Description of Research Expertise

Areas of Expertise
Bullying and identity development
Using the arts as an intervention for students at-risk
Emotional and social issues of the gifted

Professional Biography
Dr. Garinger’s career began in public education as a K-8 art instructor in Massachusetts. Later she became a middle school counselor in Connecticut and New York. She gained tremendous insight into child development after 25 years of teaching students in nine grade levels.

For the past nine years, Dr. Garinger instructed graduate students training to be school counselors and mental health professionals. She was the director of the School Counseling Program and Visiting professor at the Rockland Graduate Campus, Long Island University. She was an assistant professor at St. John’s University.

She enriched classroom experience expanding students’ counseling knowledge by visiting the Albert Ellis Institute and The Institute for Psychodrama and Sociometry in New York City. In 2006, she escorted several groups of students to meet with Dr. Albert Ellis before his death.

Dr. Garinger worked as a therapist at Child Guidance Center of Southern Connecticut, where she co-led social skills groups, counseled children, adolescents, and parents. She co-led a group on social and emotional needs of gifted middle school students and has presented at national conferences on social-emotional issues of the gifted.

Dr. Garinger draws upon practical experiences from her clinical work and years in public education, to create meaningful, insightful, and challenging courses to help graduate students become effective school and mental health counselors.

She is a Licensed Professional Counselor (Connecticut and in process in New Jersey and Pennsylvania) and Licensed Mental Health Counselor (New York). She holds certifications as: a National Certified Counselor, from the Westchester Center for the study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy, and the Albert Ellis Institute in Primary Practicum and Advanced Training in REBT. She is certified as a School Counselor, Art Teacher and Art Supervisor, K-12 in Connecticut, Massachusetts, and New York.

Research Interests and Current Projects
Dr. Garinger’s most recent research interest, Creative Connections, applies the arts as a means to engage students at-risk. Her research involves collaboration with Dr. Mike Nakkula, Practice Professor at Penn GSE. Alienated, underachieving students who are given the opportunity to succeed in a school-related activity, through the arts, can gain the confidence and self-esteem to improve their temperament and academic performance. Creative Connections uses group discussions on topics such as problem behavior, depression, and relationships to elicit creative options to divert negative to positive constructs.

In her research on bullying and cyber bullying, she has examined various forms of female adolescent bullying and intra-racial bullying in conjunction with racial identity development. She has presented at local, regional, and national conferences on the topic of female adolescent bullying.