How much does practicum affect internship?

[psychgal91]

How much does practicum experience (specifically the setting) determine where it would be "wise" to apply for internship? My dilemma is I would like to apply to prisons and hospitals. However, my first practicum was at a VA at an SMI clinic. Second year I was at a private practice conducting evals referred from DCS (I did this because it's considered "forensic" and I was hoping it would help me get into a prison for internship). For my final practicum I will either be at a health clinic and receiving integrated care experience (not my interest but since I will not be at a prison or a hospital I am interested in widening my experiences and the site says they see a lot of Axis II) or I will be at a private practice conducting DBT (again, this would give me some more Axis II experience which you see a lot in prisons and hospitals). Please don't ask why I didn't complete a prison or hospital site because trust me I have tried. I'm open minded about not applying to prisons and hospitals - I am more concerned about knowing what kind of settings I should apply to so I can actually be competitive. Thanks!

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[Justanothergrad]

Depends on the setting - knowing a number of folks who work in the BOP the feedback I've heard them say is that experience in those settings is a major part of what makes you competitive. This isn't true of all settings- many VAs are happy to have folks do their first VA experience during internship.

 

[futureapppsy2]

Depends on the setting - knowing a number of folks who work in the BOP the feedback I've heard them say is that experience in those settings is a major part of what makes you competitive. This isn't true of all settings- many VAs are happy to have folks do their first VA experience during internship.

A lot of VAs do show a strong preference for people with prior VA prac experience, though.

 

[psychgal91]

A lot of VAs do show a strong preference for people with prior VA prac experience, though.

Would I be competitive for VAs even though I was at one for my first practicum instead of more recently?

 

[futureapppsy2]

Would I be competitive for VAs even though I was at one for my first practicum instead of more recently?

I think so. Experience within that system in general is a plus.

 

[psychgal91]

What types of settings should I apply for? VAs are now on my list.

 

[cara susanna]

You can match to a VA internship without VA experience, fwiw. I did. Heck, I didn't even have hospital or medical center experience.

 

[bigdreamer3]

You can also get into a correctional setting or a state hospital without having that experience previously if you have related and relevant experiences. As someone else said, it just is a little more difficult but that doesn't mean you should throw in the towel. I'm sensing that you want us to guess where you'll be most competitive based only on knowing the general description of your placements. To answer your question, apply where you want to do an internship. It's that simple. It will not serve you to try to "guess." Just make sure you do a good job of describing your interests and fit and you'll be fine. If you're super worried, apply to a mix of settings.

 

[psychgal91]

My DCT told me to apply primarily to consortiums. I will try to add a mix as well (as brave as I can be haha).

 

[blakjak12]

It sounds like you have acquired a diverse set of strong experiences, so there are not too many "types" of sites I would rule out in your case unless it seems like a huge stretch (e.g., if you have only adult experience, do not apply to a bunch of child sites). As others have said, it is possible to get interviews at some VA sites without prior VA experiences, and I think you would be competitive for them given that you have prior VA experience. I don't think the experience being a few years ago would cause it to be perceived negatively, and I still think that will be a strength of your app.

 

[Kadhir]

Agreed that it isn't a problem for you, but for any lurkers- my sense is that community mental health experience is actually more valuable than hospital/med center experience in a VA setting. My grad program had almost exclusively CMHC (and 0 VA) practica and students did very well at VAs-- including the flagships-- for internship... greater hit rate than AMC's. I'm at a VA now and finding the same thing, although, as they say, no 2 VAs are alike.

 

[AcronymAllergy]

I second the recommendation to apply where you'd like to go to internship rather than trying to gauge where you think you'll be most competitive. There's so much variability across internship training sites that trying to tailor your application to any one specific setting can often be an exercise in frustration. Prior VA experience (generally of any kind) is typically viewed positively by VA internship sites, but not to the extent that those without such experience are excluded from consideration. This probably holds for most types of settings--prior CMHC experience can help with CMHC internship sites, etc.

I, personally, would build on Kadhir's point above and suggest that CMHC experience can be helpful for anyone. It isn't always the most well-resourced and/or supported training environment, but it gets you experience seeing patients you may not have an opportunity to see elsewhere, gets you comfortable working with potentially limited resources, and can help build self-advocacy skills.

 

[procrastin8r]

My DCT told me to apply primarily to consortiums. I will try to add a mix as well (as brave as I can be haha).

