I attended Molloy College (now Molloy University) in Rockville Centre, New York for my undergraduate education. I graduated Summa Cum Laude with a major in Psychology and a minor in Chemistry, and received honors from the Department of Psychology & Counseling for my distinguished academic achievement. My thesis project investigated the interaction between priming and locus of control on memory recall, and the results were presented at the annual Long Island Psychology Conference in 2014.

The year I graduated from my undergraduate institution, I began attending the Psychology in Education M. A. program at Teachers College | Columbia University. During my time at TC, I specialized in statistics and advanced research methods while working with Drs. George Bonanno and Joseph Geraci as a Research Support Staff member at the Resilience Center for Veterans & Families. My graduate thesis examined latent growth trajectories of Veterans following their transition from military to civilian life, and how classifications of these trajectories were related to specific outcomes via growth mixture modeling.

Although I enjoyed supporting Veterans through research, I also noticed the importance of mental healthcare in facilitating this unique and difficult life transition, especially in the context of any mental health concerns. To that end, I applied and was admitted to the Ph. D. program in Clinical Psychology at Hofstra University under the mentorship of Dr. Mitchell Schare in the Phobia & Trauma Clinic. I specialized in the use of exposure therapy in various modalities (in vivo, imaginary, virtual reality) to treat issues across the anxiety disorder spectrum, from specific phobia to PTSD. I complemented this training with externships in treating patients from a variety of backgrounds and across the developmental spectrum; from young adulthood at Hofstra Student Counseling Services to the geriatric population at the Northwell Health Zucker Hillside Hospital Geropsychology Clinic. I have also had the pleasure of receiving mentorship from Dr. Erin Reilly in the READ Lab at Hofstra, and publishing several peer-reviewed articles as a co-author and statistics consultant with both peers and mentors alike.

I completed my APA-accredited internship at the Veterans Healthcare System of the Ozarks in Fayetteville, Arkansas. As the Trauma Recovery Program (TRP) intern, I had the pleasure of working year-round with the excellent staff in the TRP providing high-quality evidence-based care for Veterans with PTSD and other co-morbid concerns. On August 31st, 2022, I defended my dissertation, entitled The Efficacy and Acceptability of Written Exposure Therapy for Veterans with PTSD: A Retrospective Chart Review.

I am currently a T32 Postdoctoral Fellow in Traumatic Stress Studies at the National Center for PTSD (Behavioral Sciences Division). My goal is to continue to expand my skillset and experience in conducting research on the effectiveness of PTSD treatments in an effort to put them in the hands of more people who need them.