Colorado School Psychology Internship Consortium

Intern Expectations

CoS-PIC offers ten-month, full-time doctoral internships beginning in August and ending in June each year. The Consortium is composed of three school districts located in the Denver metro area and provides a range of clinical and didactic experiences that represents the necessary depth and breadth required for future professional practice within rural school and clinical settings.

Interns have a primary placement at one site with the possibility of completing other training experiences at other sites within the consortium or with community partners. Across training sites, interns are expected to:

• Complete 1500 hours of training during the year. For interns who are seeking 2000 hours of training, it may be possible to establish a plan in advance to extend the duration and fulfill additional hours, when desired.
• Have at least 25% spent in face-to-face direct service delivery with a focus on evidence-based practice
• Achieve the APA Profession-Wide Competencies
• Abide by the APA Code of Ethics, requirements of the CoS-PIC training program, and the policies and procedures of their training sites.

Training Emphases

The model of training of CoS-PIC may be considered “general” as interns may gain training experiences across a range of school-age clients from preschool through high school, with diverse types of psychopathology, challenges, and needs. Training in ethical and professional standards will be incorporated in supervision and seminar presentations to prepare interns for the highest standards of professional conduct. CoS-PIC’s core facilities and affiliates are committed to the objectives, goals, and philosophy of CoS-PIC. The Consortium’s members are strongly committed to offering a high quality internship experience with intensive supervision, didactic seminars, and opportunities for direct clinical experience.

Consistent with the mission of CoS-PIC, the overarching theoretical orientation represented across sites is a culturally responsive, developmental-ecological model. This perspective in understanding human growth, development, learning and maladaptive behaviors is integrated into service delivery and seminar trainings. Services are provided within a culturally responsive framework and are nested within systems including the society (macrosystem), family, school as an organization (exosystem), classroom, family, and individual student. A culturally responsive, developmental perspective is provided as the cultural context and roles of these systems change as children mature. Through sequential and cumulative training experiences, interns are encouraged to become systematic, collaborative problem-solvers who can participate and facilitate the problem-solving of others in a variety of settings. The systematic approach to problem-solving includes moving through a sequence of stages. Although the specific labels for the stages may differ, they typically include problem identification, problem analysis, plan implementation, and plan evaluation. Throughout the internship experience, the importance of knowledge of and experience with a wide range of individual differences, including ethnicity, gender, age, culture, religion, race, SES, and lifestyle is emphasized. A central tenet of the internship experience is that students acquire the knowledge and skills to be culturally responsive leaders, innovators, and positive change agents in the service of children and families.