Marriage and family therapy, clinical Social Worker, Professional clinical Counselor Associateship and Psychological Assistantships
Bay Area Community Counseling (BACC) provides Associateships for Marriage and Family Therapists, Social Workers, and Professional Counselors as well as Psychological Assistantships for therapists in training looking to develop their skills in the areas of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy, Structural-Strategic Family Therapy, and Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing.
Training
BACC MFT associateships, Social Work associateships, Professional Counselor associateships, and psychological assistantships are for clinicians who are interested and dedicated to quality training. This program starts with an intensive, 32 hour training over a week in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy (EFT), Structural-Strategic Family Therapy, Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR), Motivational Interviewing, Child Therapy, and treating ADHD. There is then two hours of group supervision per week, one hour of individual supervision after reaching 5 client hours per week, and then another hour of supervision (or a combination of consultations) for over 10 client hours per week. Our training meets all the requirements for MFTs, LCSWs, LPCCs, and PsyD/PhDs to earn their hours towards licensure. Associates and psychological assistants are paid minimum wage for non client times, $20 per client session, and have opportunity for additional income depending on caseload and supervision choices. Many associates in our program have an additional associateship their first year, as this associateship is similar to a private practice structure, thus leading for some time for the associate to build a caseload. Recently associates have filled their caseload within a few months. Our trainers are dedicated to training in the most effective, up to date approaches, and are part of the Institute for the Advancement of Psychotherapy. To learn more about Dr. Sutton, who does the training and leads the group supervision, you can listen to a recent podcast interview on Shrink Rap Radio
Structure
The associateship and psych assistantships will start off with a five day training in July in Attachment Based - Cognitive Behavioral Systemic Therapy (Attachment Based - CBST) with a day long training on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, a day long training on Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy, a day long training on Evolving Structural-Strategic Family Therapy, and a day long training in Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing. For more information about the weeklong training, click here. In the past, BACC has only accepted associates and postdocs in June, to start in July, but we now have rolling admission. Associates and psych assistants who do not start in July will go through the Summer Intensive on their own, watching prerecorded trainings.
The weekly group supervision will meet on Mondays via Zoom with the group supervision from 11:30am-1:30pm (although supervision time may change based on the number of associates, so it is important to have availability between 10am and 2pm. Individual supervision will begin for MFTs, LCSWs, and LPCCs when they have 5 weekly client hours (PsyD/PhD psych assistants will have 1 hour per week from the start). Once the caseload reaches 10 weekly client hours, the clinician will take on another hour of individual supervision, or they will put together various consultation if they are a MFT, PCC, or CSW (e.g., ACT consult group 1x per month, EMDR consult group 1x per month, work with EFT supervisor 2x per month). Associates and psych assistants are free to pick a supervisor from within BACC, IAP, or outside of the organizations (the supervisor will then be hired by BACC as contractors). This allows associates and post docs to create the training they are most interested in.
Associates and psych assistants are paid $20 per session and minimum wage for non client hours (e.g., supervision, paperwork), as well as have opportunities for more income, depending on caseload and supervision choices. Associates and psych assistants see clients referred to BACC on a sliding scale from $150 or less per session, needing to average $85 per client session to cover costs. Associates and Post Docs can charge whatever rate they’d like for private referrals, which become their private practice once they’re licensed. Some associates have made up to $65,000 per year. Associates are seeing clients in a private practice setting, where they will usually be using an office for a half or full day in San Francisco, Marin, the East Bay, the Peninsula, and/or South Bay*. Also, many also work hybrid (in person and remote) and some are fully remote. Being available for one evening and half of a weekend day are recommended. Therapists may also provide in-home sessions.
We are asking that you commit to seeing a minimum of 10 client hours per week, which means 10 hours for clients, 1 hour for supervision, 2 hours group supervision, and 2 hours for paperwork, which total 15 hours minimum. If you are interested in seeing more than 10 client hours, we ask that you see close to 20 client hours, which would add another hour of supervision, making a total of 26 hours minimum (then 40 hours if you were interested in up to 30 clients). The more clients you are seeing the more opportunity for extra income, as the client income will exceed the expenses, thus leaving enough left over for monthly bonus. We are also looking for a minimum of a one year commitment.
To Apply
If you are interested in doing an associateship or psychological assistantship with BACC, please send a cover letter describing
1) your experience and/or interest in CBT, Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy, family therapy, and EMDR
2) your career goals
3) your motivation for quality training
4) your ability to be successful in a private practice setting, which will include needing to networking and marketing oneself (clients will be provided by BACC, but associates/post-docs are supported in developing their private practice)
5) your consideration of how many clients you are interested in seeing, and your plans for managing the time it takes to ramp up to full caseload, meaning income and hours accrued may take a bit to get to the desired level.
Please also attach a resume and we will get back to you, have a short phone interview, which may lead to an invitation for a longer Zoom interview. If it feels like a good match, then we’ll proceed with onboarding from there. Although candidates with CBT, EFT, family therapy, and EMDR experience are most preferred, you do not need to have experience in all four, but at least one will help you to stand out when your resume and cover letter are reviewed. You can contact us by emailing info@sf-bacc.org with your resume and cover letter.
*Associates are able to choose the location where they see clients. locations associates have seen clients in the past are remote on Zoom and in person in San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley, Palo Alto, San Mateo, San Jose, San Rafael, Corte Madera, Richmond, and Piedmont.
The term associateship is a recent change from the term internship for marriage and family therapy internship (MFT internship), clinical social work internship (CSW internship), professional clinical counselor internship (PCC internship).
Associates and Post-Docs receive family therapy training, cognitive behavioral therapy training, emotionally focused couples therapy training, eye movement desensitization training, and licensed professionals also interested in these trainings can go to www.sfiap.com for trainings for licensed clinicians.