Launching My Substack

You're invited for the ride.

Photo by Paris Bilal | Unsplash

For the past few years, I’ve been thinking about starting a Substack where I could regularly write about and engage others around topics I care about in a more unrestrained way than academic writing. Over this time, I’ve generated several partially written pieces and a long list of things I wanted to write about. Well, this holiday break gave me some time and space to finally get to it by organizing these thoughts and structuring a way to share them. So this is it—I’m launching As Is. You can read more about what I will write about below, but in short, it will be a mix of personal and professional perspectives on the psychological, social, cultural, and sociopolitical topics I think most about.

The name “As Is” reflects both my commitment to seeing the world “as it is” and that my ramblings only express my current thinking. So the ideas are “as is,” and I may update my thinking in light of better arguments or new evidence.

That’s where you come in. I hope this can also be a place where you and others can candidly and respectfully (this is critical) respond to and challenge my thinking. Honest and constructive critique is always welcome here.

Why Am I Doing This?

The main reasons I’m doing this are mentioned above—namely, my search for a less restrained way of communicating and exchanging ideas. This growing desire for community through dialogue is motivated by a couple of things. First, I have fewer years ahead of me than behind me, and I want to make the most of them by saying the things I want to say in the ways I want to say them. I have a major fear of looking back on my life and having regret for not doing this. In other words, this is, in part, my way of processing a mid-life crisis.

The other reason behind my desire for freer writing is that academia, the world I work in, has become increasingly censorious, and self-censorship is becoming the new normal, especially in the social sciences (I’ve advocated for institutional neutrality and free speech to address this). This saddens and really frustrates me. Again, I can’t go out like that.

Finally, I’m doing this because I think I have a unique enough perspective to add value to the topics I’ll write about here. My experiences in settings ranging from the hood, the burbs, private school, an HBCU, “elite” institutions, school boards, and more have shaped my viewpoints in ways that often differ from most people I know.

Who Am I?

Since As Is will blend the personal and professional, I should tell you who I am.

Personal

My name is Mike Strambler, and I’m a dad, husband, and psychologist. I was born to two Black parents, both of whom have passed away. My mom was a lifelong educator—first a teacher and then a learning consultant—and my dad started in the military and then went into business. They divorced when I was three. Both sides of my family have a military background, with my dad’s side being the most involved.

I’m from South New Jersey. If you know Jersey, you know it’s really two states with NYC- and Philly-associated ends. I’m from the Philly end. I was born and raised, from about the age of 3 to 12, in Camden. I then moved to Willingboro and back to Camden around age 17. Camden is a city most known for its high poverty and crime and, for a while, was characterized as the most dangerous city in the US. It’s been the topic of popular writing and research for many years.

Willingboro is a predominantly Black suburb, which at the time seemed like a Black utopia to me. I remember feeling like “we made it” when we moved there, although it was by no means an affluent town. It has since experienced a significant decline, which I regularly say would make for a fascinating study as to why (apparently, there’s a dissertation on the topic). My move back to Camden is a complicated story involving circumstances about which I probably won’t write but will show up in topics I take on.

Something different about me from most Camden and Willingboro residents is that I never attended public schools in either place. Instead, I went to a private Quaker school in a nearby affluent town. I’m convinced that this was one of the best decisions my parents made for me, as the school served as a major protective factor. I seriously doubt that my life trajectory would have been what it is had they not sent me there.

I had a meandering and diverse postsecondary education. I attended and graduated from Morehouse College (an HBCU), where I majored in psychology. I worked a year after that in a children's inpatient psychiatric institution, deciding what I wanted to do with my life and applying to a handful of psych graduate programs. I ended up in a master’s program at Stony Brook University, where I studied and earned my MA in social psychology.

I figured out that social psychology was not what I envisioned for a career, so I took off another year and moved across the country to Los Angeles, where I did clinical research and program evaluation to gain more experience while also applying to doctoral clinical and community psychology programs. I then went to UC Berkeley, where I earned my PhD in clinical and community psychology. I did predoctoral and postdoctoral training in Chicago before finishing up postdoc training at Yale University.

Professional

From grad school on, my work has primarily focused on studying and improving school, family, and community conditions for children and youth. My academic work mostly focuses on early childhood care and education, social-emotional wellbeing, and learning, and I’ve recently started studying the sociopolitics of education and health.

I’m an applied researcher, which is different from the research you might typically see written about in the popular press. Rather than focusing on generating fundamental knowledge about how and why humans do what we do, I focus on producing knowledge about how to address problems by applying and building upon existing psychosocial theory and evidence.

This often means working with practitioners and policymakers, evaluating practices, and helping organizations develop their own practices for using data to improve their practices and policies. Some of this work is published in scientific journals and books, and some is in private and public reports. I’m based at the Yale School of Medicine, but I have a PhD, not an MD.

Political

Twenty years ago, I probably would have identified as a progressive, but today it would be impossible to convince me to do so. I’ve become deeply disappointed by what’s happened on that side of the political spectrum and have been unaffiliated with any party for the past 10 years or so. My views are probably best described as center-left, but I’m politically homeless. I’m fine with that, really, because I value independent thought and think that the current state of parties and social movements is making us dumber rather than smarter. Plus, I’ve never really been the “joiner” type.

I’m also an elected member of a Connecticut public school board, an expereince that is very meaningful to me and has helped me develop a greater appreciation for the impact and challenges of local governance. Additionally, I’m a member of a charter school board.

What Will I Write About?

Basically, I’ll write about things I regularly think about, care about, worry about, and get angry about. This generally involves topics in the social and psychological realms such as education, culture, parenting (especially fathering), identity, education, mental health, and civics. You can expect it to be heavy on education, parenting, and sociocultural issues.

Things that currently occupy much of my thinking are:

• The tearing of our social fabric

• Civics and social and emotional learning in schools

• Parenting and child development

• The crisis among boys and men

• The nature, challenges, and importance of close relationships—mostly friendship, romantic partnerships, and parents

• Social justice activism

• Numerous problems in the Black community, including crime, education, and parenting

What to Expect

For now, I’ll be posting every other week. My goal is to eventually move to weekly if I can find a good rhythm that doesn’t interfere too much with work and my personal life.

For the uninitiated, Substack has options for free and paid subscriptions. Most content here will be free. Content made exclusive to paid subscribers will be more personal stuff and deep dives into topics. And maybe I’ll throw in some random material like my Mike’s Mac & Cheese recipe.

If you end up finding my writing valuable or just want to support me in doing this, I would be grateful for your paid subscription. I don’t get paid for this, and I’m already financially in the hole since my son is looking to collect for his services of co-designing the As Is logos.