Summer Practica Experience

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Ginger0211

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I would like to acquire a summer practica experience, preferably in child/adolescent assessment. I was told that it can be challenging to find a site with appropriate supervision for a summer-only experience. Is there anyone who has experience with a summer practicum?

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It will likely be very hard to only find a seasonal experience in assessment. Onboarding and training in test administration alone usually takes 1-2 months. As a reviewer of internship and postdoc apps, seeing a 3 month rotation would immediately raise red flags.
 
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I would like to acquire a summer practica experience, preferably in child/adolescent assessment. I was told that it can be challenging to find a site with appropriate supervision for a summer-only experience. Is there anyone who has experience with a summer practicum?
PM me and let me know where you're located
 
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I've known people who've done it, but it's hard to get much meaningful experience in such a short timeframe, especially with assessment. It's somewhat better/easier if you can "tag on" a summer experience at a site where you are already doing practicum.
 
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I've known people who've done it, but it's hard to get much meaningful experience in such a short timeframe, especially with assessment. It's somewhat better/easier if you can "tag on" a summer experience at a site where you are already doing practicum.
I've done this, either starting early during the summer and getting much of the training, observation, etc. out of the way so I can start actually seeing patients at the beginning of the fall semester (albeit generally still being observed by my supervisor for a while) or extending practicum an extra couple months into the summer to get extra hours, get experiences I wasn't able to get (or get enough of) earlier in the semester, etc.

It will likely be very hard to only find a seasonal experience in assessment. Onboarding and training in test administration alone usually takes 1-2 months. As a reviewer of internship and postdoc apps, seeing a 3 month rotation would immediately raise red flags.

I could potentially see a completely separate practicum experience for just the summer if it's something you already have experience in, but want to get some extra hours (e.g., doing more evals the same population and context you've previously done to get more hours and integrated reports) or maybe if it's in a research context (e.g., doing data collection and structured patient assessments for baseline before an intervention study), but I agree that I don't really know how you you'd be able to do this if you didn't have experience with the population, setting, measures, and other aspects of that particular site. Assessment might seem more doable as just a summer gig because it would all be one-offs with patients and not necessarily an ongoing relationship, but assessment is also going to be more difficult and complex than running patients through, say, a manualized therapy, especially if you aren't already quite experienced in all the aspects of what you're doing.

I would like to acquire a summer practica experience, preferably in child/adolescent assessment. I was told that it can be challenging to find a site with appropriate supervision for a summer-only experience. Is there anyone who has experience with a summer practicum?
Do you have any prior experience in child or adolescent assessment?
 
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Thank you all for your replies! It was very helpful and definitely gave me some things to think about!
I could potentially see a completely separate practicum experience for just the summer if it's something you already have experience in, but want to get some extra hours (e.g., doing more evals the same population and context you've previously done to get more hours and integrated reports) or maybe if it's in a research context (e.g., doing data collection and structured patient assessments for baseline before an intervention study), but I agree that I don't really know how you you'd be able to do this if you didn't have experience with the population, setting, measures, and other aspects of that particular site. Assessment might seem more doable as just a summer gig because it would all be one-offs with patients and not necessarily an ongoing relationship, but assessment is also going to be more difficult and complex than running patients through, say, a manualized therapy, especially if you aren't already quite experienced in all the aspects of what you're doing.
You are spot-on in my line of thinking when you said assessment might seem more doable. I've seen a few therapy opportunities come through some of the listservs for specialized summer camps so maybe that is where I should focus. Moving forward, I will try to extend my other practicum experiences through the summer.
 
Thank you all for your replies! It was very helpful and definitely gave me some things to think about!

You are spot-on in my line of thinking when you said assessment might seem more doable. I've seen a few therapy opportunities come through some of the listservs for specialized summer camps so maybe that is where I should focus. Moving forward, I will try to extend my other practicum experiences through the summer.
Are you hurting that much for hours that you're looking for these opportunities?
 
Are you hurting that much for hours that you're looking for these opportunities?
No. External practica for my program typically start in the 3rd year. I'm a second year who is interested in getting a practicum experience before my third year actually starts.
 
No. External practica for my program typically start in the 3rd year. I'm a second year who is interested in getting a practicum experience before my third year actually starts.
Unless you specifically need the hours because you're deficient in general or in a particular area, or a specific practicum site is paid and you need the money, I wouldn't really worry getting other experience beyond your normal practica.
 
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