Mentoring Channel - About Cathryn

Cathryn is known famously in her professional and private networks as "Blue." She is a Ph.D. graduate student in the experimental social psychology department at Saint Louis University (SLU), where she is currently working on a thesis which involves research on racial identity. She is also a mentor through a program called SOJOURN, which is organized through the department of African American Studies at SLU. The purpose of SOJOURN is to introduce African American freshman girls to upperclass women, graduate students, faculty, and staff so that they feel a better sense of community when they arrive at SLU. Furthermore, she is on the board of Nia Kuumba, a Catholic-based program that focuses on the empowerment of African American women in the St. Louis community.

Besides her academic and community endeavors, she is an aspiring guitarist, songwriter, and vocalist, who has been featured at local venues and festivals and performs regularly at open mic nights, where she has received high praise from other musicians. There is a delicate balance between pursuing a music career and a doctoral degree, but her mind is focused on her education and her calling as a researcher and educator.

In the future, besides being a platinum-selling rock star, Cathryn wants to do research in an academic setting. She also wants to continue to be a mentor to younger women of all cultures and ethnicities and to be a positive influence on everyone with whom she comes in contact. Her research interests include racial identity, racism, inter-partner violence, and minority women's issues in various cultures.

Read Cathryn's Blog! Grad School: How I Survive

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