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GCE - Dean's Office
Wheatley Hall, Floor 01, Room 00077
Tel. 617-287-7600
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Student Spotlight
Tari Selig
Throughout her time in our program, Tari has served as both a formal and informal leader among her peers, including serving as a very active officer of the student club. As a result, Tari has been selected as a co-recipient of the 2008 Vincent Cristiani Leadership Award by the school psychology faculty.
Tari is working toward her C.A.G.S. degree in School Psychology, having already completed her MEd, and will be completing her internship this year. Tari completed her practicum in the Quincy (MA) Schools and her internship in the Pinellas County (Florida) Public Schools. In these positions she has demonstrated competency in the full range of school psychological services including prevention programs, early intervention programs, assessment of disabilities, provision and monitoring of interventions, and collaborating with parents, teachers, and students to improve student functioning. Of particular note is her work facilitating the transition of an elementary school to the Response to Intervention (RTI) model of providing services to children, wherein formative evaluations and ongoing progress monitoring facilitate the implementation of successful evidence-based interventions.
In addition to these roles, Tari has garnered additional experiences that have called upon her leadership skills. These include serving as a mental health counselor at Franciscan Children’s Hospital in Brighton, Massachusetts and Hampstead Hospital in Hampstead New Hampshire, where she focused on helping children and adolescents develop anger management and social skills, coordinated behavior management plans, oversaw educational programs, and conducted therapeutic interventions using applied behavior analysis. While at Simmons College, Tari developed her leadership skills by serving as a resident advisor; creating campus-wide events; collaborating programs to ensure student safety; working closely with Residence Life staff to develop problem solving, conflict management and crisis intervention skills; and organizing in-service training for colleagues.
Tari has particular interest and skills in working with high risk youth and crisis intervention, both of which will draw upon her leadership skills. She is planning to accept a position as a school psychologist in New Hampshire and school psychologists in that state are already looking forward to her taking a leadership role to facilitate their transition to the RTI model of practice.
Cali White
The recipient of this year’s award for Outstanding Academic Achievement in School Psychology is Cali White. Throughout her time at UMass Boston, Cali has stood out as a stellar student, as evidenced by her perfect 4.0 grade point average.
While at UMass Boston Cali completed practica in the Boston and Quincy school systems. At the Dorchester Education Complex she provided individual counseling services to high school students regarding issues of depression, anger management, teen pregnancy, college preparation and family relationships. She also co-led a counseling group concentrating on pro-social skills with high school students diagnosed with Asperger’s and Pervasive Developmental Disorder. She assisted in compiling data to identify students in danger of failing the school year and formulated individual success plans with the student and teachers and completed achievement testing for students receiving special education. In the Quincy Public Schools, she worked closely with an elementary school teacher with a highly diverse student population. Here she taught safety and violence prevention lessons and conducted a counseling group. She has also worked for the Center for Social Development and Education at University of Massachusetts Boston, where she assisted in research for U Mass Boston project on children with emotional disturbances in the public schools. Cali is completing her internship in the California at the San Mateo Union High and the Burlingame School Districts, where her responsibilities include psycheducational assessment, report writing, individual and group counseling, intervention development and implementation, consultation and participating in team meetings. Cali’s work in her internship had been held in such high esteem that she has been hired to take over for a school psychologist who left midyear unexpectedly. Although not yet finished her program, she is working independently at two elementary schools with some time at the middle school and two days in another district for the high school. They are interested in hiring her permanently.
Faculty have found Cali’s academic work to be of an extremely high caliber and unanimously support her receipt of this award. We feel fortunate to have students such as Cali in our program.
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Lisa King
From the time she entered the program, Lisa stood out as a remarkably thoughtful and capable student. Consequently, she was encouraged to serve as the UMass Boston student liaison with the National Association of School Psychologists. Lisa fulfilled and surpassed the obligations in this position, to the point that she proved herself to be an extraordinary leader among her peers. As a result of her work in this capacity, Lisa has been selected as a co-recipient of the 2008 Vincent Cristiani Leadership Award by the school psychology faculty.
