relevance of mental health experience prior to pre-doc intership?

[Phipps]

Hi all,

after my "pre-doc internbship and GPA relevance" question another quick question for those who have been there: how important is prior experience in the field when applying to internship sites?? Is it for instance an advantage to have worked as counselor or mental health person before your internship? I know that we do practica, internships etc. during our doctoral training. I was thinking of experience prior to grad school (that some have and others don't; I don't) though.

Any thought and advice would be appreciated.

Thanks much

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[aventurine]

Unless you've done something particularly stellar or something unique that gives the pre-doc internship sites an insight into who you are as a person, clinical experience prior to grad school is not likely to be of much interest to the sites. The experience you gain in grad school will be much more in-depth and relevant.

 

[AcronymAllergy]

Unless you've done something particularly stellar or something unique that gives the pre-doc internship sites an insight into who you are as a person, clinical experience prior to grad school is not likely to be of much interest to the sites. The experience you gain in grad school will be much more in-depth and relevant.

This. Of all the sites I visited, not a single interviewer asked anything about what I had done prior to grad school.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

The vast majority of "clinical experience" would require the person to be in training or professionally licensed, so outside of working as a tech or similar, there isn't much a person can do.

 

[Phipps]

The vast majority of "clinical experience" would require the person to be in training or professionally licensed, so outside of working as a tech or similar, there isn't much a person can do.

Glad to hear that! Thanks all.

Ms. Phipps

 

[clinpsych]

While I don't feel that, overall, pre-graduate school experiences are all that relevant in the internship application process, I ended up discussing this experience a fair amount on interviews since the setting at which I worked (a VA) was similar to the internship settings to which I interviewed. In this case, I felt like my prior VA experience offered me a slight advantage.

 

[docma]

If you have done work in clinically-relevant settings prior to graduate school though, it may be valued by certain kinds of sites so don't devalue or minimize it. For example, prior work as a classroom teacher, a counselor in a residential treatment setting, or doing case management in a jail or homeless shelter all give credibility about skill sets that are valuable and will convey that you are familiar with relevant populations. We look for this kind of "depth" in candidates.

 

[psychgirl77]

Although pre grad school experience may not be relevant for internship sites, I have found that it has been very helpful in terms of securing practicum at good sites. Some of my cohort did not have much pre grad school clinical experience and thus they were not offered practicum positions on their first try, so they really had to hunt for something. My pre grad school clinical experience was definitely helpful in securing my first choice practicum.

 

[TherapyCats]

I have considerable work experience as a case manager for homeless/mentally ill adults and in residential treatment programs (also for the chronically mentally ill), and those experiences came up quite a bit during my internship interviews. I mainly applied to inpatient psych hospital and community mental health centers, and sites asked me about these experiences and how they shaped my career goals. Also, they appeared to like that I had "practical" experience with this population in addition to my clinical training experiences.