Clinical Instruction (A full description of Clinical Instruction can be found in Section III).

For students in the Marriage, Couple and Family Counseling and Therapy (MCFCT) program clinical instruction occurs in COUN 690 Practicum Seminar and COUN 693 (one term) or COUN 694/695 (two terms) Internship. COUN 690 Practicum requires 120 hours of supervised experience in a MCFCT setting including a minimum of 40 direct service clock hours. In this course students receive weekly one and a half hour group supervision with a faculty member, one hour each week of on-campus individual supervision with a faculty member, and one hour each week of supervision from a site supervisor. COUN 693 (one term) or 694/695 (two terms) Internship also takes place within a MCFCT setting and requires a total of 600 hours, including 240 direct service clock hours. In this course students receive weekly one and a half hour group supervision with a faculty member and one hour each week of supervision from an on-site supervisor who has clinical training in MCFCT.  Importantly, a minimum of 140 hours (20 hours during Practicum and 120 hours during Internship) of the student’s direct service must be in relational work.

Practicum Seminar (COUN 690) and Internship (COUN 693 or 694/695) provide MCFCT program students with the opportunity to acquire specific experiences, knowledge, and skills unique to marriage, couple, and family counseling. Within these two courses, students explore the formal and informal organizational structure of a counseling agency and the roles, functions, settings, and professional identity of the marriage and family counselor in relation to other professional and support personnel, as well as the ethical, legal, and professional issues that impact counseling agencies, e.g., staffing patterns, typical physical facilities, employment and evaluation procedures, operational resources, provisions for continuing professional development, and the relationships among the various counseling and helping services within the system. 

The clinical sequence is developmental in nature, in that, the Practicum Seminar provides beginning level counselors-in-training (CITs) with highly supervised counseling experiences, while the Internship Seminar provides a capstone comprehensive clinical experience with intensive, supervised on-the-job training specific to their MCFCT educational specialization.  In the Internship, CIT’s analyze and strengthen the application of their counseling skills, maximize the use of community resources and facilities, and identify and develop the consultation skills that are needed to negotiate professional counseling and administrative systems and advocate for clients and their families in context. 

The College of New Jersey is centrally located within the State of New Jersey and geographically proximate to eastern Pennsylvania. Therefore, students in the MCFCT program can choose from a wide variety of marriage and family counseling settings in either of these states to fulfill their supervised clinical experiences. Given the cultural and geographic diversity of the area, these field placement settings include: urban, suburban, and rural agencies; economically advantaged and distressed communities; and ethnically, culturally, and linguistically diverse clientele.