Racial, Ethnic, And Cultural Healing (REACH)
What is the REACH Program?
REACH stands for Racial, Ethnic, And Cultural Healing (REACH), a program that is all about promoting Empowered Decision-Making among BIPOC youth and adults. The program’s primary goal is to help individuals learn how to cope with and endure the impacts of Cultural Stress, or moments when people feel mistreated, negatively judged, or denied opportunities due to their background. Learn more about the general concepts of the REACH program here.
The REACH program can be incorporated into programming within your school or organization. Clinicians can also be trained to deliver REACH-oriented treatment within your practice. Consider the REACH program if your clients or individuals in your organization have experienced:
- Racial microaggressions, or being mistreated because of someone’s negative racial bias or prejudice
- Waves of hopelessness, numbness, or rage in response to repeated police shootings, acts of violence toward BIPOC, or culturally stressful events.
- Intense emotions, such as anger, sadness, or anxiety, caused by experiences of racial discrimination.
- Feeling singled out based on perceived stereotypes and biases.
- A sense of inequality, discrimination, or a racist-vibe at work or in school
- A struggle with bi-racial identity
Consultation and Collaboration
Dr. DeLapp is available to consult or collaborate with your school, organization, or therapy clinic to identify programming that addresses the impacts of racial stress on BIPOC individuals. He can tailor a program that meets your needs and results in greater cohesiveness and sensitivity to racial and cultural issues within your organization.
Uniquely Qualified
As a BIPOC clinical psychologist with a depth of understanding and years of studying racial stress, Dr. Ryan DeLapp is equipped to apply his extensive knowledge and organizational skills to develop actionable programming that makes difference. He is widely recognized as an expert in cultural stress.
Prevention and Intervention
Programming can focus on both prevention and intervention and includes a full needs assessment. Dr. DeLapp incorporates evidence-based interventions to support people in navigating the impacts of race-based stress. Tapping into the resources of the REACH program can enable your organization to become more culturally responsive.
REACH Trainings
Tailored training sessions can be offered to counselors, social workers, and school or business leaders, as well as directly to BIPOC individuals within your setting.
Trainings for BIPOC individuals within your setting can include:
- Common responses to culturally stressful events, such as racially motivated police shootings
- Processing the impacts of racism-based stress
- Exploring the Effects of Racism-related Stress on Mental Health
- Using Mindfulness and Self-Compassion to cope with Racism-Related Stress
- Coping with anxiety and anger Caused by Racism and discrimination
- Understanding how Racism Impacts Self-Love and Self-Confidence
- Gaining a Sense of Control and Agency when faced with Racism
- How to enhance mental health in (BIPOC?) children and teens
Trainings for counselors, social workers, and school or business leaders can include:
- Understanding what racism-related stress is and how it can impact BIPOC in your setting
- Tools for reducing microaggressions within your setting
- Treatment considerations for racism-related stress (clinicians only)
- Exploring implicit biases and how they impact interactions with BIPOC within your setting
- How to Talk about the impacts of Racism-related Stress with BIPOC students
Other Methods of Delivery
Conducting a needs assessment to clarify organization needs and inform recommended programming.
Dr. DeLapp can facilitate REACH Groups for BIPOC within your setting. Groups can occur in-person (if organization is in NYC) or virtually for individuals residing in NY, MD, DC, or VA.
Are you a BIPOC individual who wants to learn how to use REACH materials in your clinical practice or organization? Dr. DeLapp can teach clinicians and community leaders how to use REACH materials to offer affirming and supportive spaces for healing.
Dr. DeLapp has nearly 10 years of experience with program building in a variety of settings, including outpatient therapy clinics, schools, and summer enrichment programs. For example, this can include designing school-based social-emotional learning curriculum that are specifically crafted for the needs of elementary, middle, high school, and university settings. As such, Dr. DeLapp can collaborate with you to design programs related to promoting emotional wellness and overall empowerment within your setting.
Dr. DeLapp has lectured for graduate-level courses and residency programs on assessment and treatment considerations when working with BIPOC individuals. He’d be happy to offer lectures virtually or in-person.
For Clinicians and Mental Health Providers
Dr. DeLapp offers consultation to clinicians and practices who are looking to enhance their ability to effectively treat BIPOC patients and deliver culturally-sensitive care. Clinicians can learn skill sets and conceptual frameworks to build treatment around race-based stress or to adapt existing treatment plans whenever discussions around race-based stress appears.
Dr. DeLapp can tailor a program to meet your needs:
- Individual case consultation
- Individual or group supervision
- Program development
- Staff training programs
- Workshops on topics of interest.
- Potential topics include:
- What is Culturally Responsive Care and Why should I care about it?
- Preparing for Race Talks: How Clinicians can Enhance their
- Culturally Responsive Mindset
- Culturally Responsive Assessment of Racism-related Stress
- Flexible Treatment Planning for Racism-related Stress
- Clinician training to lead REACH Groups that focus on topics related to coping with or enduring cultural stress.
Clinicians can learn to:
- Expand their cultural responsivity
- Remain respectful of cultural stressors that may complicate goal attainment.
- Gain comfort in treating patients who want to discuss culturally stressful experiences in therapy
- Offer a healing and affirming therapeutic response to patient disclosures of cultural stress
- Adapt CBT interventions (e.g., mindfulness, cognitive coping, and activity scheduling) to help clients of color strengthen their self-love, self-confidence, and overall cultural pride
For providers who are interested in referring your patients for REACH individual therapy, please contact Dr. DeLapp directly with any questions about the program and to support the referral process.
Program Director and Group Facilitator
Dr. Ryan DeLapp
Dr. DeLapp specializes in the provision of culturally responsive care, or the acknowledgement of cultural strengths and impacts of cultural stressors within psychotherapy. Learn more about why Dr. DeLapp created the REACH program here.
Dr. DeLapp recently published a framework entitled the REACH UP: Racial, Ethnic, and Cultural Healing Unifying Principles (DeLapp & Gallo, 2022), that describes how he adapts evidenced-based treatments to embrace and respect the cultural backgrounds of the individuals he works with. His workbook based on the concepts of REACH, titled Empower Yourself Against Racial and Cultural Stress: Using Skills from the REACH Program to Heal, Cope, and Thrive is set to be published in March of 2025. He is frequently sought out to speak about racial and cultural stress in training sessions, podcasts and webinars, and his expertise has been tapped in articles in the Washington Post, CNN, and numerous other publications.
To discuss collaborative programming or consultation with Dr. DeLapp, please contact us at [email protected] or call 202-363-1010.
