Michael P. Goh, PhD

Michael P. Goh, PhD, is a tenured full professor at the University of Minnesota. A counseling psychologist by training, he now finds himself affiliated with the Counseling and Student Personnel Psychology while in a new interdisciplinary situation of introducing mental health ideas in international development and training intercultural and international educators in Comparative and International Development Education, all in the College of Education and Human Development. He is also affiliated with the university’s Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Global Change.

In 2014, Goh was appointed the university’s associate vice provost for Equity and Diversity and director of the Institute for Diversity, Equity, and Advocacy, whose mission is to sustain and support a diverse and interdisciplinary community of scholars who conduct research and produce scholarship on equity and diversity issues and topics. In 2017, Goh stepped into the role of interim vice president for Equity and Diversity and after a year-long national search, emerged in 2018 as the vice president. Additionally, Goh is one of six professors appointed Generation Next—Urban Research Outreach—Engagement Center fellows and tasked to study socio-cultural explanations for educational equity gaps in Minnesota.

In his roles as multicultural teaching and learning fellow and president’s distinguished faculty mentor, Goh is passionate about multicultural education and mentoring ethnic minority students to succeed in higher education. Goh’s teaching, research, and service are focused on discovering better ways to conceptualize, assess, and ultimately teach cultural competence in order to improve access to mental health services for ethnically diverse, new immigrant, and international populations. His current research program includes cultural competence in mental health practice, cultural intelligence, multicultural master therapists, practice-based evidence, and help-seeking behavior and attitudes across cultures and countries. He was the lead investigator on a National Institutes of Health Partners in Research grant for a community-based project to study practice-based evidence amongst cultural providers.

Goh was voted Teacher of the Year in 1998 and received a Distinguished Teaching Award in 2006. Also in 2006, Goh was recognized by the Minnesota Psychological Association for his Distinguished Leadership in Psychology and Mental Health. In 2010, the Association for Multicultural Counseling and Development of the American Counseling Association presented Goh with the Exemplary Diversity Leadership Award and he was also named the inaugural recipient of the College of Education and Human Development Marty and Jack Rossman Faculty Development Award for his creativity and innovation in scholarship, teaching, and service.

Goh looks forward to working with PSI fellows interested in intercultural/multicultural lenses on the science and practice of clinical, counseling and other applied aspects of psychology and to meet fellows at the crossroads of choosing between practice and the academy. In particular, he loves to share stories about surviving in the academy and the unexpected adventures of becoming a higher education administrator.