APF At Home: Fireside Chat with Robert Sellers, PhD

Robert M. Sellers, PhD, is a 2022 recipient of the American Psychological Foundation Gold Medal Award for Impact in Psychology. He is joined by APF Vice-president Dr. Melba Vasquez for this Fireside chat. Dr. Sellers most recently served as the Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion, Chief Diversity Officer, and the Charles D. Moody Collegiate Professor of Psychology and Education at the University of Michigan. As Vice Provost for Equity and Inclusion and Chief Diversity Officer, Dr. Sellers was responsible for the supervision and implementation of the University’s five-year strategic plan for diversity, equity, and inclusion and serves as a principal counsel to the President as a member of the University’s executive leadership team. Dr. Sellers conceptualized a new framework of racial identity that impacted the way that racial identity was studied, opening the field for new examinations of the impact and effects of race in different situations and as an element of one’s self-concept. Dr. Seller’s further opened new doors in psychology by developing young psychologists, particularly those of color, demonstrated in part through the Center for the Study of Black Youth in Social Contexts that he established at the University of Michigan, wherein scholars from multiple disciplines can translate scholarly research into social action.