NSU Alumna Retires From Yale University After Long Career

Nova Southeastern University alumna Carole Goldberg, Psy.D., recently retired from Yale University after working there for 25 years, but her professional journey has taken her to different careers and places.

In the mid 1960s, Goldberg worked as an elementary school teacher, first at a Native American reservation in Washington state, then in a small town in Alabama, and finally in St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands.

“It’s been a wonderfully rich sociological environment all along the way,” Goldberg said of her time as an elementary teacher. “I learned a lot from my students, getting a glimpse into their lives, what’s important to them, what their family structures are like.”

Goldberg also worked as a teacher in New York, but returned to the Virgin Islands and shifted gears to hospitality, working in hotel management and as a retail merchandise manager for jewelry and watches.

“It was a wonderful experience, being able to travel the world with a purpose,” she said.

After getting married, Goldberg relocated to South Florida to live with her husband and his two children. Goldberg decided to take several classes at Florida Atlantic University, but she quickly realized that she preferred to pursue a full graduate degree and applied to the psychology master’s program at NSU. A faculty member named Isabel Streisand encouraged Goldberg to switch to the Clinical Psychology doctoral program.

“One of the things I’ve talked about to a lot of student groups is people who are signposts in my life, like my coach in high school who said, ‘you should go to this college’,” Goldberg said.

Goldberg said navigating through graduate school meant unlearning many things she had learned after being out of school for 25 years. One of her favorite aspects of her time at NSU was the diversity of thought illustrated by the College of Psychology’s faculty members.

“They had wonderful collective experience,” she said. “A diversity of schools of psychology that they ascribed to.”

After graduating with her doctorate in 1996, Goldberg matched to Yale University for her postdoctoral internship, which eventually led to a full-time position as a staff psychologist in the university’s Department of Mental Health and Counseling. Goldberg initially worked in treatment but later took on additional roles as the university sought to increase the profile for its mental health services. Goldberg worked in health education and trained groups of peer counselors tasked with supporting sexual assault survivors. Goldberg also underwent additional training to become a certified sex therapist.

Goldberg found that there was a need for additional university resources for handling sexual assault. In 2006, Goldberg set up the SHARE (Sexual Harassment Assault Response and Education) Center and served as its first director. Goldberg described the SHARE Center at the start as consisting only of herself and a phone, but over the last 14 years it has grown into a full department within the Yale Health building. SHARE has four offices with a private waiting room and is staffed by licensed mental health counselors. The counselors are on call 24/7 and services can be accessed by appointment or walk-in. SHARE also offers orientation programs at the start of each academic year to the undergraduate and graduate student bodies.

“It has helped students come forward because they know someone will take them seriously,” Goldberg said. “There’s been a big shift in a positive direction.”

Wishing to spend more time with her husband, Goldberg began a phased retirement and stepped down from directing SHARE. She still has some involvement at Yale, supervising a psychology fellow in the mental health center and conducting freshman seminars. Goldberg also maintains a small private practice, but due to the COVID-19 pandemic she transitioned into working with clients virtually.

Goldberg urges current graduate students in psychology to open to all opportunities that may come their way.

“I think psychology is a very privileged profession,” she said. “You are invited into people’s stories, their inner lives. I find people infinitely fascinating. It’s a daily education that I don’t think you get anywhere else.”