Elizabeth Watson

As a scholar-practitioner-researcher, Elizabeth Anne Watson, PhD, LPC-WI, CRC, serves as the Executive Director of the Center for Innovative Transition, Education, and Employment (CITEE). Elizabeth and Jessica Smith co-founded CITEE eight years ago with a mission to advance innovative education, workforce development, and community-engaged research supporting individuals with disabilities across Wisconsin and the Midwest.

Elizabeth earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Stephen F. Austin State University and completed her Ph.D. in Rehabilitation Psychology at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Over the past fourteen years, she has held progressive leadership positions in higher education at both UW-Whitewater and UW-Milwaukee, serving in the Division of Student Affairs, teaching in rehabilitation psychology, counseling psychology, and higher education leadership, and leading large-scale initiatives focused on student retention, accessibility, behavioral health workforce development, community-based transition programs, and evidence-based training models.

At UW-Milwaukee, Elizabeth provides university-wide leadership in digital accessibility and ADA Title II implementation. She actively contributes to institutional committees, UW System working groups, and statewide advisory boards focused on disability access, rehabilitation counseling, and behavioral health systems transformation.

Elizabeth’s teaching, training, and research portfolio spans universal design for learning (UDL); disability identity and equity; behavioral health and substance-use recovery supports; peer-support specialist program development; culturally grounded transition-to-work models; and clinical supervision practices for counselors and behavioral-health professionals. She presents regionally and nationally on universal design; access and belonging in higher education; transitions to college and career; digital accessibility and adaptive technologies; and strengthening the behavioral-health workforce through innovative training and community partnerships.

In addition to her academic and administrative work, Elizabeth is a licensed practicing counselor and certified rehabilitation counselor, grounding her scholarship and program leadership in direct clinical experience with individuals, families, and communities. Her work reflects a deep commitment to equity, disability justice, and expanding access to high-quality behavioral health and educational services across Wisconsin.