APA Accredited Internship in Clinical and Counseling Psychology

Thomas E. Cook Counseling Center

Pre-doctoral Internship Program

Virginia Tech

I appreciate you taking a few minutes to complete the following evaluation of your experience with our program during the recent internship interview. As you know, we post this information on our website and your comments are a valuable resource for future intern applicants. The survey is anonymous and will have no effect on match rankings as those have already been finalized. Thank you for your assistance and all the best in your career endeavors.

Cathye Griffin Betzel, Psy.D.
Director of Training

Disclaimer: The survey responses below are presented with very little editorial intervention (other than the occasional spelling correction!). Keep in mind that these are subjective impressions and that some comments may present information that appears to conflict with each other.  If you have particular questions after reading the comments, please refer to the "official" material on the website for clarification or feel free to contact me if needed at  cbetzel@vt.edu

1.  How did you learn about our internship program?

• Online APPIC Directory

• Previous interns

• Internet search

• Printed APPIC Directory

2.  Does our website provide adequate information regarding our program?  Please explain.

• Absolutely. My experience at Virginia Tech largely matched up to the way the program is described online.

• Yes, I think it's very thorough.

• Yes, very adequate.

• The website is comprehensive and informative.

• Yes -- your information on your website is comprehensive. It might be more beneficial to be organized in a single document (i.e., a PDF) for printing, and reading purposes, but the content was adequate.

• I feel like your website has adequate information but wish it had more information about the internship program. For example, more specifics about what the internship entails would be helpful.

• Yes, but I wish there had been more info about how often you see individual clients.

• Yes. The information is more than sufficient to provide a full picture for an applicant.

• Yes, the website was informative and easy to navigate.

• Yes. I particularly liked the break down of hours for interns and access to the training manual.

• Yes. I was pleased be the information I was able to obtain.

• Your website provided adequate information regarding the program.

3.  What do you see as the strengths of our training program? 

• Focus on supervision, training, and development. Also, a large staff with a lot of diversity.

• Lots of therapy experience with a diverse student population.

• Research opportunities and assessment training.

• VA Tech has a very large staff, so there would be a variety of people to learn from during the internship year.

• Strong group program. Opportunity to work with sport psychology consultant.

• Diverse faculty with wide range of orientations and strengths.

• The diverse staff that seemed very collaborative.

• Groups, consultation with other professionals.

• The multidisciplinary approach, diverse client population in terms of demographics and presenting concerns, large and highly qualified/experienced staff.

• I believe the training opportunities were the strength of the program, as well as the outreach opportunities.

• Experience with high-volume, group, friendly staff.

• The flexibility of the program to develop specialty areas and the warmth of the staff.

• Diversity in staff interests and backgrounds; outreach programming.

• Varied training experiences, crisis experience.

• Additional training opportunities, experienced staff, solid support.

• One of your strengths as a training program is the cohesive attitude amongst the staff. There is also a strong collegiate atmosphere that fosters optimism and growth.

 4.  What do you see as the weaknesses of our training program? 

• N/A

• Maybe it's hard to adjust to seeing clients every other week.

• That caseloads were so large that most clients can only be seen bi-weekly.

• Every other week sessions with individual clients.

• Intern offices were a little small.

• I did not believe there were any weaknesses to the training program.

• Case load sounds daunting.

• The amount of time spent in seminars, the availability of assessment training, and the bi-weekly format for seeing individual clients.

• None.

• Potential for working more hours due to client load.

• One of the weaknesses of your training program seems to be a sense of cultural isolation compared to other training programs located in larger cities.

 5.  Please comment on your level of satisfaction with the onsite interview experience.

• I was extremely pleased. Everyone was friendly and made the interviewees feel very comfortable.

• It was intense and somewhat intimidating. I liked everyone I met, but I wish the interview had been somewhat more personalized.

• The experience was satisfying and informative.

• My level of satisfaction was very low. For the reasons listed above, I found the site to be disorganized, ill managed, with low security on the premises.

• I enjoyed the onsite interview. Everyone was friendly and i enjoyed the lunch with the interns.

• The luncheon and meeting with the faculty was nice. The campus is beautiful; however, the interview format is lengthy and stressful. Five interviews with three plus staff seems somewhat excessive and compared to the other experiences I had. It was good to meet all the current staff, but maybe a different format would be better.

