Carlos Albizu Miranda

Carlos Albizu Miranda (1920-1984) was a pioneering Puerto Rican psychologist who founded the Caribbean Center for Advanced Studies (Centro Caribeño de Estudios Postgraduados), now known as Albizu University — the first professional school of psychology in Puerto Rico and one of the few institutions in the Americas dedicated to training psychologists to work with Spanish-speaking populations.

Born in Juana Díaz, Albizu Miranda earned his doctorate in psychology and dedicated his career to:
- Community psychology: Developing psychological services accessible to Puerto Rican communities, particularly low-income populations
- Cultural psychology: Understanding psychological processes within Puerto Rican cultural context — rejecting the imposition of mainland psychological frameworks on island populations
- Training: Creating a pipeline of psychologists trained to work in Spanish and within Puerto Rican cultural contexts
- Research: Studying the psychological effects of colonialism, poverty, migration, and cultural dislocation

The institution he founded in 1966 has grown into Albizu University, with campuses in San Juan and Miami, training generations of psychologists who serve Puerto Rican and Latino communities. His vision — that psychology must be culturally grounded to be effective — was decades ahead of mainstream American psychology.

Albizu Miranda's work is particularly relevant given Puerto Rico's mental health crisis — exacerbated by Hurricane María, earthquakes, economic collapse, and outmigration. The need for culturally competent psychological services in Puerto Rico has never been greater.