Colin Powell Graduate Fellowship
in Leadership
and Public Service

Aleksandra Koroleva is a second-year Master’s student in Mental Health Counseling. After spending eight years as a stay-at-home mother while her family moved across four countries, Aleksandra returned to academic and clinical work she was always passionate about: improving care for people seeking treatment for Substance use. As a fellow, she wants to understand the barriers and facilitators that shape how women with Opium Use Disorder engage with treatment. Outside of her studies, Aleksandra considers herself a cinephile, enjoys reading Freud, and cooking.

Allison is a doctoral student in the Clinical Psychology program at The City College of New York. Through her research and clinical work, she is committed to understanding racial disparities in mental health care, expanding access to culturally responsive services for immigrant communities and communities of color, and examining how intersecting identities shape mental health and treatment experiences. As a fellow, she will conduct dissertation research exploring how parent–child dissonance and peer dissonance influence mental health and identity development among first-, 1.5-, and second-generation Asian immigrant adolescents and young adults.

Edoardo N. Bianchi is a multicultural psychology researcher and graduate student at The City College of New York (CCNY). Working within the ROAD Lab under Dr. Lesia Ruglass, his current research focuses on resilience and flourishing in the context of trauma and addictions. He developed his broader academic interests in psychosis, psychopathy, and barriers to treatment through prior research roles at McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School, the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), and Brooklyn College. Additionally, Edoardo works as a Behavioral Health Specialist and has volunteered for the Samaritans suicide prevention hotline. Outside of the lab, he maintains an artistic career as an actor and writer under the name Edoardo Miranda.

Najé James is a doctoral candidate in the Clinical Psychology program at The City College of New York. She earned her B.S in Psychology (summa cum laude) from The Pennsylvania State University. Her research and clinical interest are focused on Black mental health outcomes; psychosocial issues related to culture, race and ethnicity; identity development; access to mental health care; collaborative care networks; psychosis spectrum disorders and psycho-oncology. As a fellow, she will conduct research for her dissertation, which will explore mental health help seeking amongst Black emerging adults and hopes that this research will help to tailor outreach and psychoeducation efforts that bolster mental health literacy for the Black community. In her free time, Najé enjoys reading, cooking and dining at new restaurants throughout New York City.

Rachel is a doctoral student in Clinical Psychology at The City College of New York, where she works in the Attention and Neuropsychological Development (ATTEND!) lab. She holds a B.A. in Studio Art from Colorado College and a Post-Baccalaureate certificate in Psychology from Columbia University, bringing a unique interdisciplinary perspective to her research on early childhood mental health and health equity. As a fellow, she will pilot a telehealth-delivered parenting program designed to strengthen both neurocognitive development and the parent-child relationship in preschoolers with self-regulation difficulties. Rachel’s long-term goal is to develop and disseminate early interventions that reach the families who need them most. When she’s not in the lab, she enjoys doing yoga and making her way through an ever-growing Goodreads list.