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SUMMARY OF BREAKOUT GROUP FIVE
Question III A and B
Internship Emphasis
Thomas J. Boll and Randi Dorman
Members: Thomas J. Boll (Chair), Randi Dorman (Recorder); Jack Spector,
Paula Shear, Darlene Nemeth, Robin Morris. Carl Dodrill, Kenneth Adams
The group first discussed internship entry criteria. This conversation
focused on whether or not completion of the doctoral dissertation should
be considered to be an entry criterion. There was general agreement among
the group members that this was an appropriate requirement in theory, but
there was some debate over the logistics involved with implementing such
a policy. Both proponents and opponents agreed that the onus of this requirement
should fall on the faculty not the student. They felt that the faculty
of doctoral programs should accept the responsibility for seeing students
through their dissertations in a timely manner.
During the discussion, a clarification was made regarding what
can and can not be required of students prior to internship. Although completion
of the doctorate might seem to be an appropriate entry level criterion
for acceptance into an internship program, accreditation currently forbids
programs to graduate students before internship is completed. Therefore,
students may be expected to complete their dissertations, but they will
not be able to walk at graduation until they have completed the internship
(1,500 hours).
Once beyond the distinction between requiring a completed dissertation
versus a doctorate, the benefits and disadvantages of implementing this
entry criterion were discussed. While some group members supported the
notion that the dissertation be completed prior to internship, others remained
uncertain. Their major concern was that clinical neuropsychology students
would have different requirements than their classmates and would be forced
to remain at their program while their classmates advanced to the next
level of training. Other group members suggested that students benefit
from being held back. The group was reminded that the purpose of this document
was not to set policy, but rather to establish ideals toward which the
field of neuropsychology should strive. When considered from this perspective,
the group agreed that the doctoral dissertation ideally should be completed
prior to internship, so the intern is not distracted by doctoral requirements.
In response to the question of whether or not training could
occur at one level, the group was in agreement that it should not. Section
VI of the policy statement, which was developed in answer to Question II,
outlined the content areas that they thought should be required of students
at the doctoral level. The group agreed that the internship and residency
levels should be reserved for clinical training. There was discussion of
integrating the internship and residency as in the medical model. In the
neuropsychology model, students would sign on for three years and be required
to be independently licensable and board-ready at the end of training.
The first year should be a generic training year while the second and third
year should be more specific to clinical neuropsychology. Several problems
with this model were noted. For instance, if students were expected to
receive their doctorate before starting the integrated internship and residency,
some internship programs, like the VA, would not be able to admit them
since they cannot accept individuals as interns who have received their
doctorate. Internships would have to pay a residency salary. Despite such
problems, it was decided that the concept of merging the two tiers of training
was a good one, but that the details of how this model might be implemented
remained unresolved.
The group then focused on answering the question of how the three
levels of training (doctoral, internship, residency) should integrate the
clinical and clinical neuropsychology components of training. Most of the
group felt that is not necessary for students to have specialized neuropsychology
training at the doctoral level. They believed that a student should be
able to come into internship without being a specialist, and that both
the doctoral and internship levels should provide general clinical training.
Residency was identified as the level at which specialized training should
occur. It was pointed out that there is a strong push by the Commission
for the Recognition of Specialties and Proficiencies in Professional Psychology
for doctoral training to be genexal.
Group members differed in their philosophies regarding whether or not
specialization should occur at the doctoral level. Some members believed
that there are too many requirements for students, while others thought
that students with neuropsychology training at the doctoral level have
an advantage.
Several group members emphasized that it is important to provide students
with general generic clinical training at the internship level because
they won t get it elsewhere. Without solid clinical training, students
are over diagnosing neurologically based disorders; poor at administering,
clinical interviews, projectives, etc.; and lack general professionalism.
Other members felt that this general training would be an interruption
for those students who perceive themselves as neuro-specialists at the
doctoral level. A compromise was reached, describing internship as a time
that should be designated for both general clinical psychology (1,000 hours)
and neuropsychology (1,000 hours) training.
Another concern revolved around the length of clinical neuropsychology
training. The group agreed that students should be assured that they will
get their doctorate in a reasonable and predictable amount of time, before
requiring another 3 years of training of them. They also came to a consensus
that the internship and residency levels should serve to remediate the
insufficiencies of students training
Discussion revolved around whether a general clinical psychologist
should be able to get trained as a neuropsychologist via the residency
level. Another question raised was whether or not a non-specialized psychologist
could go to residency to get trained as a specialist. The group decided
that a student must have some specific training prior to residency.
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