Yale University Post-MSW Fellowship - Cedarhurst School
Yale Behavioral Health offers Post-MSW Fellowships in adult psychiatry and adolescent school-based services. Designed to augment an individual’s graduate training, Fellowships are available to individuals with a Masters Degree in Social Work from a school accredited by the Council on Social Work Education. A description of the training can be found below.
Cedarhurst School is a private therapeutic school operated by Yale University. Serving as a junior and senior high school for grades 7-12, it offers a structured supportive learning environment for students who have difficulty functioning in the mainstream setting.
The population served includes students with psychiatric illness or learning disorders, behavioral difficulties and school avoidance issues. Group therapy, crisis intervention and individual counseling provide a sound interface between the educational and clinical needs of the students. Treatment planning is focused on concrete, behaviorally based goals. The training experience at Cedarhurst is focused on developing a more clinically sophisticated knowledge of adolescents and their treatment needs within an educational setting. This is a 12-month fellowship beginning July 1st and ending June 30th. Primary objectives for the Fellowship include the following:
- Learn the fundamentals of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and how to operationalize it within a special education setting.
- Learn how to write goal focused, quantifiable Individual Educational Plans (IEP) in the context of collaboration with educational staff and parents.
- Learn how to provide crisis intervention in a special education setting, including accurate mental status examination, utilization of de-escalation techniques and triaging to local emergency room departments.
- Learn and apply group therapy curricula to a special education setting. Examples include Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT).
- Learn the fundamentals of how to complete a biopsychosocial assessment in a special education setting. This will include disposition and treatment planning.
- Learn how to effectively collaborate with school districts, outside treaters, family members, social service agencies and collateral contacts
Supervision and Training
- Supervision: Fellows receive a minimum of two hours per week of supervision with at least one of these hours provided by a licensed clinical social worker.
- Didactic Seminars: Fellows will attend at least one didactic seminar per week of their choice. Didactic seminars, offered by clinical faculty within the Department of Psychiatry, include a wide range of options such as pharmacology, forensics, contemplative practice, psychodynamic theory, attachment and trauma and co-occurring disorders.
- Grand Rounds: Fellows will have the option of attending Grand Rounds at Yale University
- Site Placement and Multidisciplinary Teams: Fellows are fully integrated into the full-time clinical staff in the setting in which they are placed and as such participate in weekly team meetings with a multidisciplinary staff.
Fellowship Eligibility
- MSW from a social work program accredited by the Council on Social Work Education
- No more than one year of post-graduate work experience
Stipends/Benefits
- A stipend of at least $44,000 is offered to post-graduate fellows
- Affordable medical benefits are available
- Dental Plan available