Northern Illinois University
Department of Psychology
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences

Dr. Davielle (Davi) Lakind brings expertise in community-engaged research, implementation science, and community psychology to NIU’s psychology department. She received her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC), completed a predoctoral internship at UIC’s Institute for Juvenile Research and postdoctoral fellowship at the University of South Carolina, and for the last five years has been a faculty member in the Department of Clinical Psychology at Mercer University in Atlanta, GA. Dr. Lakind’s research focuses on leveraging everyday settings such as schools and community-based organizations to promote mental health and wellbeing for youth and families in communities impacted by stressors related to poverty, adversity, and structural racism. These communities have included Black and Latine communities in Chicago, rural communities in South Carolina, and refugee and immigrant communities in and around Atlanta. She works in collaboration with community partners to develop, implement, and/or enhance mental health service models that fit specific settings and communities’ contexts, strengths, and their own identified needs, with a consistent focus on culturally responsive and trauma-informed services, engaging and supporting whole families, and effectively training, supervising, and supporting the workforces providing services.

Dr. Lakind’s passion for effective and compassionate training, supervision, and support extends into her work with students as a mentor and classroom teacher, and her commitment to equity, justice, and empowerment drives her national service work as Chair of the Association of Behavioral and Cognitive Therapy’s (ABCT) Dissemination, Implementation, and Community Engagement Committee and member of ABCT’s Behavioral Health Equity Committee. Outside of her professional pursuits, Dr. Lakind loves to garden, cook, hike, watch movies, see art and music, and spend time with loved ones.