Bella McGowan

Personal Statement

I have spent over three decades as a School Psychologist counseling children, adolescents and parents helping them navigate educational systems and conducting psycho-educational assessments. I have extensive experience providing direct and ongoing counseling support services, consultation/mentoring, crisis intervention management, behavioral assessment, and facilitating child/adolescent and parenting groups. I have worked with a wide range of students, from gifted to multiply handicapped, in public and private school settings, and I have advocated for families and their students in hundreds of IEP’s, conducting thorough assessments, compassionately sharing results, and guiding individualized needs-based services. I consider myself to be authentic, passionate, creative and goal-directed. I am currently continuing my work with students and their families supporting their psychological needs and healthy well-being, developing/implementing educational best practices, and special education/advocacy consultation.

Bio

Bella McGowan is an Educational Consultant and Advocate, and a School Psychologist with a lifetime credential (#SC74875) with the State of California since 1979. She received her Bachelor of Arts degree (1974) in Psychology from UCLA, and a K-12 Teaching Credential (1974) while training at the UCLA Laboratory School. She completed a Masters of Education degree (1975) in Learning Disabilities from Harvard University, and additional post-graduate work at UCLA to attain her Pupil Personnel Credential (1978) and School Psychologist Credential (1979).

She has worked as a School Psychologist since that time conducting psycho-educational assessments and behavioral analysis, providing individual and group counseling, parenting workshops, curriculum and behavioral consultation with educators, and helping families navigate school settings to best meet the needs of their children. She has also advocated for appropriate services and accommodations when families have pursued Individual Education Programs (IEP) and Section 504 Plans for their special needs children. Ms. McGowan began her career working at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute on inpatient child/adolescent psychiatric units, first teaching art and social skills, and later becoming a Mental Health Practitioner. As a School Psychologist she has worked in a variety of school settings, in private, public and non-public schools, serving a wide range of students from gifted to multiply handicapped.

Most recently Ms. McGowan was the sole School Psychologist for Palisades Charter High School, a tenured position for 22 years, serving over 3,000 students in a college preparatory high school setting. She conducted assessments for special education, crisis management, and ongoing academic, social, and emotional support for the well being of all students and their families. Ms. McGowan sits on the Board of Directors of Teen Line, a national suicide prevention hotline at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, and she also provides parenting workshops for schools as part of Teen Line’s outreach program. Additionally she runs life skills and parenting workshops for mothers with young children at People Assisting the Homeless (PATH). Ms. McGowan serves on the Advisory Council for Jumpstart, a national early childhood organization preparing children for kindergarten.