Erah Ali, a child psychology intern, likes working with young patients because “I can become a kid myself and be goofy with them,” and because “we’re changing their lives and their parents’ lives.”

Stephanie Whitney, a neuropsychology intern, was drawn to the field’s mix of diagnostics and patient care: “It’s this perfect combination of trying to help people, but also of solving a puzzle by trying to understand the underlying cause of their cognitive behavioral complaints.”

Sarah McGill, Ph.D., a recent doctoral graduate, values the diverse experiences gained during her child psychology internship, which included providing care in various settings — from inpatient facilities to summer camps — and collaborating with fellow students and practitioners.

They each attended one-year predoctoral internships through the Wichita Collaborative Psychology Internship Program, or WCPIP, a 71-year-old effort KU School of Medicine-Wichita has participated in since 1977. The program, the nation’s first consortium approved by the American Psychological Association, is one of many across the country helping students fulfill doctoral requirements. Some will go on to fellowship programs; others will head into practice.

“This is the last step before the conferral of their doctoral degree,” says Kelli Netson, Ph.D., LP, ABPP-CN, an associate professor and the medical school’s liaison to the collaborative. “My internship year was the steepest learning curve of my life. It’s an opportunity to take all the skills you’ve learned in the classroom and practicums and put it all together. You can figure out more about your own style, strengths and weaknesses.”

“Many have done a part-time practicum, but this is their first full-time immersion in clinical work,” says Nicole Klaus, Ph.D., ABPP, an associate professor who supervises child psychology interns. “They clearly come in with an interest in working with children or young adults. But over the course of the year, they may focus their interests on pediatric psychology and hospital settings, or they may decide they are more interested in outpatient care.”

The consortium and a grant

For McGill, an Andover Central High School graduate now practicing in Wichita, “part of my goal is to serve the community I grew up in.”

That, too, is a goal of the program: Growing the ranks of practitioners in Kansas, which like the rest of the nation is widely underserved. It’s a goal that, through a two-year federal grant, the consortium expanded by increasing the child psychology internships to two last year and now to three.

Along with Ali, the other current child psych interns are Kara Brown, pursuing her doctorate from Washington State University, and Samantha Baker, seeking her doctorate from Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine. They were matched — like medical residents are — through a process that brings 30 to 40 applicants each year for the child psychology internships and 30 to 50 for the single neuropsychology one. Applicants can state their preferred locations among the three consortium members — the medical school, Wichita State University’s counseling center and Newton’s Prairie View behavioral health center.

The $900,000 HRSA grant funds KEEP UP, the Kansas Educating Excellent Psychologists and Psychiatrists for Underserved/Rural Youth Patients program. The hope is funding can be renewed beyond the current class. Interns receive benefits and a stipend while compiling at least 2,000 practice hours counting toward licensure.

“Our goal is to not only train them to be excellent clinicians but also to become future educators and supervisors and trainers for our next generation of psychologists, as well as consultants for multidisciplinary teams,” Klaus says. “We want them to be able to consult with primary care clinicians, schools and others who are doing mental health treatments in their own practices and to have the expertise to guide the highest quality of evidence-based care.”

The interns at work

All three child psychology interns work from the clinic at the medical school, while Whitney is based at the off-campus neuropsychology clinic. Each intern also spends one day a week at a “switch site” — which happens to be Wichita State’s Counseling and Psychological Services center for all four.

The child psychology internships cover much ground. They’re exposed to neuropsychology  and to the KSKidsMAP program that supports primary care physicians and others providing mental health care. Some interns work in the Haysville district’s school-based health clinic.

Ali, a New York native, went to Wichita State for graduate school. Since starting the internship in July, she’s seen patients from ages 3 to adolescent and works jointly with parents and children on conditions including autism, anxiety, ADHD and behavioral issues. She is part of a consultation team at Wesley Medical Center, seeing patients with cancer, suicidal thoughts or behaviors, other emotional or behavioral factors affecting medical care, and helping devise treatment plans. She also leads DBT (dialectical behavior therapy) group sessions at Ascension Via Christi.

At the start, full-time clinical work was an adjustment to “night owl” Ali. But every day brings a new case or experience and “it’s always a great time.”

Unlike child psychology, neuropsychology might be less familiar to many people. It involves extensive pencil and paper testing to assess how patients’ brain functions are and aren’t working. Patients include dementia and trauma patients, and neuropsychologists consult with other psychologists, psychiatrists, neurologists and other physicians. “It integrates lots of different information sources and provides information to a lot of different sources,” Netson says.

For both children and adults, the testing can include assessments of IQ, language and math abilities, visual spatiality, processing speed and “their ability to hold information in their mind and manipulate it,” Whitney says. “We'll also assess fine motor skills if we suspect, especially with kids, some sort of motor difficulty might be impacting their writing or their ability to button or tie shoes.”

Whitney, a University of Miami student, made the Wichita internship a top choice because it provides experience — which is rare — with  both adult and child neuropsychology (Netson is a pediatric neuropsychologist). In addition, "with my switch rotation at Wichita State, I’ll be able to work with a young adult population doing more counseling, which is something I'm excited about.”

McGill, who earned her doctorate from Wichita State, went from her internship to a private practice group. She now sees patients of all ages but has a particular interest in children who are neurodivergent because “it’s so fascinating to observe the unique ways in which their brains process information and emotions, and it’s an ever-evolving field.”

“The internship experience overall was incredible,” McGill says. “I worked with ages all the way from 4 to adulthood. I’m so thankful I was able to train and stay in Wichita. I appreciate that they invested in me.”