Associate Editors
S Anandavalli (she, her, hers), PhD, NCC, LPC (I), CCTP, is an award-winning, nationally recognized trauma-informed mental health counselor and counselor educator. She is the owner and founder of Soulfulness Counseling, LLC, a private practice dedicated to serving women who have been exposed to early childhood trauma. An expert on minority women’s mental health needs, she has served as a consultant and speaker for several nonprofits and Oregon state government agencies. She is a leader and change agent within the counseling profession and has spearheaded several grant-funded research initiatives which have been published in top-tier peer-reviewed counseling and allied journals. A former tenure-track assistant professor, she currently adjuncts for several accredited counseling programs.
Robin DuFresne (she, her, hers), PhD, NCC, ACS, LPCC-S, is a graduate of the Counselor Education and Supervision program at the University of Toledo. She is currently an assistant professor of graduate counseling and the field coordinator at Heidelberg University in Tiffin, Ohio. Dr. DuFresne also owns a small practice focusing on supervision of dependently licensed counselors. Her clinical experience has focused on working with individuals with severe and persistent mental illness in the community mental health setting as well as working with individuals diagnosed with developmental disabilities. Dr. DuFresne has served the counseling profession at both the local and national levels. She has experience with both quantitative and qualitative research and has served as a peer reviewer for The Professional Counselor since 2018.
Courtney E. Gasser (she, her, hers), PhD, NCC, LP, is a counseling psychologist licensed in the state of Maryland, a National Certified Counselor, and an associate professor of applied behavioral sciences at the University of Baltimore. She received her master’s and doctoral degrees from Iowa State University, where she trained as a counselor, researcher, and instructor and developed specialties in vocational psychology and counseling supervision. For the past 20+ years, Dr. Gasser has pursued these interests in the clinical, research, and pedagogical domains. In her clinical work, she has helped adults experiencing mental health and career issues in both individual and group settings and has expertise in providing clinical supervision to students training to be counselors and psychologists. She is knowledgeable in the use of a variety of personality, intellectual, and career assessments and tools. In her research, Dr. Gasser has examined constructs such as personality, career interests, educational aspirations, and self-efficacy. Recently, her work has focused on helping adult students in career transition. Dr. Gasser enjoys teaching and training graduate and undergraduate students in counseling psychology and mentoring them through their career process.
Mike Kalkbrenner, PhD, NCC, is an associate professor of counseling and educational psychology at New Mexico State University. He received his doctorate in counselor education and supervision from Old Dominion University and his MS in mental health counseling from The College at Brockport, State University of New York. Dr. Kalkbrenner’s research agenda is centered on two major themes—psychometrics and college student mental health, and measurement and evaluation of dimensions of integrated mental and physical wellness. He has utilized quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods research paradigms, with an emphasis on quantitative methodology in psychometrics and other multivariate statistical analyses. Dr. Kalkbrenner’s teaching pedagogy is based on John Dewey’s theory of experiential learning and the flipped classroom in which the instructor is responsible for the learning environment and students are responsible for their own learning. Dr. Kalkbrenner has clinical experience providing counseling to a variety of populations in an array of different settings, including medical residents, veterans, college students, and children.
Jason H. King, PhD, NCC, CCMHC, ACS, is the Psychotherapy Practicum Director for the psychiatry concentration track in the Doctor of Medical Science (DMSc) degree at Rocky Mountain University of Health Professions. He received a bachelor’s degree in human development and family studies from the University of Utah, a master’s in counseling (CMHC) from University of Phoenix, a doctoral degree in counselor education and supervision from Capella University, and a post-doctoral certificate in leadership and organizational strategy from Walden University. Dr. King served as a behavioral health clinical panel member for Stanford University’s Health Policy Center for Primary Care and Outcomes Research, assisting in investigating community-level quality indicators for various disorders and intimate partner violence and abuse. He was a collaborating investigator in the American Psychiatric Association’s Routine Clinical Practice field trials, collecting data that informed the DSM-5 revision process. Dr. King has been a peer reviewer for The Professional Counselor and the Journal of Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences. He served as the governor-appointed member and chairperson of the Utah CMHC licensing board. He is a former CSI Intern, was recognized as an ACES Emerging Leader fellow, and received the 2012 AMHCA Mental Health Counselor of the Year Award. Dr. King is a qualitative researcher with a particular interest in professional identity, ethics, and accreditation. His clinical specialty is forensic mental health evaluations, trauma and dissociative disorders, addictive behaviors, psychopharmacology, and psychodiagnostics.
Katharine Sperandio, PhD, NCC, ACS, LPC, joined the clinical mental health counseling (CMHC) faculty as an assistant professor at Saint Joseph’s University in 2022. She is currently the CACREP-accreditation coordinator for the CMHC program. She completed her PhD in counselor education and supervision at William & Mary in 2019. Her work as a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) has granted her the opportunity to work with a variety of populations, including those living with addictions. Dr. Sperandio actively serves clients in the Philadelphia community, using her clinical experiences to inform her teaching and scholarship. The mission of her research agenda is to increase understanding on how to help those living with addiction promote and sustain their recovery and how to optimally support families who are impacted by addiction. She has also explored topic areas pertaining to supporting mental health and addictions counselors who are undergoing chronic stress. Dr. Sperandio also co-constructed the Multidimensional Cultural Humility Scale (MCHS) to assess levels of cultural humility among mental health and school counselors. She has worked with colleagues on multiple research projects to investigate how to support students in being more culturally responsive and trauma-informed in their clinical practice. Her scholarly work is published in a multitude of professional journals, including the Journal of Counseling & Development, Journal of LGBTQ Issues in Counseling, Journal of Mental Health Counseling, The Family Journal: Counseling and Therapy for Couples and Families, Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, and the Journal of Addictions and Offender Counseling. Dr. Sperandio regularly presents at a variety of national, regional, and state conferences and serves on the editorial review board for multiple professional journals, including the Journal of Counseling & Development, Counseling and Values, the Journal of Counselor Preparation and Supervision, and the Journal of Addictions and Offender Counseling.
