Stefanie F. Smith, Ph.D is a licensed clinical psychologist who brings 30 years of youth and family focused experience across a range of sectors including public and private school education, community mental health, crisis response, health care/hospital, legal, non-profit, residential, and undergraduate and graduate training. She has served as direct service provider (teacher and psychologist), researcher and program evaluator, consultant, supervisor, trainer, professor, and executive leadership. She specializes in strategic planning, program development, and evaluation design. Her overarching expertise is in trauma specific services, and trauma-responsive care.

Currently, Dr. Smith serves as the chair for the Cultural Diversity Special Interest Group for the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, member of the Diversity Committee to ISTSS’s board, and a contributing editor to “StressPoints.” She is an affiliate member of the National Child Traumatic Stress Network.

Dr. Smith has experience presenting and training in the area of child trauma, adult trauma, complex trauma, and post-traumatic stress disorder, logic-model development, and program evaluation at the local, national, and international levels. She also has published several articles and book chapters in the field of trauma and is a co-editor of the book, International Perspectives on Traumatic Stress. Current foci include the neurophysiological impact of complex trauma, body-based interventions for trauma, and implementing trauma-informed systems. To that end, Dr. Smith has worked on helping develop trauma-informed practices for numerous schools, youth-serving agencies, and government departments. She also has received grants focused on developing and teaching program evaluation.

Dr. Smith earned a Bachelor’s in English and Psychology from Georgetown University, a teaching credential and Master’s in Education from Stanford Teacher Education Program (Stanford University) (the S.T.E.P. multicultural education program), and a Ph.D. from University of Connecticut. She completed her postdoctoral fellowship at the Trauma Center in Boston/Brookline.