Training in psychoanalytic psychotherapy

We are currently accepting applications for our training in psychoanalytic psychotherapy

Applications for the next year have been extended to the end of June. If you are interested in applying and wish to obtain an application pack or for more details or to arrange to speak to our applications secretary who will be able to answer any questions, you can contact the Guild office on: 020 7401 3260 or e-mail admin@guildofpsychotherapists.org.uk

About training with The Guild

The Guild was founded in 1974 by a group of psychotherapists from Freudian, Jungian and Phenomenological backgrounds. As a pluralist training, no one body of theory is regarded as holding ‘the truth’; trainees are introduced to the richness and diversity of psychoanalytic perspectives on unconscious life, on sources of human distress, and on the psychotherapeutic encounter.

The Guild aims to involve trainees in the continuing evaluation and reformulation of psychoanalytic thinking, emphasising a questioning approach and the importance of recognising context – historical, cultural and individual (biographical) – in which concepts have developed, and taking account of the ethnocentric, gender and anti-homosexual ideology which may be present in theory.

Selection for training

The training course begins in October of each year, selection taking place in the preceding Spring. The Guild values the individual qualities trainees bring to the psychotherapeutic work and offers guidance to potential applicants whose background may put them at a disadvantage in meeting the requirements of the course. The Guild accepts trainees from diverse backgrounds and wishes to widen the range of groups from whom applications are received. All previous life and work experience is considered. Emphasis is placed on the applicant’s capacity for drawing on personal resources as well as on capacity to undertake an intellectually rigorous course. Applicants will previously have had and will be in personal psychoanalytic psychotherapy before application, at a minimum frequency of twice weekly.

The course

Seminars are held over a period of four years on Wednesday evenings at Nelson Square. Teaching is done in seminar groups (average eight students) to which trainees contribute both with prepared presentations and in discussion and debate. The evening has one theory seminar and one clinical discussion seminar.

The teaching programme is reviewed annually to consider both the range of psychoanalytic theories and the contemporary developments which it reflects. Trainees are invited to provide feedback on their experience both termly and at the annual syllabus meeting. Three additional training days are held annually to allow concentration on (1) assessment, research and writing, (2) ethics in practice, (3) building a private practice.

The course requirements are for continuing personal psychoanalytic psychotherapy until qualification, for attendance at seminars, and for gaining clinical experience with a range of patients and in different situations. This includes work with patients under training supervision, building up (as appropriate to the individual) a practice, undertaking a placement in The Guild community based reduced fee clinic (up to two years) and undertaking a placement within an adult psychiatric setting (minimum half a day per week for six months).

The other requirement is for the submission of specified written work, which takes two forms: six-monthly reports on work with ‘training’ patients which are submitted to the trainee’s personal tutor, and (currently) annual pieces of work which have a theoretical or clinical focus. One essay, half way through the course, is a self-assessment which the trainee contributes to the mid-training review. A non-assessed essay on the experience of working in The Guild Clinic is also written. All these pieces of work prepare for the final clinical paper, presented when the trainee applies for qualification. Prior to the final paper, trainees receive feedback from termly assessment meetings of the Training Committee.

Trainees

Trainees are subject to The Guild’s Code of Ethics and Grievance Procedures. Consideration of ethical issues forms part of supervision, of discussion with tutors, and one of three training days addresses this central topic. Professional indemnity insurance is arranged by The Guild. Trainees have a personal tutor who is their link to the Training Committee, the role being academic and pastoral. Feedback to the trainee is given by the tutor, in supervisor’s reports, in written comments on assessed essays, and (where necessary) from the Training Committee.

If you are interested in applying and wish to obtain an application pack or for more details or to arrange to speak to our applications secretary who will be able to answer any questions, you can contact the Guild office on: 020 7401 3260 or e-mail admin@guildofpsychotherapists.org.uk