You are part way through your Master’s Degree and you’re starting to consider where you’ll do your Student Practicum Placement. When you’re ready to apply, please do take care to follow the directions on this page carefully–applications sent to specific people at our organization do not go through the proper channels and are unlikely to be moved forward for interview.
Maybe you have a sense of what kind of therapy you’d like to practice or how you would like to be in the room with clients. Maybe you have no idea yet. That’s ok. If you know for sure that some form of relational therapy is for you and you are deeply committed to learning and growing both as a person and as a therapist, then we might be a good fit with one another for your student practicum.
Lavender Counselling offers an 8 month practicum placement, and welcomes a new cohort of students each September, January and April. We allow students to gain direct client, group, and professional hours. Over the 8 months, students work up to and maintain a maximum of 20 hours per week. Extensive supervision is offered both individually, and in group. The focus of the Lavender Counselling Practicum is to help you develop a trauma informed practice that allows you to feel confident in a private practice setting.
Pre-Application
We host a complimentary workshop for those seeking to learn about our Practicum Placement and Practicum Placements more broadly. It will be hosted in September, January, and April in the 2025/26 year.
We have in previous offered a low-cost group therapy experience where we explore the role of relational practices/empathy in counselling and student or new counsellors’ reactions to it. While this group gives interested applicants an opportunity to get a sense of Lavender Counselling before they may decide to apply for a practicum placement with us, we are not currently offering it in the 2025/26 year. We have hosted this in September, January, and April of each year. It is not a required group to do a placement with us.
Application Dates
April start date (April -December placement) – Applications due Nov 15th
Sept start date (Sept-April placement) – Application due February 15th
Jan start date (Jan – August placement) – Applications due Sept 15th
Requirements
Students are required to have 20 hours per week available for the placement that is made up of two days and 2 evenings. Students will see a maximum of 15 clients per week. We request students to complete the BC Crisis Centre’s ASSIST training prior to their placement. (https://www.crisiscentre.bc.ca/training/asist/)
Supervision
Supervision – minimum 2 hours of supervision per week. Supplemental group supervision may add an additional 3 hours of supervision per month (not offered all semesters). On call supervisors are available at all time points a student is in session. Group hours are available with an Internationally Certified Group Psychotherapist with the American Group Psychotherapy Association.
Suitability/Competency
Finding students who are a good fit for our highly trauma-informed, relational style is very important to us. We support those working in modalities that have a broadly person centered base (EFT, AEDP, Somatic approaches, Experiential Focusing, etc). We do not have competency to supervise students coming from more cognitive, or behavioural approaches.
If a student decides a theoretical orientation outside of one with a broadly person centered base is a better fit for them, we encourage them in finding a path that is best suited for them. We will terminate the placement and do our best to assist the student in finding another placement that is more conducive to their desired growth.
Application Process
Please send a resume, cover letter, and any reference letters you may wish us to have, as a single package to joinus@lavendercounselling.com. Please make the subject of that email Practicum Application: Start date (please add when your preferred start date would be April, Sept or January). We know that finding a placement can be difficult, and while we absolutely appreciate everyone who applies, we will only be in contact with those who we will be inviting to an interview.
We know the practicum application process can be stressful and that it often is highly comptetitive to get a placement. We appreciate that you may be feeling anxious to ensure your application gets to the right people at our organization for review. In order to ensure your application is moved through our internal processes and not missed, it is important to follow the application process.
Please do not email others at our organization with your application, or an enquiry about your application. Any applications outside of our standard process are very likely to not be moved forward in our selection process. We do sometimes have applications that are sent to our joinus@lavendercounselling.com email as well as to other counsellors at our organization. We kindly ask you not to cc your application to any others at our organization during your application process. We wish you all the best in your placement and welcome you to the profession.