Meet Dr. Saeromi Kim, the new Director of Counseling Services at SWS

December 03, 2024

“I struggled in college so there is a personal connection for me, to be there for students who are struggling,” says Dr. Saeromi Kim, Caltech’s new Director of Counseling Services at Student Wellness Services (SWS). Dr. Kim, who uses she/they pronouns and is of Korean-Venezuelan ethnic backgrounds, came to Caltech after 13 years of counseling experience at UCLA. She herself has faced mental health and identity issues in college, as well as had to navigate the issues involved with being queer and an immigrant.

“In interviews, I actually start with my identities because they inform why I do what I do, and why it matters, and what I’ve chosen in my life,” says Dr. Kim. “So, I tell people it’s a complicated story.”

Dr. Kim was born in Korea and moved to Venezuela when she was five. At 18, they enrolled in Brown university as an international student. However, she would come to face mental health issues in college: “I took a year off in the middle of sophomore and junior year because of mental health issues […] as well as identity development questions,” they say. “I felt really stuck, it’s hard for an Asian to tell their Asian parents that you’re going to take a year off.”

Thanks to a program that helps students find work while on leave, they were able to take a year off to recover, and think more about where she wanted to go in life. She found work on a farm as a caretaker at a rehabilitation center for people with severe mental illnesses: “I don’t know why they hired a 19 year old,” she said, laughing.

For Dr. Kim, this is where her “mental health career, really, in some way, started.” Not only did the experience spark her interest in this occupation, but it was where she learned an important lesson about the importance of community, for mental health.

“What’s amazing is that I was just the helper,” says Dr. Kim. “There were psychiatrists, counselors, and administrators, but I was the person who was sitting with folks every day.” As that person, she was able to have an impact on these patient’s lives. “I realized [… that] what a lot of people need is passion and companionship. That farm helped me realize that it can’t just be one person […] it has to be an actual community response, and environment matters.”

After working on the farm for a year, she came back to Brown and changed their major from comparative literature to psychology. “I felt much more focused.” says Dr. Kim. Though right after graduating, things were not as straightforward.

“As an international student, I wasn’t sure what to do next, especially because I had also come out as queer.” She did not “think going back to Venezuela would be safe” because of her identity, so she decided to stay in the US, and first figure out how to “live as a queer person.”

Because she needed a visa, Dr. Kim took the first job she could get. Working in the admissions department of Brown, they worked with underrepresented students and pre-college enrichment programs. They then got a PhD in psychology at Clark University, and worked as a clinical psychologist at Connecticut College, Rhode Island College, Wellesley College, and UCLA, before coming to Caltech.

A Community-Based Approach

During her 13 years at UCLA, Dr. Kim learned the importance of personalized treatment, as well as a community-level approach. She spent seven of these years as assistant clinical director at UCLA’s Counseling and Psychological Services, where she oversaw community outreach efforts. Expanding access to care for minoritized, undocumented, and international students, Dr. Kim gained experience adapting counseling services for a wide diversity of students. From this, she realized “you can’t just do mental health one way […] there are all these different, completely different populations and groups.”

Though she also learned the importance of a community-based approach to counseling. Dr. Kim saw the impact of the national crisis in mental health first-hand at her office:‘“between 2007 and 2017 [we …] went from a small team, like 30, and [we] were 100 when I left […] and it was still incredibly busy and [we] still had very long waits. We had to put in a triage system.”

She recognized that in order to prevent mental health resources from being inundated, a different approach, one that is more focused on improving student conditions, must be taken: “We also have to think about what we’re doing on a community level that’s going to help the students […] or else our clinics are just going to get bigger and bigger and bigger because more people are hurting because their communities and environments are hostile or oppressive or not supportive enough. We can’t do that.”

Dr. Kim acknowledged how students have raised concerns about wait times and other issues regarding Caltech’s counseling services. She explained that building a more compassionate community can help reduce strain on our mental health resources by preventing mental health issues from arising in the first place.

What does building a more compassionate community entail? Dr. Kim explains that this means creating a community where, “everybody has the obligation and responsibility to do wellness, not just the counseling center […] Rather than a dean saying, ‘just go to counseling’, can the Dean have a conversation with you? Compassion doesn’t always mean just saying yes to anything a student is asking for. Compassion means, yes, this person needs to graduate, and this person needs to do well. But can we show some flexibility? Can we show some compassion? It makes a huge difference.”

Enacting campus-wide change is something she hopes to do as the director of counseling services. “That’s why I went for a director job,” says Dr. Kim. “While I really enjoy the one-on-one… I want to be able to work at a more systemic level so we can try to figure out what it is that is creating this much pain and suffering.”

Identity

A painting in Dr. Kim’s office symbolizes their Korean-Venezuelan background.

Dr. Kim’s office is as colorful as her bubbly personality. On her walls and shelves are a variety of art pieces and mementos that represent her intersectional identity, storied past, and varied interests. These include figurines from Venezuela and Korea, advocacy art for trans women, and gifts from previous clients and coworkers. “I just feel more like me when I have these things around me. It’s not like I was born today; I have all this history. So it’s really helpful.”

Dr. Kim enthusiastically described some of her favorite items, for example, her Russian nesting dolls. “You know, they are just like people, we always have another layer and another layer and different parts of us. Not only because of that, but I just think they’re adorable.“

Another is her wooden elephant carving: “I love elephants […] Elephants are very community-minded. Elephants are always looking after everybody else while also trying to take care of themselves.”

Outside of work, Dr. Kim likes following non-binary and women’s sports leagues, the Dodgers, attending LGBTQ advocacy events like pride parades, and playing pool. Their partner is non-binary trans, so she also likes to attend other trans-affirming events. “I was president of the Los Angeles pool league until just recently, because this job is keeping me very busy, and I can’t lead a whole other organization,” she chuckles.

Continuing Their Listening Tour

Since they have stepped foot on campus, Dr. Kim has embarked on a “listening tour” of Caltech. To gain a better understanding of the campus community, she has been researching Caltech as well as talking to students and faculty. “Caltech is so unique. I get it’s a little bit of a unicorn. I can’t just transfer my knowledge from past places […] I’m gonna be on a listening tour for at least a year. And of course, it just continues, the listening tour never stops.“ Showing their commitment to said tour, they proceeded to ask me about Caltech after our interview and expressed interest in talking to more student leaders.

The fact that the Caltech community has a voice to be heard is something that Dr. Kim appreciates: “I’m very grateful, because I feel like I am at a time when people have been vocally advocating.” She mentioned reading articles in the Tech regarding student life issues, and says she’s excited for the upcoming SFC (Student-Faculty Conference) and SLEC (Student Life and Experience Conference). “There’s some schools where that’s not even happening,” she says. “All of that work is like a dream for a director coming in. The conversation has already started.“