The Society of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology (SCCAP) enjoys a long history of efforts at outreach, dedication, and programming relevant to its Early Career Members (ECMs). SCCAP thrives when it fosters the development of ECMs, as they represent the next generation of mentors who will train the generation of ECMs that follow them. We propose a Special Interest Group devoted to Professional Development and Mentoring (PDM SIG), with a specific emphasis on SCCAP’s ECMs. Through a partnership with an annual meeting devoted to the professional development and mentoring of ECMs (i.e., Future Directions Forum), the PDM SIG will advocate for ECM interests, provide a means for established SCCAP members to consult and provide guidance, and solicit information from ECMs on professional development programming and mentoring opportunities of interest to them.
The PDM SIG’s mission is of relevance to the SCCAP membership broadly. As such, the PDM SIG will be open to any SCCAP member, regardless of career stage. That said, the PDM SIG’s mission will be of particular relevance to a diverse group of ECMs and allied partners. Per APA’s definition of an Early Career Psychologist (ECP), this group would include those in the first 10 years of their career post-Ph.D. Student Members will also form a core base of membership, and because Student Membership at SCCAP comes free of charge, these SIG members would incur no financial barriers to join the SIG. An important consideration is that no existing SIG at SCCAP was explicitly founded to center ECMs and their needs. In this respect, we expect the PDM SIG to serve as a “gateway” for ECMs to join SCCAP. This gateway function of the PDM SIG addresses a perennial issue that faces professional societies broadly, namely how to maintain members in the transition from Student Members to “Full Members.” The PDM SIG focuses on ECMs enrolled in training programs as well as throughout their first decade of post-training work. This feature of the PDM SIG helps SCCAP to justify its value to members across the ECM period, thus facilitating long-term membership in SCCAP. Beyond ECMs, the PDM SIG welcomes mid-career and senior-level SCCAP Members―many of whom have extensive expertise in the mentoring and professional development of ECMs, and thus reflect a core segment of PDM SIG members. Crucially, our list of Founding Members includes members who traverse career stages. As such, we listed below for each Founding Member their name, email address, SCCAP membership category, and career stage.
To encourage accountability and representation, the rich diversity of membership in the PDM SIG will inform its leadership structure. Student Members and Members of SCCAP will share leadership roles, with board positions for members at various career stages (e.g., student, ECP, mid-career, senior). Beyond career stages, we expect to include board roles for ECMs at various stages of training (e.g., undergraduate, post-baccalaureate, master’s, doctoral, post-doctoral). Governing members will work together to produce professional development and mentoring opportunities that center SCCAP’s ECMs.
The PDM SIG’s annual meeting, the Future Directions Forum, is where we expect to hold our annual board meetings. The value of this infrastructure is that the Future DirectionsForum will serve as a capstone for the PDM SIG’s year-round activities. We expect to hold monthly board meetings virtually, at which a member of our Executive Board, the Community Manager, will lead discussions surrounding virtual programming offered throughout the year, and collaborate with the board to design social events for the APA Convention. Collectively, these activities will serve to engage PDM SIG members year-round, and create an outlet for attendees who have yet to become SCCAP members to learn more about the society and see the value of becoming a member.
Founding Members
| Name (SCCAP Membership Category & Career/Training Stage) |
|---|
| Hannah Ades (Student Member, Master’s-Level) |
| Donte Bernard (Member, Early-Career) |
| Jennifer Cutri (Student Member, Doctoral-Level) |
| Andres De Los Reyes (Fellow, Senior-Level) |
| Mary Fristad (Fellow, Senior-Level) |
| Chardée Galán (Member, Early-Career) |
| Alli Hollender (Student Member, Doctoral-Level) |
| Kate Humphreys (Member, Early-Career) |
| Emma Ilyaz (Student Member, Doctoral-Level) |
| Traci Kennedy (Member, Early-Career) |
| Emily Lang (Student Member, Post-Baccalaureate) |
| David Langer (Member, Mid-Career) |
| Jannah Moussaoui (Student Member, Post-Baccalaureate) |
| Matthew Nock (Member, Senior-Level) |
| Hide Okuno (Student Member, Doctoral-Level) |
| Mitch Prinstein (Fellow, Senior-Level) |
| Sarah Racz (Member, Mid-Career) |
| Rebecca Schwartz-Mette (Member, Mid-Career) |
| Zoe Smith (Member, Early-Career) |
| Ian Sotomayor (Student Member, Post-Baccalaureate) |
| Elizabeth Talbott (Member, Senior-Level) |
| Kathy Trang (Member, Early-Career) |
| Amy West (Member, Senior-Level) |
| Henry Willis (Member, Early-Career) |
| Hao Xu (Student Member, Doctoral-Level) |
Questions? Contact Co-chairs
Andres De Los Reyes, PhD
Hannah Ades, MS
PDMSIG@SCCAP53.org
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