Sam Bello, MSEd

Sam Bello, MSEd, is a PhD Student at the School of Social Policy and Practice. Sam earned her Masters in Education at Penn’s GSE, completing her thesis with distinction. She earned her BA in Psychology and Sociology from Boston College’s Woods College of Advancing Studies, receiving the “McGuinness Award for outstanding achievement in and a commitment to excellence in the field of psychology or the social sciences at the B.A. level””.

For eight years, Sam worked across direct-service, nonprofits, and research: in public schools,
juvenile court system, emergency shelters, community- and school-based poetry programs, and in clinical research. Sam is also a community organizer.

Sam’s research and practice is driven by a deep commitment to systemic change and transformation within child welfare and clinical practice. Broadly, she is interested in cultivating a body of scholarship engaged with survivor-led and peer support models of care, criminalization and pathologization of survivorship among youth, clinical service provision, clinical education reform, systems-involved and institutionalized youth, childhood sexual exploitation and trafficking, and critical histories of clinical work.

Sam is also passionate about supporting first-generation students—especially Latine and Caribbean students, and students who were/are systems-involved—in navigating higher education: from high schoolers beginning the college application process to applying to graduate and PhD programs.