Predoctoral Internship in

Professional Psychology

2007-2008

Letter to Prospective Applicants

Welcome to our website for the Ohio University Predoctoral Psychology Internship Program at Counseling and Psychological Services (CPS).  Our goal is to provide high quality training in the practice of professional psychology.  Interns in our program have the opportunity to receive a wide variety of training experiences that will help you prepare for full-time clinical work.  This brochure is designed to help you become familiar with the organization and goals of our training program, in order to help you in your application decisions.

CPS is a department within the Division of Student Affairs.  Interns have an opportunity to gain familiarity with how an organization such as the Division interacts cooperatively across departments to meet student needs and promote success, wellness, and good citizenship. 

Our full-time staff consists of 6 licensed psychologists, 1 licensed clinical mental health counselor, and one alcohol/substance abuse specialist.  We have two clerical support staff who operate the front desk, schedule clients, manage files, coordinate meetings and communications, and also provide a wide variety of support tasks for staff.  We provide training for up to 6 graduate student trainees from Ohio University’s Psychology department and Counselor Education program, in addition to our internship program.  We also currently have two postdoctoral psychology positions whose job it is to work with branch campuses, providing mental health education, brief interventions, and referral to longer-term services. They also work on our Athens campus at CPS for 2 days a week.  As you can imagine, the staff, including interns, engage in rich interactions with each other and get opportunities to take on many different roles and types of activities. 

On this webpage, you can find a complete description of our training program, including a link to our Internship Training Handbook, but if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me via e-mail:  youngs2@ohio.edu.

Regards,

Susan B. Young, Ph.D.

Philosophy of Training

At Ohio University’s Counseling and Psychological Services, interns engage in structured training and professional practice designed to provide a sequence of increasingly complex professional experiences, roles, and responsibilities. As confidence and competency increase, interns learn by becoming progressively more independent while retaining access to consultation, training and support. By the end of the internship year, interns are expected to be ready to function as autonomous, entry-level practitioners with an intermediate to advanced level of competency in all professional areas.

To accomplish this, the training program at Ohio University uses the Practitioner-Scholar-Mentor model. We help interns build on previous skills and knowledge with hands-on learning opportunities as full-time practitioners in training under the guidance of skilled clinicians. We emphasize the dynamic relationship between the larger conversations going on in the scientific field of psychology and the more intimate conversations going on between the mentor and the apprentice.

The three basic components of our training program are first, a strong emphasis on the growth process of the interns throughout their experience of socialization into the field of professional psychology. Second, we consider as critical the amount and quality of supervision and mentoring the intern receives from experienced clinicians. Third, we understand good professional practice to be possible only when science and practice are integrated (Belar and Perry, 1992) and when the practitioner "reflects-in-action" (Peterson 1995 p.980). We believe that to be responsible and effective practitioners, we must also be scholars.

Description of Internship Activities

A. Seminars

Special Topics Seminar (1 hour/wk, all year)

This seminar is designed to give special attention to issues such as multicultural competence and cross-cultural counseling, eating disorders, substance abuse, brief therapy models, and many others.  Although the seminar is designed to meet for one hour weekly, it is often formatted as a workshop, and so can sometimes be scheduled for 2, 3, or 4 hours once or twice a month.

Intern Seminar (1 hour/wk, all year)

This is a seminar focused on professional development and ethics throughout the year and is facilitated by the training director. 

Supervision of Supervision Seminar (1 hour/wk, fall quarter)

Provides training and preparation for supervision of counseling and psychology practicum students and trainees at CPS. 

Group Supervision of Supervision (2 hours/wk, winter and spring quarters)

Interns provide supervision of practicum students in winter and trainees in spring quarters under supervision of licensed staff.

Group Therapy Seminar/Supervision (1 hour/wk, fall, winter, and spring quarters)

Interns meet to learn about group facilitation and to get supervision for their ongoing therapy groups at CPS.  

