It is an honor to welcome our guest mentor for this episode, Dr. Natasha Thomas.

Natasha Thomas, PhD is a Board Certified Music Therapist (MT-BC) currently serving as Assistant Professor at Indiana University Purdue University at Indianapolis (IUPUI). She received her undergraduate degree in music therapy from the University of North Dakota (UND), holds a masters degree in special education (also from UND, with an emphasis on visual impairment), and completed her PhD in expressive therapies from Lesley University in Cambridge, MA. Natasha has served on the Midwest and Southeastern Regional Boards of the American Music Therapy Association (AMTA) in various committee positions, including the Diversity & Multiculturalism Committee. She is currently serving on the steering committee of the Black Music Therapists Network (BMTN) and co-facilitates the BMTN sponsored podcast “Black Creative Healing” with Adenike Webb, sharing in radical conversations, mindful collaborations, and wholistic (spelling intended!) visioning that centers Black communities. Natasha is a committed advocate for creative & culturally sustaining support for marginalized communities. Her current research focus involves Black creativity, particularly identity construction and community care. Natasha is interested in the meaning made behind artistic & collaborative choices made by Black/African American youth from limited resource communities, as well as the Black professionals who serve them, and Black creatives in general. Her research and clinical work are inclusive of emerging technology, as well as the perspectives of disability and queer identities, and the unique ways those perspectives and resources can intersect to impact quality of life, identity construction and meaning making.