I am a fifth-year doctoral student at the Harvard Laboratory for Youth Mental Health and the Co-Founder and Scientific Director of the Shamiri Institute. The Shamiri Institute is a 501(c)3 non-profit dedicated to developing, testing, and disseminating scalable mental health and wellness interventions for youth in Kenya. Through dedicated efforts of over 50 full-time staff, over 2,000 part-time staff, and many other collaborators, the Shamiri Institute has raised over five million USD and provided programming to over one hundred and thirty thousand youth.

As a youth global mental health researcher and entrepreneur, my professional aims are twofold: 1) to conduct applied, community-partnered research on psychotherapies for youth (i.e., children and adolescents) to improve quality and accessibility of youth clinical care, and 2) to deliver at scale evidence-based, yet flexible and individualized, clinical care in community settings to youth and their families. I work toward these aims primarily through research in the United States and in Kenya. Much of my research involves studying the effectiveness and moderators of treatment components using multiple methods. To this end, I am currently funded by a National Institute of Mental Health National Research Service Award to study decision making about treatment elements in modular psychotherapies such as MATCH using multi-level models and statistical learning. I am also studying the effectiveness of individual treatment elements in the Shamiri Wellness Intervention in a randomized controlled trial, working to design novel interventions and delivery systems in Kenyan high schools, and studying the effects of treatment principles using ecological momentary assessment. Finally, I have conducted several meta-analyses and systematic reviews to assess existing literature on youth psychotherapies.

As a clinical psychology graduate student, and as a researcher focused on provision of therapies in community settings, I also work directly with children and adolescents, their caregivers, and community-based professionals and lay-providers, to provide assessment and intervention services. In all of my clinical and research work, health equity, diversity, justice, and community partnership are of high priority, and I aim in my work to acknowledge and understand the role of context and life circumstances in mental health, illness, and treatment. Finally, I am passionate about mentoring and aim to provide high quality mentorship to individuals with a variety of personal characteristics and professional goals and interests.

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