Beth N. Rom-Rymer, Ph. D.
For APA President
Pioneered women’s educational opportunities; trained with internationally renowned psychologists; early co-founder/President, domestic violence shelter; teaching next generations; author; multiple leadership roles/awards, APA/IPA/community;President, National Register;APF; international leadership; legislative advocacy to serve society’s vulnerable. As APA President: collaborative, intersectional, team focus on science; bridge-building; EDI; unraveling/solving our world’s toughest challenges.
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We are living in a world shaken by trauma: the ongoing crimes against humanity in Ukraine; the struggle to sustain international democratic states amidst authoritarianism; the battles to inoculate people, worldwide, against Covid-19, while Covid deaths and post-acute Covid symptoms continue to devastate families and communities; the suffering caused by institutional racism, anti-Semitism, violence against BIPOC, LGBTQ, AAPI, other-abled communities.
My life’s work as trauma clinician, forensic expert, legislative advocate, University lecturer, author, state/national/international leader, uniquely qualifies me to be APA President.
Psychologists, because of our extraordinary education, training, and experience, have an impact, every day, on the lives of those who are suffering in our local, national, and international communities.Therefore, I wholeheartedly support the critical work done by academic researchers and experimental psychologists; social, forensic, industrial, organizational, and all applied psychologists; and the frontline work of clinicians. We will continue to powerfully speak on behalf of all psychologists!
I passionately believe in protecting clinical practice while seeking to expand practice to include: prescriptive authority; integrated behavioral health in primary care and in a variety of healthcare/medical settings; community mental health; public/population health; and a plethora of collaborative working relationships among scientists and clinicians, working on ways to achieve health equity. I am especially interested in identifying and applying effective models of treatment, focused on enhancing positive adaptation to adversity.
Having had broad experience in APA governance, including APA Board, APA Council, CLT Chair, SPTA and Division President, and as a founder and leader of the International Prescriptive Authority Movement, I understand how to get things done! I strongly support SPTA leadership and envision our advancing multi-disciplinary, multicultural, and multinational leadership of both APA and APF.
As your President, I will walk courageously, with you, into our future. My outreach to all of our communities will be collaborative, intersectional, with an emphasis on scientific evidence and psychological knowledge, bridge-building, EDI, and gender and sexual diversity, to unravel and solve our world’s toughest challenges.
Beth N. Rom-Rymer, Ph.D. and her daughter, Symi Rom-Rymer, with then-Vice President Joe Biden at the Naval Observatory
(January 19, 2012)
Dr. Rom-Rymer held numerous positions of community leadership, hospital administrative positions, University faculty positions, APA elective positions, beginning in 1978.
- Co-Founder, President, Refuge House, Shelter for surviving families of domestic violence (1978-1979)
- Senior Partner, Bresolin and Rom-Rymer, Ltd, Chicago, Illinois (1988-1993)
- Co-Director, Children’s Unit, Chicago Lakeshore Hospital, Chicago, Illinois (1990-1991)
- Director, Psychological Services, Charter Behavioral Health System of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois (1993-1995)
- President, Rom-Rymer Associates, Chicago, Illinois (1993-Present)
- Director, Corporate Admissions, Riveredge Hospital, Forest Park, Illinois (1997-1998)
- Lecturer (Adjunct Faculty), University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (1988-2001)
- Lecturer (Faculty in Psychiatry), The Osler Institute, Chicago, Illinois (1997-1999)
- Lecturer (Adjunct Faculty), The Chicago Medical School / Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science (Summer 1999)
- Lecturer (Faculty), The Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology/William James College, Post-Doctoral M.S. Program in Clinical Psychopharmacology (2002-2007)
- Lecturer (Guest), Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry (2002-Present)
- Lecturer (Adjunct Faculty), Academy of Medical Psychology (AMP), Preparation for the Psychopharmacological Exam for Psychologists (PEP), Chicago, Illinois (2004)
- President, Division 55 (Prescribing Psychology) (2004)
- APA Council Representative, Division 55 (2007-2012, 2017)
- Treasurer, Division 56 (2008-2013)
- Member, APA Finance Committee (2011-2013, 2014-2016, 2017)
Beth N. Rom-Rymer, Ph.D. and Karla Torres Ferrer, Psy.D., with Patrick J. Kennedy, on the occasion of the annual dinner, in Chicago, sponsored by the Kennedy Forum
(October 2014)
As a past IPA President and the Founder, President, and CEO of the Illinois Association of Prescribing Psychologists (IAPP), Dr. Rom-Rymer continues (from 2014 – the Present) to implement the Prescriptive Authority legislation that successfully passed the Illinois General Assembly on May 30, 2014, culminating in then Governor Pat Quinn’s signature on June 25, 2014. Dr. Rom-Rymer had led the Movement to pass this legislation. As of February 2021, Illinois has 8 licensed prescribing psychologists with an expectation of 10-12 additional licensed psychologist prescribers in 2021 and a pipeline of over 50 psychologists training to become psychologist prescribers. Dr. Rom-Rymer and the Illinois Association of Prescribing Psychologists will continue, for many years, to lobby for legislation that expands the scope of practice of the prescribing psychologist so that our most vulnerable communities can take advantage of optimal, comprehensive, integrative mental health care.
