Stijn de Leeuw, who is pursuing his PhD in Developmental Psychology at UCT, has been awarded the Patrice L Engle Dissertation Grant from the Society for Research in Child Development. The grant is in honour of Patrice L. Engle, Ph.D. (1944-2012) who was a pioneer and leader in global early child development. The grant provides support for junior students interested in a career in global early child development who are from or doing research in low- or middle-income countries. Stijn is working under the supervision or Dr. Susan Malcolm-Smith. His research focuses on investigating protective factors that support resilience longitudinally in children aged 3 to 8. The research is part of a larger, ongoing study, the Drakenstein Child Health Study (DCHS), which is a multidisciplinary birth cohort study, headed by Prof Heather Zar. Different protective factors and processes will be researched longitudinally. Seeing how these factors are possibly interrelated and function over time should elucidate potential pathways to resilience in this particular context. After his dissertation, Stijn’s goal is to put research into practice and set up resilience interventions for children in low - and middle-income countries. Stijn holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree in Clinical Developmental Psychology from the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.