Psycholegal evaluations in Immigration Court: Free online training series

Feb. 5 UPDATE: The first webinar in this series was a huge success. To register for any or all of the remaining three webinars, click HERE.

Torture victims from El Salvador. Gay people from Uganda. Immigrants with elderly dependents who are U.S. citizens.

In our increasingly multicultural society, more and more people find themselves in U.S. Immigration Court. And, often, psychological evaluations play a role in deciding their fates. Unfortunately, most immigrants applying for political asylum or hardship waivers have very little money, creating an acute need for psychologists willing and able to provide low-fee evaluations.

Working to fulfill this need is my hard-working colleague Anatasia Kim, a professor at the Wright Institute in Berkeley and chair of the Immigration Task Force of the California Psychological Association. Dr. Kim is spearheading a drive to train a cadre of psychologists to conduct these evaluations. In exchange for conducting low-fee or pro bono evaluations, psychologists and students will get free mentorship by expert forensic psychologists and attorneys in the field.  

As part of the campaign, the Immigration Task Force is hosting a four-part Webinar series in February aimed at teaching the basic competencies. Immigration attorneys and psychologists will train virtual attendees on the nuts and bolts of conducting psycholegal evaluations in immigration courts.

Best of all, the series is entirely FREE. You can even earn continuing education credits (one unit per session).

The four workshops, each running from noon to 1:00 p.m. (Pacific Standard Time) on

a Tuesday, are:

Feb. 4: Basics of Conducting a Psychological Evaluation for Immigration Court. Nancy Baker, Ph.D., ABPP, Diplomate in Forensic Psychology, Director of Forensic Concentration at Fielding Graduate University

Feb. 11: Legal Relevance of Psychologists’ Opinions in the Immigration Context. Robin Goldfaden, Esq., Senior Attorney, Immigrant Justice, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, and Lisa Fryman, Esq., Associate Director/Managing Attorney, Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at U.C. Hastings College of Law

Feb. 18: Recommended Immigration Evaluation Process for Hardship Cases. Margaret Lee, Ph.D., Clinical Psychologist and Adjunct Professor, Alliant International University, San Diego and Former Clinical Director at Survivors of Torture International

Feb. 25: Writing Psychological Assessment Reports for Immigration Court. James Livingston, Ph.D., Senior Staff Psychologist, Center for the Survivors of Torture in San Jose.

You can register for the first training HERE. 

If you have any questions, email Dr. Kim HERE.