Consultation/Outreach Seminar/Supervision (1 hours/wk, all year starting fall)

Ongoing seminar looking at theory, models, and techniques of consultation and outreach, including how to design programming, conduct a needs assessment, etc. Intern activities in the areas of consultation and outreach are supervised at this time.  This seminar meets for 2 hours at a time and alternates times with the Clinical Issues Seminar.

Clinical Issues + Assessment Seminar/Supervision (1 hour/wk, all year starting fall)

This seminar provides an opportunity for interns to conduct ongoing case presentations and develop more expertise in the area of assessment for the wide variety of clinical cases we see at CPS.

Summer intensive seminars (12+ hours per week, 5 weeks in summer)

Brief, intensive seminars are offered in summer to get interns “jump-started” so they can begin providing services in a wide range of areas for fall quarter and our busier periods.  These seminars are offered in the following areas: alcohol and substance abuse treatment (10 hours), group therapy (12 hours), couples’ therapy (4 hours), career development (10 hours), clinical interviewing (20 hours), emergency services and clinical management (8 hours).

Clinical Team Meeting (1 hour/wk, all year starting in fall)

All interns join with the clinical staff for one hour weekly clinical consultation meeting. This meeting provides an opportunity to receive support, feedback, and suggestions in regard to particularly interesting and challenging cases, or those where some factor(s) present potential ethical conflicts, etc. This is also a forum to discuss emerging critical clinical issues from the university community: recent university crises, or emerging situations likely to lead to crisis, such as severe conflict in a program, a student death, an attempted suicide, etc. The meetings are informal in format, and trainees as well as staff are invited to bring in relevant information, viewpoints, or case material.

Individual Clinical Supervision (2 hours/wk, all year)

Intern supervision is a priority of the program and is geared to the intern’s level of professional development.  Each intern receives a minimum of two hours of individual supervision weekly. All primary supervisors are licensed psychologists.  As might benefit the intern, other staff contribute supplementary supervision in areas such as group work, consultation and outreach, etc.  Interns will be evaluated quarterly by each of their ongoing supervisors (see Quarterly Intern Performance Evaluation).  Each intern also has a broader evaluation given twice yearly, written by his or her primary supervisor.  This evaluation will include feedback from all staff members who had worked with the intern during that evaluation period and will be shared with the intern’s home department (see Mid-Year Intern Performance Evaluation).  Evaluation will be discussed in more detail in the section on evaluation.

Liaison Supervision (weekly as arranged for apprenticeship)

Clinicians at CPS have expertise in a number of different areas, whether clinically (i.e., eating disorders, substance abuse), in other services areas (i.e., diversity training, outreach), or administratively (i.e., training, for which they offer specific mentorship.  Interns have a choice of one apprenticeship area per six month period.  At the mid-year, they can either choose to stay on in the apprenticeship they have chosen, or chose a second area and start working with a different mentor. 

B. Administrative/Staff Activities

Administrative Staff Meeting (1 hr/wk, all year)

All interns and the full staff meet together once a week, for one hour for an administrative meeting to discuss issues, changes, concerns, or information important to all staff. Procedural changes, additions to the computer networks, new forms and documents, or scheduling of programs are examples of topics that may be covered in these meetings. Trainees as well as full staff are invited to bring in relevant information or bring up topics and concerns to be discussed. 

Meeting with the Training Director (1 hr/wk, all year)

The training director meets with the interns as an opportunity to do any business that we need to do, air problems, process, and relax together. This is for the purpose of keeping the lines of communication open between the interns, the training director, and the staff.

Committee Work (variable)

Interns, as part of their apprenticeship experiences and interests, may become involved in committee work either in CPS to further our own goals, for the Division of Student Affairs (DSA), or for the Ohio University campus at large.  Some examples of committee work might be: for the purpose of improving outreach and prevention of eating disorders, improving services to athletes, improving the process of identification and referral of students with substance abuse problems, assessing some aspect of CPS or DSA functioning through benchmarking or use of CAS standards, etc. 

