Rachel Sikorski, LCAT, ATR-BC, RPT-S
Rachel has been working with children, adolescents, and their families for over 15 years. Her professional experience includes several years of work providing trauma-informed, arts-based psychotherapy to at-risk youth in residential treatment and educational settings, children and families in outpatient mental health clinics, and to all ages in private practice. She has experience working with a variety of client populations, including those with trauma and adjustment-related disorders; anxiety and depression; suicidal and self-injurious behavior; oppositional and conduct-related disorders; executive functioning and neurodevelopmental disorders such as ADHD/ADD and ASD. Rachel firmly believes that therapy should be short-term, client-centered, solution-focused, and strength-based in its approach; partnering with clients, their parents & families, and supplemental supports to help increase self-awareness, emotional tolerance, and coping resources that will allow them to build skills to achieve goals quickly and sustain progress long-term.
Rachel Sikorski, LCAT, ATR-BC, RPT-S is a New York State Licensed Creative Arts Therapist (LCAT), nationally registered and board-certified art therapist (ATR-BC), as well as a nationally registered play therapist and play therapy supervisor (RPT-S). She has an undergraduate degree (BA) in Psychology from Canisius College in Buffalo, NY, and a graduate degree (MS) in Art Therapy from Nazareth College in Rochester, NY.
In addition to the visual and creative arts, Rachel has extensive professional training and experience utilizing play therapy, solution-focused therapy, mindfulness, and trauma-informed treatment approaches in her clinical practice. Rachel is fully trained in the trauma-resolution methods of PC (Progressive Counting) and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing Therapy), as well as completed a 9-month, comprehensive trauma certificate training through the Trauma Institute/Child Trauma Institute. She is a professional member of the American Art Therapy Association (AATA), the Association for Play Therapy (APT), and the EMDR International Association (EMDRIA). Her specialty lies in adapting trauma treatment for children -- utilizing sensory materials, the tools and narratives of play, as well as the visual nature of art -- to make this work both palatable and beneficial to children at all stages of cognitive, emotional, and physical development.
Rachel is a founding member of Art Therapy Buffalo, a professional network of local art therapists whose mission is to educate the community and advocate for increased access to professional art therapy services within the Buffalo-Niagara area. For the past several years, her group has hosted free, community-based, public art activities at Larkin Square’s Food Truck Tuesday and live music events, as well as coordinated educational art therapy exhibitions at the Buffalo Arts Studio, ¡Buen Vivir! Gallery for Contemporary Art, and Project 308 Gallery. These exhibitions featured the work of client-artists of all ages who have benefitted from art therapy, as well as art therapist responses to client experiences and beyond. For updates on current events and art therapy in the news, find them on social media, or visit them on the web at arttherapybuffalo.com.
Rachel has been the Art Therapy Minor Program Coordinator at Buffalo State College, Art & Design Department, since 2018. There, as a part-time lecturer, Rachel teaches the ATS 320: Introduction to Art Therapy course and mentors students interested in the art therapy minor or pursuing graduate school for a future career in art therapy (art therapists must have a Master's Degree, at minimum). Her goal is to expand this program to increase access to graduate-level training in art therapy, thereby increasing representation in the field and access to more culturally and racially diverse art therapy professionals within the communities of Buffalo-Niagara regions of Western NY, and beyond.
Rachel has been in private practice for nearly a decade. She began working privately on an in-home basis, before opening offices in Amherst and Allentown, in the city of Buffalo, respectively. She relocated her practice to Gates Circle in 2017, where she shares space with a talented group of independent practitioners who specialize in trauma treatment for adolescents, adults, and couples.