Congratulations to new McNair Scholar Bakima Ssebanakitta! Bakima was selected by the McNair Scholars’ selection committee on the basis of her passion for research, commitment to attaining a PhD, and overall potential for success in graduate school.
The federally-funded TRIO Ronald E. McNair Post-baccalaureate Achievement Program at EWU selects motivated and talented juniors and seniors who are first-generation and low-income college students, and/or from groups underrepresented at the doctoral level to introduce them to academic research and provide them with effective strategies for getting into and graduating from PhD programs.
Bakima Ssebanakitta is an undergraduate at Eastern Washington University, majoring in Psychology through the Honors Program. Ssebanakitta has seven years of experience in professional life coaching, mediation, and end-of-life facilitation applications. Pursuing a path towards a PhD in Psychology, Ssebanakitta plans to expand into tenured professorship and private counseling practice. In counseling, her aim is to educate clients on self-advocacy and somatic approaches to healing. She hopes her research and creative writing background will merge valid academic knowledge into the public sphere, culminating in an actionable book for humanity. Currently, Ssebanakitta is focusing research pursuits in the quantitative relationships between stress and resiliency under the mentorship of Dr. Jillene Seiver. Future research interests include the cause of motivation, grief navigation, equitable societal applications, and grief scale creation.
We look forward to accompanying Bakima as her research unfolds!
