Biography

Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint is Director of the Media Center of the Judge Baker Children's Center in Boston. He is also a Professor of Psychiatry and Faculty Associate Dean for Student Affairs at Harvard Medical School.

He is co-author, with James P. Comer, M.D., of Raising Black Children, 1992; and co-author, with Amy Alexander, of Lay My Burden Down, 2000.

He has written dozens of articles for lay and professional publications. In 1997, he received a New England Emmy award for Outstanding Children's Special as co-executive producer of Willoughby's Wonders.

Dr. Poussaint is an expert on race relations in America, the dynamics of prejudice, and issues of diversity as our society becomes increasingly multicultural. He believes that extreme (violent) racists suffer from a delusional mental illness. He lectures widely on college campuses and also serves as a consultant to government agencies and private corporations.

In addition, he is active in consulting to the media on a wide range of social issues. He is concerned with media images and issues regarding the needs of children and the changing family; he has been active in the national TV rating and V-chip discussions. He is a strong proponent of non-violent parenting and parenting education.

Born in East Harlem, he attended Columbia and received his M.D. from Cornell University in 1960. He completed his postgraduate training at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) Neuropsychiatric Institute, where he served as Chief Resident in Psychiatry in 1964-65. At UCLA, he pursued research in psychopharmacology.

From 1965 to 1967, he was Southern Field Director of the Medical Committee for Human Rights in Jackson, Mississippi, providing medical care to civil rights workers and aiding in the desegregation of health facilities throughout the South. He is former chair of the board of directors of PUSH for Excellence.

In 1967, after leaving Mississippi, Dr. Poussaint joined the Tufts Medical School faculty as director of a psychiatry program in a low-income housing development. In 1969, he joined Harvard. From 1975-1978 he was Director of Student Affairs at Harvard Medical School. He was a script consultant to NBC's The Cosby Show and continues to consult to the media as an advocate of more responsible programming.

He is a life fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, a member of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, and a fellow of the American Orthopsychiatric Association. He has received numerous awards and is the recipient of many honorary degrees.