Lisa will be completing her C.A.G.S. degree in School Psychology this year. Lisa completed her practicum in the Randolph Public (MA) Schools and her internship in the Brookline (MA) Public Schools. In these positions she has demonstrated competency in the full range of school psychological services including prevention programs, early intervention programs, assessment of disabilities, provision and monitoring of interventions, and collaborating with parents, teachers, and students to improve student functioning. However, it is important to note that in addition to her expertise as a school psychologist, Lisa has garnered additional experiences that greatly inform her work. It is particularly noteworthy that in many of these positions she assumed a leadership role, as befits her strengths in academic, organizational, and interpersonal skills. Lisa’s experiences include working as an instructor with the Urban Scholars program at UMass Boston; working as a shelter manager and director of residential services in Dorchester and Waltham, Massachusetts; serving as a college admissions counselor; working as a teaching assistant; and engaging in a variety of roles as a research assistant. Altogether, Lisa has experience working intensely with widely diverse individuals in terms of socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, age, and disability. She has worked with a wide range of parents, from those who are intensely and even overly involved with their children, to those that struggle to even survive and muster the energy to care for their children. These experiences have led to Lisa’s particular interest in fostering parental involvement for disadvantaged and at-risk children and youth. We anticipate that in the future she will take a leadership role in facilitating progress in this challenging area.
Cindy Adamchek
Cindy Adamchek, has demonstrated remarkable skills in applied scholarship throughout her graduate education at UMass Boston despite simultaneously parenting Christopher, now two years old. As a graduate assistant, Cindy provided invaluable assistance gathering, aggregating, and interpreting outcomes data for the extension of approval of the School Psychology Program by the National Association of School Psychologists. She also was very helpful in the preparation of the book manuscript Professional Development and Supervision of School Psychology. Finally, during her internship Cindy has demonstrated extraordinary clinical skill in applying evidence-based interventions to assist students.
Cindy has excelled throughout her academic career at UMass Boston. Her grade point average is one of the highest in her class and her work is consistently of very high quality. Prior to entering our program, Cindy attained a master’s degree in child and family development and was licensed as a mental health counselor, certified as a criminal justice addictions specialist, and certified as a domestic violence counselor. With these credentials, she was a behavioral health assessment therapist wherein she conducted diagnostic evaluations of children who were removed from their homes due to abuse and neglect, assessed family functioning and made recommendations to the courts. She also was the director of a consulting firm specializing in management consultation through the Federal Supply Schedule for Human Resource and EEO services; a program director of a high-intensity residential programs for psychiatric/chemically dependent clients transitioning into the community from psychiatric hospitals; and a clinician working with clients with psychiatric, addiction and dual diagnosis. While at UMass Boston, Cindy completed a practicum in the Quincy Schools that focused on prevention and early intervention work. Currently, she is completing her internship in the Waltham (MA) Public Schools at the elementary and secondary levels. During her internship she has conducted assessments, provided individual and group counseling, consulted with teachers regarding the development and implementation of evidence-based interventions, facilitated team building process groups with teachers, and conducted program reevaluations.
The faculty are pleased to recognize Cindy’s work with this award with the full knowledge that her commitment to applied research will continue to enrich her work as a school psychologist.
Katia da Rosa
Inspired by teachers early on in her academic journey and by the students whom she tutored and mentored during high school, Katia da Rosa chose to challenge the “blatant inequities in urban schools” by studying to become a teacher. Although teaching has not been her family’s primary choice of career for her, Katia’s experiences in the classroom as part of her degree continuously remind of why teachers like her are needed in urban schools. In her view,“teachers are the beacons that guide individuals toward success and development. If there were no teachers, we would not have the phenomenal individuals that have affected so much change in our society.”
Shawn Pirelli
Viewing the classroom as a “sanctuary for those craving discovery, free thought, experimentation, and questions,” Shawn Pirelli views his role as a classroom teacher not simply as one who imparts knowledge and facilitates critical discussion between his students. Pirelli envisions himself as a teacher who will empower students to use their technical knowledge to become better citizens aware of their role in the social, economic, and environmental trajectories of their communities, immediate and distant. As part of his field experience, he encourages his students to see the linkages between historical and current events and to think critically of how their actions as students and citizens impact theirs and future generations.
The Graduate College of Education is proud to be represented by these two exemplary teacher candidates, Katia da Rosa and Shawn Pirelli.