Counseling & Psychological Services

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Heidi has worked at the Appalachian State University Counseling Center in varying capacities for over 10 years, most recently as a full-time Staff Counselor. She comes from a background in community and school mental health, working in interdisciplinary settings with youth, adults, and families. Heidi works with a wide range of issues, including depression and suicide, trauma, anxiety, women’s issues, eating concerns, and relationship and attachment problems. Heidi has a strong interest in working with underserved and marginalized populations and currently co-facilitates the Transgender Therapy Group at the Counseling Center. For the past year, Heidi has served in a new role as the primary Counseling Center liaison to the Athletics Department, providing consultation, outreach, and psychoeducation to student-athletes, coaches, administration, and other staff.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Heidi works from a holistic, collaborative approach to therapy. Her theoretical orientation is integrative, primarily drawing from client-centered, interpersonal process, and – more recently - relational-cultural and feminist perspectives. Heidi frequently incorporates cognitive-behavioral, dialectical behavioral, and mindfulness techniques into her work. She has a strong belief in every person’s capacity for growth and health and views her role as therapist as creating an affirming, safe space to foster change and potential.

Personal Interests: Heidi cherishes spending time with family and loved ones, especially going on outdoor adventures with her husband and two children. She is an avid runner, cyclist, and skier and takes any opportunity to get out in the mountains of the High Country. Heidi is also a keen traveler and especially enjoys experiencing different cultures. In her quieter moments, she enjoys reading, baking, and gardening.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Scott likes to utilize "Strengths Based Perspective" to meet students where they are in their college journey, and assist them in connecting with community resources that will best meet their needs. In addition, he incorporates Cognitive-Behavioral therapy into his Individual Therapy practices when working with students.

Personal Interests: Scott enjoys anything outdoors, time with his family, video games, and traveling to new places.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Kate is a generalist by training, but she has a special passion for working with students’ concerns related to interpersonal relationships, sexual assault and other types of trauma, identity concerns, and adjustment for first-generation college students.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Kate’s theoretical orientation is rooted in relational-cultural, feminist, and multicultural modalities. She believes that clients are the experts of their own lives and works with students to help them to name their experiences as they go through the healing process. She often uses mindfulness and self-compassion techniques to help empower clients in their journey. Kate also enjoys incorporating creative expression into her work with clients as a way of processing experiences that are difficult to talk about verbally.

Personal Interests: In her free time Kate spends her time hiking the trails of the Blue Ridge Mountains and hanging out on her porch. She is also an avid knitter and loves to talk about all things yarn with others.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Chris has a particular interest in the relationship between physical and mental health, men's issues, mindfulness, research in clinical settings, and program evaluation.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Chris is respectful of each individual and focuses on the development of the whole person. He integrates interpersonal and cognitive-behavioral therapy into his work with students, while also emphasizing a client-centered, mindfulness, and multicultural approach.

Personal Interests: In his spare time, Chris enjoys spending time with his family; sports and exercise, whether it be heading to the gym, hiking a trail, or watching a game on T.V.; traveling and exploring new places; and the challenges of learning how to do new home improvement projects.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Julie works with a wide variety of concerns, but has a particular passion for working with trauma, sexual assault, identity development, LGBTQ issues, and emotion regulation difficulties. She has a strong interest in and passion for helping individuals explore their intersecting identities and the ways in which they move through the systems in place in the community and in the world. In addition to this, she also enjoys group therapy, supervision, and training.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Julie’s approach to working with clients is collaborative and integrative. Her approach is multicultural, trauma-informed, rooted in interpersonal therapy, and draws from existential, mindfulness-based, and Dialectical Behavioral therapy (DBT) modalities. She values the unique nature of each individual, as well as their values, goals, and strengths.

Personal Interests: In her free time, Julie enjoys spending time with her friends and family, cooking, reading good books, and watching puppy videos on YouTube.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Sara's areas of interest range widely, but she is particularly passionate about mindfulness, working with survivors of trauma, and working with folks experiencing oppression. Other interests include stress management, graduate students, transfer students, and people working through identity-related or existential concerns. In addition to individual therapy, Sara enjoys group work, supervision, and wilderness therapy.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Sara's approach to counseling is collaborative and holistic, drawing on an integration of Eastern, multicultural/feminist, and interpersonal approaches. She often uses mindfulness and other contemplative practices in her work, and believes in using a strength-based model to help clients gain empowerment on their healing journey.

