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Isak Kim, Ph.D.

Dr. Isak Kim, Ph.D., NCC, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Counselor Education at the University of Iowa. He is a counseling researcher whose work focuses on childhood trauma, youth and school mental health, and the development of scalable, implementation-ready mental health supports across educational and community systems.

Dr. Kim’s work is grounded in the premise that resilience and recovery in youth mental health are fundamentally relational. Guided by this perspective, his research examines how relational contexts, across peer, family, school, and community systems, function as measurable risk and protective mechanisms shaping behavioral and mental health, trauma responses, and recovery processes. His program of research integrates adverse and positive childhood experiences, peer and school dynamics, mental health crises, including non-suicidal self-injury and suicidality, and workforce-related factors in counseling and school mental health. 

In support of this work, Dr. Kim has secured over $1.3 million in external and internal research and training funding from federal agencies, academic institutions, and community organizations, with additional multi-year proposals currently under review. His funded projects include large-scale peer-led school mental health initiatives, workforce development and training programs, and cross-cultural adaptation and implementation of digital mental health interventions for adolescents.

A noteworthy feature of Dr. Kim’s program of research is its strong international, cross-national, and multi-disciplinary collaboration. He is actively engaged in collaborative projects spanning the U.S., South Korea, and other countries, including partnerships with medical centers, universities, and various research institutes focused on digital therapeutics, trauma-informed care, and adolescent mental health. These international efforts emphasize cultural adaptation, implementation feasibility, and the generation of globally relevant evidence for trauma literature and youth mental health practice.

Dr. Kim has published more than 50 peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and scholarly reports, and his work has appeared in leading journals across counseling, school mental health, traumatic stress, and child and adolescent mental health. His research has been presented extensively at national and international conferences and continues to inform both empirical scholarship and applied mental health programming for youth and underserved populations.

Dr. Kim earned his Ph.D. in Counselor Education from The Pennsylvania State University in 2021. His work is informed by interdisciplinary training and professional experience across clinical, educational, and international research settings, supporting a sustained commitment to scalable, culturally responsive mental health innovation.