Contact: Michael Tullier, APR, Office of Communications, Public Relations and Marketing
As part of Ƶ’s homecoming celebration the week of Oct. 15-21, the College of Arts and Sciences honored 2005 graduate Dr. Courtney Lockhart McMickens as its 2018 Most Distinguished Alumna Award recipient. She was recognized as part of the college’s fourth annual homecoming open house, held on Friday, Oct. 19.
A native of nearby Opelika, Alabama, McMickens currently is a child and adolescent psychiatrist in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where she focusses on community-based systems of care that promote resilience in under-resourced and traumatized communities, as well as programs that decrease the stigma of mental health.
“Tuskegee is that place that molds you and prepares you for your future,” McMickens told students, faculty, staff and alumni attending her lecture in the Tompkins Hall Auditorium. “The opportunity to study here gave me a solid foundation in the medical field that has followed me throughout the years.”
She encouraged students to embrace every opportunity, no matter how it comes packaged.
“Take advantage of your summers, and attend as many summer programs as you can –– that’s where you’ll have an opportunity to work in labs, do research and have a hands-on experience,” she recommended. “It’s at that point that you truly discover your passion in life.”
After graduating summa cum laude from Tuskegee, McMickens earned a master’s in public health from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and a medical degree from Harvard Medical School. She also completed a general psychiatry residency at the University of Pennsylvania, and a child and adolescent psychiatry fellowship at Cambridge Health Alliance/Harvard Medical School. She later participated in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholars Program at Yale School of Medicine and served on the faculty of the Boston University School of Medicine.
She was a 2008-09 Zuckerman Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School Center on Public Leadership, a 2012-14 American Psychiatric Association Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration Fellow, and a 2014 American College of Psychiatrists Laughlin Fellow.
McMickens has published and presented on topics related to improving readiness for integrated mental health transformation, assessing school mental health crises, evaluating the impact of childhood trauma with childcare settings, and providing community-based treatment of maternal depression. She is a co-author of the book “AIDS: Biographies of
Disease” and a contributing author for the recently published book, “Pediatric Mental Health for Primary Care Providers – A Clinician’s Guide.
She is married to Dr. Tryan L. McMickens, who earned a bachelor’s in sales, marketing and business administration from Tuskegee in 2005. He currently serves as an associate professor and director of the Administration of Higher Education Program in Suffolk University’s College of Arts and Sciences. Together, they have a son named Baldwin.
To learn more about the College of Arts and Sciences, visit www.tuskegee.edu/cas.
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