Because of Dr. Rom-Rymer’s vision, the largest state university in Illinois, The University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, with over 34,000 students, now has a Pre-Prescribing Psychologist curriculum for psychology undergraduate students. Southern Illinois University, with a little over 11,000 students, is excited about creating preparatory training opportunities for its undergraduate and graduate students who are thinking about becoming prescribing psychologists.
Beth N. Rom-Rymer, Ph.D. with Karla Torres Ferrer, Psy.D., at the Illinois State Capitol, Springfield, Illinois
(March 2014)
Beth N. Rom-Rymer, Ph.D. with President Barack Obama in Chicago
(July 17, 2008)
In the most recent decade (2009-the present), Dr. Rom-Rymer has continued to professionally contribute to psychological scholarship and training and APA governance. Additionally, Dr. Rom-Rymer led the Illinois Psychological Association to legislative victory in 2014.
- Member, Board of Trustees, Alliant International University, San Francisco, (2009-2014)
- President, Illinois Psychological Association (2011-2012, 2013-2014)
- Vice Chair, Board of Trustees, Alliant International University, San Francisco (2012-2014)
- Treasurer, Illinois Psychological Association, (2015-2017)
- President, Division 56 (Trauma) (2015)
- Member, Board of Directors, Thresholds, the oldest and largest social service organization in Illinois, serving the SMI population (2015-Present)
- Member, Advisory Council, Center for Health and Wellbeing (CHW), The Princeton School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University (2016-Present)
- Mentor, University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, Department of Psychology, undergraduates specializing in training to become a prescribing psychologist (2017 - Present)
- Chair, Academic Search Committee for Chair, Clinical Psychopharmacology Department, The Chicago School of Professional Psychology (2017)
- Consultant, The Chicago School of Professional Psychology, Master’s of Science in Clinical Psychopharmacology Department (2017 - Present)
- Member, Psychopharmacology Exam for Psychologists-Job Task Analysis Task Force, Association of State and Provincial Psychology Boards (ASPPB) (2017)
- Member, APA Board of Directors (2018-2019)
- Founder, President, and CEO, Illinois Association of Prescribing Psychologists (2018-Present)
- Chair, APA Council Leadership Team (2019)
- Member, Board of Directors, National Register of Health Service Psychologists (2019-2022)
- President and Chair, Board of Directors, National Register of Health Service Psychologists (2021-2022)
Beth N. Rom-Rymer, Ph.D. has been a pioneer throughout her life. She was in the first class of women at Princeton University, graduating in 1973. Dr. Rom-Rymer created the Victim-Witness Assistance Unit in the State Attorney's Office, Tallahassee, Florida, in 1977, where she worked on the Ted Bundy serial murder case, 1978-1979. During that time, she also co-founded and was the first Board president of Refuge House, a shelter for surviving families of domestic violence in Tallahassee, Florida. Dr. Rom-Rymer gave a keynote talk at the 40th anniversary celebration of Refuge House. Dr. Rom-Rymer is one of the psychologists who created the field of forensic geriatrics in 2000, testifying, nationally, in cases concerning the sexual abuse of older adults in nursing homes and writing book chapters about the role of the forensic psychologist in geriatric settings. Foreseeing the critical need for comprehensive mental health prescribers, Dr. Rom-Rymer undertook training in Clinical Psychopharmacology during the 1990's and became a national leader in the advocacy for psychologists' prescriptive authority, when she was elected the fourth president of the fledgling APA Division 55 (Pharmacotherapy) in 2004.