ACA Blog

One of the largest mistakes would-be interns make in attempting to find internships is very, very easy to avoid. Here’s how.

If you read my last blog, you know that I was preparing myself for a long wait in getting my temporary LPC license. Well, good news! It only took EIGHT days from the day I mailed it until the day I was granted my LPC-I number with the state of Texas! I think that must be a new record or something, right? It actually happened so fast that I didn’t know until days later. I want to share some tips with you so hopefully your license will get to you quickly as well.

When I began my internship for my graduate program, almost two years ago, with a company working within assisted living and skilled nursing facilities, I was excited to immerse myself in counseling older adults. My experiences throughout my internship working with older adults afforded me invaluable opportunities to learn and cultivate my passion for older adults. A great deal of my focus in my own research and writing revolved around the older adult population, and this blog has been driven by my experiences with my older adult clients

After one Army tour in Afghanistan and three years working at the Pentagon and the FBI, I’m finally back in the great state of Texas. Home sweet home! I’m spending time with family and old friends again. Excited to start my life in Dallas. Happy to be only months away from my PhD. I’ve been invited to join the most amazing DFW counselors at the LifeWorks Group. I’m can’t wait to meet my first new client…but I’m stuck waiting on the state licensing board. Oh yeah…that.

A recent email from a would-be-graduate counseling intern: “I am currently completing my counseling graduate coursework at a university in pursuit of licensure. I have been searching for an internship position beginning in the Fall 2013. I have been looking for 6 months now. I interviewed, but did not get an internship from an agency who had only 14 applicants for 10 open positions. Their response to me was that they thought I could obtain something elsewhere due to my extensive background (I already have an M.A. in Human Services and Education) and others could not. I wish they'd tell me the real reason as I thought the interview went very well. I am frustrated, so I was avidly searching for other places to apply and found your site… Since I have plenty of experience, I am baffled as to why I cannot find an internship.”

One night last week as I was drifting off to sleep, I realized how much I really have changed since my very first counseling class two winters ago. Those changes have been subtle, which perhaps explains how I missed them for a while--they’re changes in my words. I speak quite a bit and write even more, both in counseling and my paid job as a fundraiser. Over these past two years, my language has shifted to reflect everything I’ve learned and how I’ve grown and changed as a person.

Busy with internship and last stretch of graduate school. Trying to keep family going smoothly while earning some money. Might as well be turning water into wine or tin into gold. Wanna write – need to write – not writing.

In Part 1 of “What’s Wrong with the Counseling Intern Picture?”, I made clear that the way counselors-in-training approach the internship phase of their programs needs changing. I’d now like to turn our attention to what needs changing in Professional Counseling culture toward young people in general, and especially toward counseling interns.

Frequently, I get contacts from students panicked, sometimes legitimately, over one internship thing or another. I try to help in any way I can, but often, my answers may have a similar ring to them. It lead me to start wondering, both from the perspective of counseling interns and the perspective of the counseling industry’s culture toward them, what is wrong with this picture?

Congratulations! You’re at the point in your graduate program where you get to choose a topic for your doctoral dissertation or master’s thesis. Yea! All those classes…all those dollars spent on tuition…the pages upon pages of mind-numbing journal articles…now you finally get to choose a topic for the final requirement necessary to hang that degree on the wall! You’re energized. You’re ready to get started on your research. You have some interests in mind. Now to choose your topic…easy right? Not always so, as I learned this past year.