Candidate in the Community Mentoring Award
Link to: Candidate in the Community Mentoring Award
In addition to providing clinical services in their offices, psychoanalysts take on a variety of roles and functions in a range of community settings, including hospitals, clinics, community mental health centers, non-profit organizations, corporations, governmental agencies, veterans services, police departments, courts, schools, colleges, and more. Yet candidates in psychoanalytic training frequently experience a disconnect between their psychoanalytic training and their community-based work, and find it challenging to integrate that work into their emerging identities as psychoanalysts.
Sponsor
APsA’s Department of Psychoanalytic Education | Psychoanalyst in the Community Section
Eligibility Criteria
The DPE Psychoanalyst in the Community Section invites APsA candidates with a demonstrated interest in applying psychoanalytic/psychodynamic perspectives in community settings and organizations to apply for the Candidate in the Community Mentoring Award.
Criteria for selecting award recipients will include the strength of the applicant’s rationale for how mentoring will support their development, as well as considerations of diversity among the awards in terms of geography and type of community-based setting.
To apply, please submit the following to Lizbeth Moses, PhD, Chair of the Psychoanalyst in the Community Section, at lizbeth.moses3@gmail.com
- A 1-to-2 page proposal including your name, institute, year of training, a brief description of your community-based work, and an explanation of how this mentoring will support this work and your personal and professional development.
- Include a copy of your current curriculum vitae (CV).
- Applicants are also strongly encouraged to submit two letters of support from colleagues familiar with their work in the community.
Applications due: TBA
Award
Each awardee will receive an honorarium of $750 and will be paired with a mentor, a senior analyst with expertise in the candidate’s area of interest.
- Award recipients will be expected to meet virtually with their mentors at least one time each month and, if possible, to meet in person at the APsA Meeting.
- Recipients will be asked to write up a brief report at the end of the mentoring year, with the hope that their experiences will generate new ideas for how institutes and societies can support psychoanalytic work in the community.
Prior Experiences of Candidate Recipients
- I have been studying psychoanalysis for over a decade and have always struggled to find a way to bridge the gap between my love for psychoanalysis and my love for community work. Quite often, it seemed like an impossible marriage that would hinder my opportunities of becoming an analyst. I saw the announcement of the Psychoanalyst in the Community Program. I then decided to research their principles and quickly found the courage to apply. I am extremely glad and grateful that I did because of the countless benefits and the fruits that I have been able to bear from being selected as a Fellow. The program chairs were gifted with the ability to fantastically match me with a mentor that was perfect in that we share similar cultures and ways of thinking. Together, we were able to develop a community program which I have been able to start implementing in its initial phase. As an added benefit, the PCP as well as my mentor were able to help facilitate my attendance to my first APsA in person meeting and it was great. I strongly encourage anyone who is interested in finding ways of bringing psychoanalysis into their communities to apply because I can attest to the fact that, if used well, it can be a game changer. – Iraira Butcher, Psy.D. | Candidate, New Orleans-Birmingham Psychoanalytic Center
- I was honored to be one of the recipients of this award. It has been such an important experience to receive ongoing mentoring from Dr. Paula Kliger! I have learnt a lot about how to go about making this much needed connection which seems to be sorely lacking in so many of our local communities. I feel I have developed an important relationship with my mentor which will shape my professional development for decades to come. I encourage all candidates with an interest in giving to their community, to apply for this award. – Himanshu Agrawal, M.D., DF-APA | Advanced Candidate, Minnesota Psychoanalytic Institute
- As a candidate participant in DPE’s Candidate in Community Program, I met by phone or video every couple of weeks with my mentor, Dr. Deborah Choate, who helped me learn new ways to listen to and experience the patients I worked with in the community. Before working with my mentor, I used to focus almost exclusively on symptoms, medication, and diagnosis. With my mentor’s guidance, I began learning how to listen for the psychic reality of patients and became curious about the many meanings of the material they brought into the room each week. She helped me listen for and think about the underlying forces and challenges of race, class, gender, and power in the clinical setting. Through the experience of her listening to me with curiosity, compassion, and imagination, she helped me consider the ways in which relatedness, intuition, and emotional receptivity generated new connections and growth in the small, windowless room of a transitional housing complex. – Elizabeth Schmick, D.O | Candidate, Oregon Psychoanalytic Center