Personal Interests: Sara's personal interests include hanging out with her human and canine loved ones, adventuring in the outdoors, crafting baked goods/tasty dinners/natural remedies, live music, meditation, and yoga.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Stephanies areas of interest include LGBT, trauma-related issues, life transitions, transfer students, and eating concerns. In addition to individual therapy, she also has a passion for group therapy, supervision/training, and outreach. Stephanie also has a strong research interest in the human-animal bond and womens issues, and she is nationally active with the APA in these areas. Stephanie is also the Co-Coordinator of the Sexual Assault Response Team of Watauga County.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: A generalist by training, Stephanie utilizes an integrative therapeutic approach in her client work. She believes in the power of crafting a strong, affirming relationship with her clients and often uses interpersonal, developmental, cognitive-behavioral, and mindfulness techniques in therapy.

Personal Interests: In her free time Stephanie enjoys being with her pets: four furry four-legged companions, nine chickens, and two hives of bees. She also loves connecting with friends and family around the country, drinking coffee, exploring the outdoors, practicing yoga, and eating scrumptious food.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Emily has trained in university counseling centers and a rural community mental health center. She has also worked as an advisor for students on academic probation and been involved with the campus group Active Minds. In addition to providing individual therapy, Emily enjoys group therapy and campus outreach and prevention. She is also particularly interested in working with first generation college students, academic and career concerns, phobias, self-harm, grief and loss, suicide prevention, issues of social justice, and reducing stigma around seeking mental health care.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Emily's approach to counseling is collaborative, emphasizing the therapeutic relationship and students' goals and strengths. She primarily integrates principles of interpersonal, cognitive-behavioral, mindfulness-based, and dialectical behavior therapies.

Personal Interests: In her free time, Emily enjoys spending time with loved ones, traveling, creative writing, cooking, biking, drinking tea, and watching British TV.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Leslie’s areas of interest include the training and supervision of new and emerging professionals. She also enjoys career counseling, working with non-traditional students, and helping students who are navigating identity-related and developmental concerns. Leslie is passionate about prevention and outreach efforts, and loves working with the Appalachian State Mental Health Ambassadors, a program she co-created and co-coordinates with Dr. Denise Lovin.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Leslie’s approach to working with clients is collaborative, and she prefers a holistic integrative approach to treatment that incorporates cognitive-behavioral, interpersonal, existential, and client-centered techniques. Leslie recognizes that there is no “one size fits all” approach to therapy and tries to tailor her interventions to each client’s unique needs and preferences. The value of authenticity is appreciated and modeled in Leslie’s therapy sessions.

Personal Interests: Leslie’s interests and hobbies include playing pranks on her co-workers, spending time with her family, enjoying the outdoors, armchair traveling, magic, and robots. Okay, she’s not really into magic and robots, but she does love to read five books at once, listen to good music, and spend money on shoes.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Matt has experience working in inpatient psychiatric hospitals, community mental health clinics, and college counseling centers and has worked with most varieties of psychological distress and illness. He has particular interests in mindfulness-based interventions and psychosis, but believes that all varieties of psychological distress inform aspects of the human experience.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Initially, Matt focuses on building understanding and appreciation of others’ experience, and drawing out the processes which contribute to distress. After mutually acceptable consensus is reached, he will likely encourage informed and relevant experimentations in self-awareness practices, daily habits, and styles of interaction. Matt’s primary training is in cognitive-behavioral and mindfulness-oriented treatment approaches, and is informed by a variety of perspectives, including evolutionary, psychodynamic, existential and transpersonal.

