Comments from past participants

"Taking Intensive has greatly impacted my work in a residential setting with male sex offenders. Learning the family systems approach has taken my clinical administrator's view well beyond where it was. As I have conceptualized the program as a large family, it has solidified my view that we are all focused on the common goal of helping the kids and helped me to develop the kid and staff skills/strengths through collaboration. Understanding how patterns work does not allow for me to get caught in the blame or personalization that often runs rampant in these type of intense environments. I have been able to understand each person's perspective as valid and necessary for the whole to function and to help people shift when necessary to do the work more effectively. I believe that this program is an important resource. "

Patti Huminski. LICSW, Clinical Director, residential program

" Working in home-based family-focused collaborative services can often feel overwhelming and chaotic - many of us not knowing where to begin or how to proceed once we get in the door. By participating in the Intensive program, I have been given a gift of "calm direction in the midst". Through the readings, discussions and supervision, I now better understand the systems that operate in families, can analyze and focus on the relationship patterns in families, and am able to root myself in a relational stance that helps direct the work in even the most difficult situations. I now have a reliable compass, rooted in theory, application and intervention, which allows me to keep focused on the goals identified by the family, instead of the episodic enticements that inevitably pop up during the process of therapy. And I feel confident to help colleagues to challenge themselves to do this work meaningfully, helping pass onto them helpful interviewing techniques, an understanding of the history and current modalities operating in the field of family therapy, and assist them in identifying their working selves and the work that they do as relational, circular, whole - in other words, familial. I am very grateful for having had the opportunity to be a member of the Intensive program. "

Kaitlin Mulcahy, LMHC, Early Intervention and home based therapist

" My work doing psychiatric crisis evaluations has changed since I have taken the Intensive Course. I am able to add my understanding of family systems to my work with persons in psychiatric crisis, that is, to think about the person in the context of his family, and to think of how the family can help or contributes to the crisis. In practice this mean, when possible, I interview the family as a whole instead of just the individual. Aside from viewing the family/individual in terms of what is not working, I look for strengths; I have found people more motivated to change when they recognize their own competencies and goals. I have a variety of kinds of interventions including reflection, circular questioning, solution based and narrative approaches. My repertoire of interventions has been so much enhanced (and so my effectiveness). "

Melinda Brecher, LICSW, Crisis Team Evaluator and fee for service clinician with the elderly

"I am in a position where I am supervising social work interns, psychology fellows, psychiatry residents and child psychiatry fellows. It is challenging to develop curriculum that each discipline will be interested in. The intensive course has been beneficial in multiple ways. The course provides indepth, intriguing content which makes it easy to find topics that are relevant to each discipline. I consistently feel better prepared than prior to taking the course, to provide useful ideas, theory and particular interventions to trainees when the come to me with their struggles. In addition, while working on formulation of a patient with trainees, I have increased confidence in discussing different theories and incorporating family therapy philosophy. As a result of taking the course, I have confidence I did not have prior. Another benefit of the intensive course, which I have rarely, if ever, found in other trainings, is walking away with actual tools, specific questions and approaches that I can pass on to trainees and utilize in my own work. It is an amazing learning experience that enriches ones own practice while simultaneously increasing ones ability as a teacher."

Kimberlee Dennery, LICSW, team leader, child psychiatric hospital and private practice

"I signed up for this course due to being tasked with developing a family therapy studies program for the child and adolescent psychiatric residents at Dartmouth Medical School. I have previously studied family therapy both in graduate school and through seminars in previous places of employment. This course and instructor Elizabeth Brenner have been very helpful with providing me with a more comprehensive understanding of the development of family therapy, a better understanding of how to formulate family cases, and utilize effective interventions with families. Due to the readings assigned, discussions with the instructor and other professionals taking the course, role plays, and real case consultations, I feel more confident and prepared to provide better quality family therapy as well as to teach and supervise others to do so. "

Michelle Belk, MA, LCMHC, outpatient therapist and supervisor/teacher