The RAMS practicum is opened to students in professional training programs: psychology, social work, and marriage & family therapy. It is designed to provide the trainees with the generalized professional practice skills expected of a novice therapist under supervision. Because of the rich cultural diversity of the client population and clinical staff, trainees have the opportunity to hone their skills while developing clinical sensitivity to issues of diversity: cultural, religious, ethnic, disability, sexual orientation, gender. In fact, we seek students who have an expressed interest in cultural competence training and the vision of working with minority populations.

Practicum trainees function as integral members of our Outpatient Services and of an already diverse clinical staff while receiving didactic and supervisory training. The program is designed to facilitate the trainees' growth as clinicians, and the expectation is that proficiency will be established for the clinical evaluation and assessment, conduct of psychotherapy (individual, family, group & couples) across the life span, and intervention with the more disturbed and chronically troubled patient. Trainees will receive training in brief and longer-term psychotherapy and case management. They will learn to search for clients' strengths and liabilities and make the evaluation data relevant to functional life skills. Because of the nature of the client population trainees will also learn counseling related to post-traumatic stress and grief and adaptation to major life changes.

RAMS Clinical Practicum Program offers 12-14 positions for doctoral-level psychology practicum students and masters-level counseling and social work interns.

This clinical training requires a 20-hour per week time commitment for twelve months: from the beginning of September until the end of August. There is no stipend;
each trainee is entitled to 90 hours of time off (combined vacation and sick leave).

Work schedule is flexible. However, all trainees need to attend weekly seminars and team meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings and mandatory group supervision on either Thursday morning or Wednesday afternoon. There are also two supplementary training experiences: elective Group Supervision on Child Cases (Monday afternoon) and Psychodynamic Theory Group (Tuesday morning).
For details on Practicum Training Schedule, click here.

Trainees work with a caseload of approximately 8-10 clients, including children, families, couples, and adults (the exact percentage of each is based on the actual cases referred to RAMS and varies from year to year) . There is an expectation of 8-10 hours of direct client contact per week, including a clinical intake hour.

Every week, trainees receive one hour of individual supervision with a licensed mental health professional (for brief Supervisor Bios, click here). Additionally, all trainees attend at least one 1.5 hour group supervision session per week (up to three and a half hours of group supervision including electives).

Training is predominantly psychodynamic in approach and emphasizes object relations and contemporary relational perspectives on working with severely disturbed clients. It also features a strong emphasis on cultural competency, especially in regard to Asian, Pacific Islander, and Russian-speaking ethnicities. Students can expect to receive considerable didactic and experiential training in these areas and cultural competency in general.

The training year starts with an intensive three-week-long Orientation Program. During these three weeks trainees are expected to attend orientation trainings 9am through 5pm on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. After that, there are two weekly Didactic Training Seminars. One, which is held on Tuesdays, is for practicum students and pre-doctoral psychology interns only. During the second half of the training year, a case conference format is utilized for this seminar. The other seminar is our Wednesday In-service Training for the entire Outpatient Services staff. Additionally, trainees are welcome to attend agency-wide "feature trainings" such as the RAMS Psychoanalytic Scholar Series held throughout the year (for RAMS Training Sessions, click here).

To see a list of Practicum Activities at a glance, please click here.

The deadline for application is February 12th, 2010 with interviews held shortly thereafter. For details on the application procedure and selection criteria, please see Application Process.