I am at a consortium, and they interview and rank applicants separately for each sub-consortium site. This may or may not be the case elsewhere. Just wanted to clarify, in case your DCT made it seem like consortiums are an easy in or an east in for generalists. The competitiveness ranges across and within.

 

[psyqued]

How much does practicum experience (specifically the setting) determine where it would be "wise" to apply for internship? My dilemma is I would like to apply to prisons and hospitals. However, my first practicum was at a VA at an SMI clinic. Second year I was at a private practice conducting evals referred from DCS (I did this because it's considered "forensic" and I was hoping it would help me get into a prison for internship). For my final practicum I will either be at a health clinic and receiving integrated care experience (not my interest but since I will not be at a prison or a hospital I am interested in widening my experiences and the site says they see a lot of Axis II) or I will be at a private practice conducting DBT (again, this would give me some more Axis II experience which you see a lot in prisons and hospitals). Please don't ask why I didn't complete a prison or hospital site because trust me I have tried. I'm open minded about not applying to prisons and hospitals - I am more concerned about knowing what kind of settings I should apply to so I can actually be competitive. Thanks!

Psychgal91,

Here is what I know. Apply to the internship sites that you are interested in. I recently matched (YAAY!) to a BOP site that no student from my program has matched at since at least 2007, and my DCT tried to talk me out of applying altogether (and then tried to talk me into applying to VAs, UCCs, and CMHCs because she thought they'd be "safe" for me because I had very low assessment hours going in). I applied to NONE of the places she suggested simply because I didn't want to be there and couldn't justify spending my money that way. I approached internship application time with an attitude of "I'll make them tell me no." With that being said, consider how your experiences are applicable to the prison/hospital settings that you wish to apply. In general, about 90% of all our training is the same - with a 10% difference based on specialty rotations/settings. BOP does take students who do not have experience in the prison setting and (I believe) 50% of new Staff Psychologists at BOP have not worked in a prison before.

Ultimately, it's up to you where you apply, how many sites you apply to, and if you want to apply to "safe" sites. Keep in mind that it may be evident to some sites that they're your "safe" choice and that's not a fun position to be in. The point is, you never know what each site is actually looking for when they review applications - they may have hours requirements listed on the APPI, but that also doesn't mean it's set in stone. If you are unable to get experience in a correctional facility beforehand, do yourself a favor and speak to other students who have so that you can get an idea of what is different about that environment. Also, make sure you know the difference between correctional psychology and forensic psychology. Please let me know if I can answer any other questions.

 

[psychgal91]

Thank you everyone!

 

[psychgal91]

What's the consensus on hospitals? Do they favor inpatient experience too, or will my SMI experience from the VA be enough? Sorry to ask so many questions, I am a few days away from having to rank where I want to go for my final practicum! There is a hospital that said they would take me but it is 100 miles away and my car has been having problems lately (need to save that money for internship apps haha).

 

[Justanothergrad]

Holy... 100 miles? For the sake of work-life balance I would never take that.

 

[Spydra]

I'm still early in my program so my comments are based on what I've learned in my experiences so far, from more senior students, and my DCT.

My thoughts on hospitals is that what they prefer may vary based on the type of patients they see. If they are an ER well they see anyone and everyone so you could argue that all of your experience is applicable in some way. If they are a rehab department then they may prefer some exposure to health psych related issues or the VA.

As for prison settings what I've learned is that they tend to be more open to someone who hasn't had that type of experience because it isn't a setting that everyone has access to and it often isn't something people begin their doctoral programs considering. But you might be able to argue that your existing experience is relevant if you can connect the dots for them. Inmates often have serious mental illnesses, significant trauma histories, substance abuse disorders, etc and the skills you develop working with non-inmates with those challenges are transferable.

 

[psychgal91]

I'm still early in my program so my comments are based on what I've learned in my experiences so far, from more senior students, and my DCT.

My thoughts on hospitals is that what they prefer may vary based on the type of patients they see. If they are an ER well they see anyone and everyone so you could argue that all of your experience is applicable in some way. If they are a rehab department then they may prefer some exposure to health psych related issues or the VA.

As for prison settings what I've learned is that they tend to be more open to someone who hasn't had that type of experience because it isn't a setting that everyone has access to and it often isn't something people begin their doctoral programs considering. But you might be able to argue that your existing experience is relevant if you can connect the dots for them. Inmates often have serious mental illnesses, significant trauma histories, substance abuse disorders, etc and the skills you develop working with non-inmates with those challenges are transferable.

That was very helpful, thank you!