Field Placement

Placement within an agency or within a private practice environment is a very complicated issue for any graduate school which trains clinicians in the field of psychology in the State of California. Both the Board of Behavioral Sciences (which oversees the licensure of Marriage and Family Therapists) and the Board of Psychology (which oversees the licensure of psychologists) require 3,000 hours of supervised clinical experience before a graduate can sit for the respective State of California licensing examinations.

At the doctoral level, despite having arranged for the lion's share of initial funding for the California Psychology Internship Council (CAPIC), PSP students have been largely excluded from participation in their internship programs. By virtue of not being an APA-approved institution, PSP students have also been excluded from participation in APA internship programs. Of course, our high quality of education produces PSP graduates who fare very well when placed side by side with graduates of other graduate schools. These various internship exclusions relate to the politics of accreditation more than the nature of education. Nonetheless, PSP graduates have to scramble more than the graduates of other institutions to find and develop doctoral level internship opportunities.

Masters level trainees are able to find clinical practicum opportunities more easily, due to the relative preponderance of masters level supervisors in the marketplace (Marriage and Family Therapist-bound students may receive supervision from licensed MFT's, licensed LCSW's, and from licensed Clinical Psychologists).

All students are directed to the web sites of the Board of Behavioral Sciences www.bbs.ca.gov or the Board of
Psychology www.psychboard.ca.gov to obtain the relevant recent copy of their laws and regulations.

Prospective and current PSP students are reminded that one of the features of our graduate school is that it is small and not 'fat' with administrative personnel. Other graduate schools are far more expensive than PSP, in part because they employ full-time field placement coordinators. Still, we are working very hard to network with clinical alumni and with area agencies to help our students find appropriate field placement. Bonnie Hampton is the PSP Field Placement Coordinator, and can be contacted for appointments through PSP main phone (916-641-6542).