Other Professional Activities (4 hours/wk, variable)

Each intern is allowed up to four hours per week time for professional development. This time can be used to individualize one's training program by allowing time to spend on special interest areas or to pursue other areas such as teaching, research, program development, or dissertation work. This time can be used to listen to tapes, read, prepare for clinical work and supervision, write case notes, and consult on cases.

C. Direct Services

Clinical Services

Interns are required to provide direct clinical services to individuals and couples, as well as conduct group therapy sessions throughout the year.  They are also required to provide emergency walk-in services in rotation with the rest of the professional staff.  Clients at CPS represent a wide range of backgrounds and identities, presenting concerns, and levels of clinical complexity.  Interns must contract for the minimum number of hours weekly to meet training requirements, but each intern will be able to either develop some specific clinical interests within an apprenticeship structure or develop broad generalist skills in the counseling center. 

Consultation and Outreach Services

Interns engage in regular outreach and prevention programming for CPS, while attending the C/O seminar and group supervision meetings every other week for two hours.  Over the course of the year, each intern must provide a minimum of two programs per quarter for the fall, winter, and spring quarters.  In addition, each intern will work with the C/O supervisor to design a consultation project that will meet the goals of the division’s strategic plan and the needs of the university community.  Within this requirement, there is a great deal of flexibility to choose programming or consultation projects that fit within each interns developed interests as an apprentice. 

Supervision of Practicum and Trainees

Interns will be required to provide direct supervision to at least one practicum student during winter quarter of the calendar year.  Practicum students typically have between one and two clients.  Part of the supervision will involve reviewing tapes and notes of the supervisee.  Training and supervision for supervision will be provided throughout the year, first in the form of a seminar in the fall, then in the form of a 2-hour supervision-of-supervision meeting.  Interns will have an option for more advanced supervision experience during spring quarter supervising clinical psychology trainees who are here on an externship.  Those trainees see between 7-9 clients and their supervision is split between two supervisors, one of which can be an intern. 

D. Documentation of Hours

Interns are responsible for documenting their hours on an Excel spreadsheet that is provided to them ahead of time.  Hours can be totaled for report in the spreadsheet.  A copy of the spreadsheet data needs to be submitted to the Training Director on a monthly basis.  Interns will be given feedback about their hours every three months at minimum.

List of Potential Apprenticeships

Working with Eating Disorders

An intern apprenticing in this area would develop more in-depth experience with clients who have diagnosed with an eating disorder, would meet regularly with the ED interdisciplinary team, and his or her outreach and/or consultation responsibilities could be focused on outreach, training, and consultation with the Ping Center, OU Athletics, Wellworks, Health Promotion, and other groups on campus as needed.  The staff member in charge of organizing and monitoring this area is Michelle Pride. 

Substance Abuse

Alcohol and other drug use present a huge challenge to student development and wellbeing.  An intern wanting extra experience in this area can shadow our AOD specialist, work with him on programming, training, and consultation with the many departments and people he collaborates with regularly.  The intern will also develop more in-depth clinical experience with alcohol and drug issues by having a greater concentration of AOD issues in their client caseload.  This apprenticeship will be mentored by Jason Weber, while individual client cases will be supervised by Jeanne Heaton, as one of the two assigned clinical supervisors for that six month period.

Training

This is an administrative apprenticeship that permits the intern to gain expertise with organizing a training program.  This intern would co-teach the trainee seminar throughout the six months, help to manage coordination and communication between the students’ home departments, the supervisors on staff, and the training director at CPS.  The staff member responsible for this area is Susan Young.

Group Therapy

An intern choosing a more intensive experience with group work will get experience doing process observation, co-lead an additional group of their choice, and aid in administrating and promoting the group program at CPS.  The staff member responsible for this area is Michelle Pride.

