has also served for several years as a reviewer for the Diversity Research Grant and currently serves on the editorial board for CPPP.

Candidate Statement

I am honored to be nominated for the member at large for diversity position. Since early in my career, I have been passionate about addressing the needs of children and families with minority status through research, clinical service and training.

Over the past seven years, I have enjoyed working with the past three members at Large for diversity, first as a member of the Diversity Committee and then as chair for the Diversity SIG. In these roles, I have enjoyed participating in initiatives including the introduction of the Div. 54 Diversity Research Grant, the development of our Diversity SIG and the creation of a platform for sharing evidence-based resources related to diversity within our membership. It has been exciting to be part of these endeavors, and I would look forward to continuing to this tradition by promoting issues related to diversity, broadly defined, within the division.

If elected, it would be my pleasure to work with the board (as well as our committee and SIG) to continue advocating for the interests of underrepresented pediatric psychologists and their work with underserved minority populations. I feel well qualified in this capacity, given my longstanding participation in the Diversity Committee and advocacy in my own center and university. I appreciate your support, and would be excited to serve in this role.

Roger Harrison is a pediatric psychologist with Nemours Alfred I. duPont Hospital for Children in Wilmington, Delaware, and clinical assistant professor of pediatrics at Sidney Kimmel College of Medicine at Thomas Jefferson University. He received his PhD in clinical psychology from Brigham Young University and completed internship and postdoctoral fellowship at A.I. duPont Hospital for Children. 

Harrison provides psychological services to patients and consultation to primary care providers in the pediatric primary care clinics affiliated with A.I. duPont Hospital. He supervises and trains graduate externs, predoctoral interns and postdoctoral fellows. A dedicated clinician, he directs the ADHD Consultation Clinic, a diagnostic evaluation program for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) at A.I. duPont Hospital and runs the Parent Child Conduct Clinic, a parent and child group therapy program offered to families of children with behavioral and/or attention concerns.

Harrison enjoys lecturing and offering presentations to various medical and allied health professionals, medical residents, teachers, parents and students on various topics, including behavior management, ADHD and executive functioning, learning disabilities, anxiety and depression.

Candidate Statement

It is a true honor to be nominated for the SPP member at large for diversity position. As a clinician working with very diverse clinic populations, a faculty psychologist training clinicians to be culturally sensitive and aware, and a person of color in an exciting subspecialty of psychology, I feel energized by the opportunity to assist in growing SPPs efforts to promote sensitivity to diversity among the populations we serve, as well as within our institutions and within the ranks of pediatric psychologists.

The face of America is rapidly changing. We will be well served by ensuring that our field reflects our nation’s diversity in our clinics, labs, universities and positions of leadership. If elected, I will strive to coordinate with all motivated parties working toward a goal of increasing cultural sensitivity and diversity awareness in pediatric psychology. I am also excited to develop or expand outreach programs to diverse student groups beginning at the undergraduate level, increasing awareness of and interest in pediatric psychology to increase the diversity of our pool of graduate students and trainees.

I look forward to this opportunity and thank you for your support.