Interns present two trainings, of at least one hour in length, about a body of psychological knowledge to a target audience. The first training is conducted early in the year on a unit where the intern is primarily working, and is designed to help staff recognize the intern’s strengths and utility, which can help the intern integrate into the treatment team. Moreover, this experience develops the intern’s presentation skills. The topic should be one with which the intern is already familiar or has a degree of expertise.
The second training should benefit the population of Newark, and continue to promote our relationship with the community we serve. It should cover some aspect of diversity, including possibly a discussion of racial and ethnic disparities in behavioral healthcare; issues in the treatment of Latino and African-American individuals and families; the role of spirituality; GLBT issues; gender issues; ability/disability issues; ageism; or issues of socioeconomic class. We encourage interns to present outside of UBHC/UCHC if possible, and to arrange their presentation to meet community needs and to present their work well. Audiences can be mental health professionals inside University Hospital, or professionals or non-professionals who have requested a training from UBHC (e.g., teachers, a church group, DCPP workers, probation officers of the Family Court). Interns can work together on presentations, but each intern should have clearly definied responsibility for an identifiable aspect of the training, and each intern should conduct a presentation that lasts at least one hour. Interns formulate a few clear objectives, collect evaluations from the target audience, and submit a self-evaluation of the project with suggestions for changes in future presentations.
The goal of this experience is for interns to develop the ability to translate academic knowledge into understandable language, and to promote the spreading of psychological knowledge to a target population. In our many professional contexts, psychologists invariably assume the role of teaching others and disseminating information. As with the Outcome Assessment/Program Development Experience, the aim is to prepare interns for future leadership roles, to learn to market their strengths, and foster collaborative relationships with community agencies.