The Psychologist-Artist: Founder of New York School of the Arts Betsy Lawrence '95, PsyD, Uniquely Merges Art and Helping Others

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Betsy Lawrence ’95, PsyD, has had a hunger for learning ever since she was a child, a quality that would propel her throughout both her personal life and her extraordinary dual career as a psychologist and psychoanalyst, as well as founder and president of New York School of the Arts (NYSA), a not-for-profit arts school and cultural center in New York City.

In the early years of her education, classes in art and mathematics that interested Lawrence were not largely available. With college on the horizon, she also faced a lack of precedence in her family of women attending higher education, let alone earning a doctorate. However, Lawrence’s deep desire to learn–and to help others with that knowledge–coupled with meeting supportive people along the way guided her to achieve an education that supported her dreams and passions.

Early training

Lawrence’s entry into the field of psychology was completely unexpected.

With an undergraduate degree in both Greek and Latin, and master’s in childhood special education, it was during her work teaching language and reading to children with special needs at St. Luke’s Hospital in Manhattan that she first encountered psychologists and psychiatrists. It was at a time during which terms such as dyslexia and attention deficit disorder were relatively new, and many questions existed in the medical community on treatment. Lawrence was both concerned and curious; she saw young patients placed on medication and wanted to delve deeper, to know more. It was then that she decided to become a child psychoanalyst.

Lawrence attended evening classes as part of the School-Clinical Child Psychology PsyD program at Pace, one she was drawn to because of its flexibility and dual focus. Over the years, she would work closely with her faculty mentor, Barbara Mowder, PhD, leading to a dissertation on educators’ perceptions of parental roles, and put theory to practice in externships, most prominently at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Manhattan, where she also did a post-graduate fellowship in neuropsychology. It was an exciting time and she felt that her mind could grow with the supportive foundation she found at Pace.

“I think that if you ask students, they will agree that Pace faculty are very, very open to ideas,” said Lawrence. “Sharing is encouraged, and people here tend to have a good heart, too. You didn't have to pretend you knew everything. There was help, and this was really quite special.”

She holds fond memories of students supporting each other based on their own strengths: for example, Lawrence would be approached by the more mathematically-inclined students for assistance with writing (a skill which she highly credits another New York Psychology department faculty mentor, Florence Denmark, PhD, with helping her to develop), and they, in turn, would guide her on numbers-based research that was a key part of the program.

Creating opportunities

Although Lawrence would go on to a successful career as a psychologist and psychoanalyst, including in private practice guiding parents through their children’s developmental stages, she was ever an artist at heart. She enrolled in an intensive art program at the historic National Academy, an art school, museum, and association of professional artists in Manhattan near her work. A dark reality, however, had loomed: the school’s closure, and with it, job losses for the director and as many as 40 faculty.

It was a unifying neighborhood staple, and she could not simply stand by idly.

Lawrence knew both artists and individuals familiar with buildings in Manhattan. So, with a combination of drive, a can-do spirit, and a bit of luck, she worked quickly to open a new institution for the art community to continue, the New York School for the Arts. Through it, she has been able to provide others with what she always deeply wanted for herself: the chance to realize their unique artistic talent, something she feels everyone possesses and just needs to be nurtured.

She describes it as a “magical place” where one can palpably feel the creative process within which others are engaged and to be in this “extraordinary walk” with them. (Some patrons have even shared with Lawrence that her school’s pivoting to online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic, followed not long after by a resumption of classes, had “saved their life”).

Just as an expression of ideas was so openly encouraged in her days as a Pace student, at NYSA, the faculty, diverse and esteemed professionals in their own right, provide students with ideas on experimentation—for example, on how to work with materials—then allow them the space to take that where they wish to. There is also another similarity to Pace: the small classroom sizes encourage a more social, collaborative environment.

“I was good at art. I just didn’t have the opportunity to do it. But it doesn’t mean that, because you haven’t done it, you can’t,” she said. “You never stop learning.”

The liberal arts in life

Today, Lawrence’s psychology practice is part-time, and so she has been able to devote more energy to her artistic endeavors. She now sees herself as, first, a watercolor artist, and second, a sculptor, working with terracotta to bronze. Thematically, she loves to incorporate the mythological as well as symbolism in her art, as she feels that stories in literature have as much relevance today as in the past.

She also credits her background in Greek and Latin as giving her a greater appreciation for these stories, as well as being able to read “almost anything” due to the roots of words of ancient languages finding their way into more modern ones and modes of expression.

“All these wonderful arts—including languages—just bring people together.”

Giving back

Today, we can also find Lawrence giving back to her community in another, unexpected way.

An award-winning sailor, she and her husband have found a way to help veterans of war with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) heal from their trauma with the use of sound and movement from wind created by sails. Working with several foundations, it was simply an idea inspired by her psychological training at Pace that launched and has made a real difference in people’s lives.

Lawrence, who credits sailing as teaching both self-reliance and teamwork, takes the opportunity to use maritime language to similarly reflect on her days as a Pace student:

“I'm a sailor. I got on the boat, and it was the right boat, and we sailed together.”