The first year course on making a developmental diagnosis, developing a treatment plan and contract, understanding the various aspects of empathy and of the therapeutic alliance, recognizing and working with ego strengths and weaknesses, identifying and understanding what to do with defenses, learning the use and misuse of transference manifestations, becoming comfortable with countertransference experiences, and appreciating the therapeutic usefulness of transference-countertransference enactments. An effort is made to give everyone who wishes an opportunity to present ongoing clinical material. The emphasis is not on what should have been done. The instructors, instead, will make an effort with the class members to understand what is going on in the material and try to develop some consensus about the therapeutic process. The length of time devoted to any one case is individually determined.
Every student is assigned a supervisor.
Preferences are honored where possible. Generally speaking, the required 60 hours should be divided about evenly between the two years. Students are urged to work with a different supervisor each year. Supervision is individualized to meet the specific learning needs of the student, with an effort made to integrate what is being learned in the course work with the student's clinical work. Some students may wish to present only a few ongoing cases in depth, while others may wish to look at a spectrum of cases.