Dr. LaTrice L. Dowtin, Ph.D., LCPC, NCSP, RPT-S, PMH-C, PCIT-Within Agency Trainer

Dr. LaTrice L. Dowtin is a Black cisgender woman who believes in the ongoing pursuit of humility and social justice. She is a licensed clinical psychologist, licensed clinical professional counselor, nationally certified school psychologist, and Registered Play Therapist-SupervisorTM who specializes in perinatal, infant mental health (IMH), and trauma populations with a special focus on culturally, racially, and linguistically marginalized people of the global majority.  Dr. Dowtin is a native African American Vernacular English speaker, fluent in US English, and is proficient in American Sign Language.    

Over the course of the past 25 years, she carved out a career as an early childhood specialist in the area of social-emotional development for young children and families. She has held such positions as preschool teacher, infant care specialist, Center Director of an early care program, early childhood mental health consultant, early childhood trauma and family therapist, adjunct faculty in an early childhood teacher education program, Deaf infant-parent support group facilitator, school psychologists, therapist, and invited presenter at University of California San Francisco, Bowie State University, and Cornell University.   

For graduate education, Dr. Dowtin was educated at Bowie State University (BSU), which is Maryland's oldest Historically Black University where the focus of the intersection of race, culture, and identity is deeply embedded throughout the curriculum. Following school psychology and counselor training at BSU, Dr. Dowtin continued learning clinical psychology at Gallaudet University where she had the opportunity to train at Children’s National in their child development clinic conducting consultations in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and neonatal follow-up assessments for a predominantly Black community. Dr. Dowtin's additional training at the Lourie Center for Children's Social Emotional Wellness afforded her the opportunity to support children and families with severe trauma backgrounds while working with children and families at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore City, Maryland. She then completed a clinical psychology doctoral internship at Tulane University School of Medicine with a focus on families and infant mental health for trauma survivors in the city of New Orleans. Following internship, Dr. Dowtin completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship at Stanford University in the NICU focusing on perinatal and infant mental health.    

Since 2019, she has been an active member of the National Perinatal Association in conjunction  with the National Network of NICU Psychologists (NNNP), where she serves as the Co-Chair. Through NNNP, Dr. Dowtin was the Co-Chair of the Training and Education Committee dedicated to educating the next generation of practitioners in anti-racism and cultural responsiveness. She is also a published researcher and author with several book chapters and peer-reviewed journal articles on topics related to implicit bias, clinical supervision, play therapy, racial and social justice, NICU, perinatal mental health, and education justice for young Black children. She is the former Director of the Infants, Toddlers, and Families Graduate Certificate program at Gallaudet University where she also taught for several years establishing a standard for unpacking race and marginalization their courses. She is also co-developer of a Trauma-Informed Preschool Supports (TIPS ECHO) program through Adventist HealthCare’s The Lourie Center for Children’s Social and Emotional Wellness.   

Currently, Dr. Dowtin is the co-chair of the National Network of NICU Psychologists and is on the Medical Advisory Board for Hope for HIE. She is the Executive Director and CEO of a growing trauma-focused private practice, PlayfulLeigh Psyched, LLC, founded in 2018 and works from a social justice and trauma-based framework. Given her background, training, and lived experiences as a Black woman in the US, Dr. Dowtin is passionate about eradicating racial injustices for historically marginalized populations, disrupting the generational transmission of trauma, and facilitating healthy social-emotional development from conception through adulthood.