In August, APA released its Racial Equity Action Plan and simultaneously announced the creation of the Leadership Development Institute (LDI). The purpose of the LDI is to serve as a science-based, central hub for all APA leadership development, training and mentoring programs, including APA’s Leadership Institute for Women in Psychology and Minority Fellowship Programopens in new window.
Both programs have a long proud record due to the support of APA’s members, experts in the field, and federal funding from the National Institutes of Health and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Many of MFP’s 2,200 alumni have gone onto distinguished careers and positions in APA leadership such as past-president Melba J. T. Vazquez, PhD. LIWP has over 400 alumni with past-presidents Jessica Henderson Daniel, PhD, and Jennifer F. Kelly, PhD, on its advisory committee and past-president Sandy Shullman as a founding member and current faculty member. LIWP also received presidential citations in 2017 and 2019. LIWP and MFP are respectively celebrating their 15th and 48th anniversaries this year. Three factors led to the creation of the Leadership Development Institute. Namely,
- recommendations from the Council of Representatives’ Good Governance Project,
- consistent feedback throughout the years from APA members about the need for coordinated leadership programs for marginalized scholars, and
- opportune alignment with APA’s EDI framework and racial equity efforts.
The LDI will build on this strong foundation and allow APA to accelerate its racial equity work by cultivating leaders who can act as global champions of equity, diversity, and inclusion. The current top priorities for the LDI are:
- to assess ways that APA can foster innovation in leadership development,
- evolve its existing flagship leadership programs, and
- create new programming that would be impactful for the broader membership.
This work is being led by Janice Y.S. Haskins, PhD, (head of APA Leadership Development Institute) and her team, with input from an interdisciplinary advisory committee consisting of members from LIWP, MFP, the Diversity Leadership Program, and experts in the field.
Next Steps
In the short to medium term, Haskins and her team will focus on:
- communicating LDI’s purpose and priorities to APA staff, divisions, boards, and committees, and
- outlining the programming that has already been established, future programs that meet the needs of scholars from graduate to advanced career levels, and exactly how potential applicants can participate.
