Donna San Antonio
Professional Title: Assistant Professor of Counseling and Psychology
Areas of Academic Focus and Expertise:
School Counseling, Adolescent Development, Rural Education, Adventure Therapy, Program Development, Participatory Action Research.
Area of Work and Concentration at Lesley: Counseling and Psychology, School and Community focus.
Representative List of Recent Courses Taught:
• Orientation to Professional Psychology
• Theories of Counseling and Psychotherapy
• Clinical Skills and Counseling Processes
• Counseling Adolescents
• Psychology of Culture and Identity
• Advanced Seminar
• Professional Integrative Seminar
Education: B.A., Sociology, University of New Hampshire; M.Ed., Counseling, University of New Hampshire; Ed.M., International Education, Harvard University; CAS, Human Development and Psychology, Harvard University; Ed.D., Administration, Planning, and Social Policy, Harvard University
Licensed School Psychologist and School Guidance Counselor.
Representative List of Recent Publications / Exhibitions:
Conferences
San Antonio, D. (2012, October) Effective Cross Disciplinary Teaming. 17th Annual Conference on Advancing School Mental Health. Salt Lake City, UT.
San Antonio, D. (2012, April) “I got grand things in me and America won’t let me give nothing:” Contrasting perspectives on immigration then and now. Symposium on Immigration: Centennial Anniversary of the 1912 Strike. Lawrence, MA.
Publications
San Antonio, D., Marcel, E., Tieken, M., & Wiener, K. (2011, April) Lives in transition: What students say. Educational Leadership Online, Vol. 68, No. 7. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
San Antonio, D. (2008, April) Understanding students’ strengths and struggles. Educational Leadership, Vol. 65, No. 7. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
San Antonio, D. & Salzfass, E. (2007, May) How we treat one another in school. Educational Leadership, Vol. 64, No. 8. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
Fun Facts:
Former Licensed Middle-High School teacher
Competitive Canoeist
Donna Marie San Antonio has worked as a community organizer, middle school teacher, school counselor, outdoor educator, non-profit administrator, and university instructor. She came to Lesley University in 2011 after teaching for seven years in the Risk and Prevention Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. For twenty-five years, she directed the Appalachian Mountain Teen Project, an activity-based counseling program that she founded in 1984 to serve low-income and struggling youth in central and northern NH. Dr. San Antonio is a frequent consultant to rural school and community programs addressing social, emotional, and economic barriers to success for children and youth. Her work in the northernmost part of NH continues as the Inventing the Future Project – a project that strengthens the capacity of schools and communities to guide low-income young people toward higher education and good careers. “The Inventing the Future Project will provide possibilities for me to collaborate with graduate students to work with school counselors, mentor referred youth, and engage in research and writing. I enjoy working across diverse sectors of the community and I believe in involving youth as active participants in addressing issues that threaten their well being, such as poverty, racism, trauma, sexism, and homophobia.” As a classroom instructor, Dr. San Antonio values, “working to create a classroom community that offers a high level of active critical reflection and dialogue.” She enjoys being outdoors, especially hiking, biking, canoeing, cross-country skiing, and snowshoeing.
Research interests include developmental transitions for adolescents and emerging adults; rural education; social class and education/career opportunity; experiential education; adventure therapy; school-based mentoring; school climate and social-emotional development; cross-role and cross-institutional collaboration; cross-cultural ethnographic research; and community and school-based participatory action research for social change.