Personal Interests: Matt enjoys spending time with friends, absurdity and nonsense, creating and performing music, team-oriented video games, learning, exercise, and cooking.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Audrey is a generalist by training, and as such enjoys working with students with a broad variety of presenting concerns. These commonly include anxiety, depression, relationship issues, trauma, and eating concerns. Special areas of interest include group therapy, campus outreach, connecting with traditionally under-served student populations, and the therapeutic use of art for healing and self-expression.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Audrey uses an integrative, person-centered approach to therapy that draws on mindfulness, interpersonal processing, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and expressive arts therapy. She strives to incorporate a multicultural perspective into her work, acknowledging the numerous intersecting identities that shape her clients' unique experiences in the world.

Personal Interests: In her free time she enjoys gardening, crafting, the occasional Netflix binge, and hiking with her dog, Margo.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Ashley comes to CAPS with a background in health psychology and has trained in university counseling, hospital settings, and community mental health. She works with a wide range of issues including anxiety, mood problems, trauma, relationship issues, and body image or eating concerns. She is especially passionate about working with trans* students, LGBQ students, students of color, and students struggling with other issues of marginalization. Ashley has specialized training in the treatment of eating disorders and coordinates the interdisciplinary Eating Concerns Treatment Team for CAPS.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Ashley takes a holistic approach to treatment, but above all, believes that change begins with the client-therapist relationship. Working from a Gestalt perspective within a multicultural framework, her therapy style is heavily relational with an emphasis on power dynamics and their impact on interpersonal process. She frequently incorporates experiential and body-focused interventions with techniques from cognitive-behavioral, dialectical behavioral, and emotion-focused therapies. Ashley strives to work collaboratively to facilitate holistic healing and well-living for all of her clients.

Personal Interests: Ashley’s favorite place to be is outdoors with her husband and daughter— especially if it involves hiking or camping. To quench her creative side, she also loves baking, gardening, and woodworking. Her favorite pastime, however, is teaming up with her daughter to raise swallowtail butterflies in their backyard.

Personal Interests: In Ashley’s free time she enjoys spending time with friends and family, painting, curling up with a good book, and hiking with her dog, Avery.

Personal Interests: As a native of Florida, Dawn enjoys camping, boating, kayaking, and reading a good book. She loves spending time with her family. Dawn states that "I miss the beach and the feel of the sand between my toes."

Personal Interests: Among Sammy's interest are spending time with family and friends, learning new concepts, ideologies, and methodolgies in a number of fields, history, music (all forms), guitar, photography, art, reading, sports, television, and working with computers and various software programs. He enjoys doing research and the creative part of the writing process.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Matt’s areas of interest include the relationship between medical and mental illnesses and their effective conceptualization and treatment, anxiety disorders, and identity development among the college population. He is also interested in men’s issues and co-facilitates a men’s therapy group in the counseling center. He also takes interest in promoting important mentorship and supervision relationships with developing clinicians.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Matt views the relationship between client and counselor as the most important component of therapy. He takes an interpersonal approach to therapy, highlighting relational concerns of clients. He also focuses heavily on the use of evidence-based CBT and mindfulness interventions to assist clients in the counseling process.

Personal Interests: Matt’s interests include soccer and rugby, bad tattoos, 90’s nostalgia, live music, recorded music, dreaming about music, and music documentaries. He also enjoys obscure movie references and quotes.

Professional Interests / Areas of Expertise: Caroline served as a professor for seven years before returning full-time to counseling. She was trained as a broad generalist and has worked in a variety of settings ranging from domestic violence agencies and juvenile court to wilderness therapy, inpatient treatment, and counseling centers. She has a special interest in working with clients on GLBTQ or cultural issues, mood disorders, interpersonal difficulties, trauma, and stress management. Caroline has also done work on prejudice and mental illness stigma, which informs her passion for social justice and equity outreach.

Approach to counseling / Theoretical Orientation: Caroline works with clients from an integrative perspective, drawing from interpersonal process, humanistic, cognitive-behavioral, and feminist/multicultural approaches. She sees therapy as an evolving process rooted in a safe and honest relationship. She works collaboratively with clients to develop a treatment plan that fosters empowerment and growth and is based on their strengths and unique personal narrative.

Personal Interests: Caroline is a proud native of Western North Carolina. She loves spending time outdoors with her partner Courtney and their small menagerie of two horses, two cats, and one giant dog. When she isn’t hiking the high country, she can be found making music with her friends, crafting, or researching things for fun.