Career Development

Many counseling centers are housed together with the institution’s career services, unlike CPS.  An intern wishing to get a more intensive experience working with students who need career counseling can work with Career Services in providing a few hours a week of direct client service, as well as provide assessments and individual counseling on career issues here at CPS.  The intern can also choose to focus their consultation and outreach projects in the area of career services.  The staff member who will be mentoring and coordinating this opportunity is Paul Castelino. 

Supervision

This will be an opportunity to double the experience of the intern’s supervision of trainees in at CPS.  The direct supervision opportunity is only offered through spring quarter extending the regular winter quarter supervision rotation.  Interns can also focus their consultation and outreach responsibilities to help with the Counselor in Residence Program, as part of learning how to administrate and supervise those trainees who are C.R.s.  The staff member mentoring this opportunity is Paul Castelino. 

Consultation and Outreach

An intern can work directly with the C/O coordinator, learning how outreach programming is organized and managed, how to connect staff with expertise and potential clients needing outreach and consultation.  The intern will have an opportunity to get more in-depth experience in the practice of consultation, developing and working on additional projects that are the direct responsibility of the coordinator.  The staff member mentoring this opportunity is Sheila Williams. 

Administration

This will provide an opportunity to work with our director in understanding budgetary procedures, reporting and advising procedures within the administrative structure of the Division of Student Affairs, developing cooperative relationships with other departments within and outside the division.  It is a chance to really understand the director’s role in the center and in the larger university community.  The staff member mentoring this opportunity is Jeanne Heaton.

Goals and Expected Competencies for Internship

Goals and Objectives  

I.            To provide interns the opportunity to function as professional psychologists.  This objective is implemented through

a.    providing a collegial environment in which interns work with other professional psychologists as staff members;

b.   exposing interns to a variety of client concerns and diagnoses, a diversity of client ethnic and cultural backgrounds, different theoretical orientations, and a variety of treatment modalities;

c.    increasing interns’ responsibilities and opportunities for autonomous functioning over the duration of the internship;

d.   exposing interns to a variety of professional activities beyond assessment, diagnosis, and treatment including activities such as outreach programming, supervision of trainees, administrative and committee involvement, consultation, etc.;

II.          To provide regular, intensive supervision of intern activities.  This objective is accomplished through the provision of

a.    a minimum of two hours a week of individual, face-to-face supervision by a licensed psychologist in addition to other supervision experiences as described below, to total a minimum of approximately one hour of direct supervision for every four hours of direct service provided;

b.   formal and informal consultation as requested with staff members;

c.    apprenticeship opportunities for one-on-one supervision in specialized areas such as eating disorders, substance abuse, cross-cultural services, or administration.

d.    group supervision provided within training activities such as professional issues seminar, outreach and consultation seminar, clinical issues seminar, and group seminar.

III.        To provide a depth and breadth of educational experiences focused on the acquisition of core and secondary professional skills.  This objective is accomplished through

a.    participating in training seminars and apprenticeship experiences offered by professional staff with expertise in working with special populations, (clients with alcohol or drug problems; eating disordered clients); counseling ethnic and cultural minorities; counseling couples; and/or using special treatment modalities such as brief psychodynamic therapy, stress debriefing, motivational interviewing, or Dialectical Behavioral therapy;

b.   providing direct psychological services with a professional staff member, e.g. group or couples’ therapy;

IV.         To provide individualized experiences in addition to the required activities.  These activities are provided via

a.    opportunities for individualizing intern experience including participation in the multidisciplinary Eating Disorders Treatment Team; participating in Student Affairs committees and other professional student affairs activities; working collaboratively with professional staff on administration and assessment projects; developing a consultation project that is an outgrowth of the intern’s particular interests combined with the institution’s strategic goals; apprenticeship experiences;

b.   allowing time for individualized personal and professional growth experiences (attending workshops, attending regional professional conferences, continuing education, etc.).