• Very happy with the overall experience.

• I thought it was helpful. There were a lot of interviews, which made it relatively intense and potentially overwhelming. I also felt like some of the pre-scripted questions were vague and made it difficult to know what kind of info was being asked for.

• I was very satisfied. My interview experience factored as a positive influence in my ranking decision.

• The interview format was adequate to test the applicants knowledge base, but the process was quite formal and did not seem very inviting. Although the current group of interns did leave a good impression during the luncheon.

• Completely satisfied. I liked breaking things up into 30 minute segments, that seemed to help things go quickly.

• I really enjoyed my interview. Although it was a "whirlwind," I felt welcomed. Including the interns in the process let me know how valued interns are there and also gave me a sense that the answers given to questions were honest.

• At first it seemed overwhelming when looking at the itinerary, but everyone was very friendly and interested in getting know me.

• I liked the onsite interview b/c I met most of the staff and had a chance to talk to interns.

• I really enjoyed my interview experience.

• The interview is moderate. There was no prior notification about the process of the interview. The number of rounds and number of interviewers was overwhelming. The length of time spent in each room was short, and began to feel less welcoming and more shuffling as the day progressed.

6.   Do you support informing applicants when they are no longer under consideration in the interview process?  Please explain. 

• I do. It just seems like the applicant should have a right to know if they are not going to be ranked by a program.

• Yes, I appreciated this very much.

• Yes. It is best to be on the same page with applicants so that they may realistically assess their standing.

• Yes, I do support informing applicants if they are no longer under consideration so that the interns can have a realistic idea of what sites to rank.

• Yes. It would be especially helpful if the applicant is torn between a few sites to not waste their time considering where to rank them. Also, it would be nice not to get one's hopes up if it was ranked highly.

• Yes -- it helps applicants make informed decisions regarding their matching order.

• Yes - it was very helpful in the ranking process. Also it allows us to see where we stand with you - so we know if we still have a chance.

• Yes. Though this information can be anxiety provoking, it is helpful to reduce as much of the ambiguity of the process as possible. Knowing that you are or are not any longer under consideration gives you a clearer view of the ranking process.

• Yes, an applicant will be able to make a more informed decision if they know that your site has decided not to rank them.

• Yes. It makes sense.

• Yes. Its nice to know one way or another when rankings are done.

• Yes because it helps the applicants in making ranking decisions.

• Yes, it gives students a sense of where to rank other programs etc...

• I do, because it allows applicants to not "hold out hope" and if there are other places they can still apply, allows them to marshal the resources to do so.

• Yes that way students are able to make future plans and make decisions for match day.

7.  Based on your review of our materials and interactions with our staff how well do you believe our program meets the needs of applicants from individually and culturally diverse groups?  

• I think that is one of the strengths of this program.

• Probably pretty well.

• It appeared to me that the program considers the needs of applicants from diverse groups.

• No.

• Adequate.

• You appear to especially target diverse groups, so it seems as if you set up the internship well to garner strong diverse candidates.

• It seems very well.

• I think that would depend on what the needs of those persons were.

• I believe the training site meets the needs of diverse applicants moderately well due to a fairly diverse staff and a fairly diverse student population. I think the rural location may be a concern for some students of color.

• Yes. It was clear that diversity issues are important.

• I thought the program was great and would meet my training needs.

• Very well.

• I believe that the staff was good at working with minorities and diverse individuals.

• I believe that Virginia Tech meets the standard in cultural competency but does not exceed the standard.

8.  Other comments are welcome about any aspect of the Cook Counseling Center intern recruitment process.   

• It was a great experience.

• The lunch was great!

• I suggest forming a whole new interview process, starting with a session that informs the interns what to expect, followed by 2 interviews with staff members based on common interests and one interview with the chief of staff at the counseling center. It would save time, be more low key and less disorganized for all involved.

• I really enjoyed it. I think I would have liked working there...maybe another time...

• The on-the-spot counseling session took me off guard and was uncomfortable (there are usually not 2 others watching me in therapy, I know when I expect to go into a counseling session, and there was just too much pressure to think). I would LOVE to see VA Tech include a campus tour as the campus is REALLY neat!

• I found the staff friendly and inviting. The interview process would be more effective with 1. less interviewers and 2. more time during each round.