UNC Clinical Psychology Program

Overview
Mission Statement
Application Process
Adult Track
Child Track
Teaching
Commitment to Diversity
Ongoing Seminars
UNC Conferences

Child Practicum Sites for the Clinical Program at UNC

Davie Hall Psychological Services Center

UNC Psychology Department Community Clinic: The mission of UNC's in-house training clinic is to provide high quality treatment and assessment in the process of training doctoral and postdoctoral students in clinical psychology and of conducting research on psychotherapy. Clients seen at Davie Hall or the Finley Buidling clinic are referred from other campus resources such as Student Health Services, as well as from various referral sources in the community. The clients served through the Community Clinic are from a variety of racial, cultural, socioeconomic, and sexual orientation backgrounds. The teams or clinical experiences are:

The Child Therapy Practicum supervised by Dr. Jen Youngstrom provides students with a broad based opportunity to provide psychological services to children in the schools and through the Community Clinic. This practicum includes didactic instruction in the provision of school-based psychological services and consultation and the provision of clinic-based individual assessment and intervention services. For the school-based portion of this practicum, students are assigned to work in a school setting where they provide psychological services and teacher consultations with faculty supervisor collaboration and oversight. Children at the schools present with a wide variety of problems, including conduct disorder, depression, thought disorder, learning disabilities, and school phobias. The schools currently participating in the school practicum serve a very heterogeneous population of children and adolescents from a wide variety of racial, cultural, religious, and socioeconomic backgrounds. Students also receive instruction and oversight related to the provision of psychological services to children in the clinic setting. The clinic-based portion of the practicum consists of supervised experience in a clinical setting and individual face- to-face meetings with a faculty supervisor.

Student Psychological Services

The UNC Student Health Service emphasizes brief psychotherapy training within an interdisciplinary program. Trainees develop skills in rapid assessment and brief psychotherapeutic interventions. Opportunities to conduct couples and group therapy, stress management training and problem pregnancy counseling are available. The clients are undergraduate and graduate students who present with a diversity of developmental and emotional conflicts, as well as difficulties reflecting a broad spectrum of psychopathology. Supervision is provided by Dr. Mayer and other psychologists on staff. Additional supervision is provided for the "walk-in" emergency service.

UNC Memorial Hospitals

In the Pediatric Neurology Clinic (supervised by Dr. Whitt), students conduct evaluations of children with neurological disorders and their families within the context of an outpatient pediatric neurology clinic. Other experiences within pediatric outpatient clinics (e.g., Adolescent Behavioral Medicine, GI clinic, and Endocrine clinic) are available and offer a broad variety of pediatric psychology experiences.

In the UNC Forensic Psychiatry Service, students complete court ordered evaluations related to child custody cases. In this training experience, students conduct interviews, child and adult projective and objective personality tests, intelligence testing, parent-child observations and parent-parent observations. Students also participate in a number of didactic experiences, some of which include observing other professionals interviewing, testing, appearing in court, or conferencing with attorneys.

In the Eating Disorders Program, students participate in a variety of assessment and intervention experiences with adolescents and adults. Students complete comprehensive psychological evaluations of individuals with eating disorders which include a semi- structured interview focused on ED symptoms and evaluation and interpretation of standardized pencil and paper questionnaires. Students are also involved in disposition planning within a multidisciplinary format which includes coordinating evaluation results and care with pediatricians, internal medicine providers, and community mental health providers. Students also participate in a variety of training experiences in treatment with individuals with ED symptoms, including inpatient, day-treatment, and outpatient treatment modalities.

The Clinical Center for the Study of Development and Learning offers a variety of experiences in assessment, treatment, and interdisciplinary team planning through several programs: the Assistive Technology Program for non-verbal or minimally verbal children, the neurodevelopmental nutrition program for children with Prader-Willi Syndrome and other eating disorders related to developmental disabilities, the Learning and Evaluation and Advancement Program for early adolescents with learning and attention difficulties, and the Developmental Neuropharmacology Clinic for children and adolescents with developmental disabilities and severe behavioral problems.

The TEACCH Clinic is an assessment and treatment project for children with autism and related communication handicaps of all ages and levels of functioning. Students participate in diagnostic evaluations and in designing parent training programs.

John Umstead Hospital

John Umstead Hospital (JUH) is one of North Carolina's four state-operated regional psychiatric facilities. Located in Butner, North Carolina, it lies about 29 miles northeast of Chapel Hill. A variety of practicum opportunities are available at JUH, as described below:

The Children's Psychiatric Institute (CPI) offers a variety of outpatient and inpatient services to psychiatrically-disturbed children, adolescents, and their families within the context of a multidisciplinary team. Students provide assessment, conduct short and long-term individual, group and family therapy, and become members of the multidisciplinary team. Clinical orientations represented within the OPC include psychodynamic, developmental, cognitive-behavioral, client-centered, and experiential, psychopharmacological, and family systems approaches. The supervisors are Drs. Margolis, Schwartz, Stevens and Dunn.