Bangor University - North Wales Clinical Psychology Programme

PROGRAMME STRUCTURE

The programme is full-time, and the length of the programme cannot be reduced through the accreditation of prior learning or experience: you are required to complete the full programme of training to qualify. 

a)    Academic Component

The academic component of the programme actively engages you in the learning process.  This is helped greatly by the relatively small size of each year group (currently 15 trainees), allowing plenty of scope for discussion and development of ideas and skills.  
You are expected to take an active role in teaching by bringing your own clinical material and experiences to discussions, and by taking part in role plays to develop skills.

The academic curriculum emphasises a life span perspective. This means that topic areas can be taught by clinicians from a range of specialisms, thus ensuring that you gain a developmental view and appreciate how the same theoretical models and approaches are applied with different client groups and across different age groups.

Following the programme’s competence-based model, most of our teaching matches the focus of the competencies developed in each of the five placements.
At the start of year one, you are provided with foundation teaching relevant to the general work of assessment and formulation undertaken by clinical psychologists across a wide range of settings. This includes core engagement, assessment, and some therapeutic skills, as well as professional codes of ethics and conduct, and relevant legal frameworks.

During placement time, one of the aims of the teaching is to equip you with both the theoretical knowledge and skills to complete robust psychological assessments and formulations.

Half-way through this first placement you also engage in an 8-week mindfulness course as part of your teaching, to set the foundations for learning more about third wave approaches and to use yourselves to help manage the demands of training.

During the second and third placements (intervention I and intervention II), teaching has a greater focus on therapeutic models and skills development, including Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Dialectical Behavioural Therapy.

Other therapeutic models are also introduced as training progresses including Schema Therapy and Compassion Focused Therapy. During the final competency placement (Working with Systems and Leadership) there is a stronger focus in the teaching on these areas in terms of their theories and practice. 

We are working steadily to develop our teaching so that it contributes to accreditation requirements for other professional qualifications, such as British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) CBT therapist accreditation, Association for Family Therapy and Systemic Practice (AFT) foundation level training and the British Psychological Society’s qualification in clinical neuropsychology.

Our DBT teaching (and related clinical experience) has been expanded, so that you can have acquired all the knowledge-based competencies and most of the practice-based competencies you require for level 1 accreditation as a DBT therapist with the Society for DBT in the UK and Ireland, that implements the International DBT Accreditation standards.  

Teaching timetable

Each placement is preceded by a block of teaching spanning between two and five weeks.

Once you are on placement, weekly teaching days continue for most of the year, which enables ongoing contact with fellow members of your year group, other trainees, and programme team members.

There are also two teaching days each academic year, when all three cohorts come together, where specialist and current topics are presented and discussed. Titles for recent all cohort teaching days have been ‘Mentalization interventions’ and ‘Creative supervision’.

Teaching format

Under normal circumstances, teaching is delivered in our dedicated teaching rooms in Bangor University, close to the programme team members’ offices with a roomy shared kitchen and dining area.

Occasional remote teaching sessions are still employed. When learning remotely, each teaching slot includes an online group video session facilitated by the teacher, which is supported by self-directed learning tasks involving academic papers, podcasts, videos, and PowerPoint presentations. 

Teachers

While clinical and academic psychologists within North Wales deliver most of the teaching, psychologists from outside the area and other professionals are also invited to contribute where appropriate.

Members of our People Panel (our expert by experience advisory group) and other service users and carers are actively involved in several teaching sessions throughout the three years. Trainees greatly appreciate and value their perspective and feedback is consistently high.

Trainees give feedback on all academic sessions, thus enabling the programme to keep improving the standards of its teaching.

Academic assignments

There are three academic assignments to be completed across the three years: 

• You start with a problem-based learning assignment, which you work on with fellow trainees.
• In year two, you give a presentation on a professional issue arising from your systemic and leadership placement.
• After the thesis hand in, you write a reflective assignment on your learning, which is formatively assessed. 

While the format for the assignments is set, you choose your own clinically relevant topics for these. 

Welsh speakers can submit their work in Welsh.

b)    Clinical Experience

Learning continues as you apply theories and practice introduced in the classroom and through independent study to working with your clients and colleagues on placement.

Placements are as follows:

• Year 1: Foundations of Assessment, Formulation and Intervention (Nov – April) 
• Year 1: Intervention I (May – October)
• Year 2: Intervention II (November – June)
• Year 2/3: Working with Systems and Leadership (July – December)
• Year 3: Elective/Supplementary (December – September)

All clinical placements will be undertaken within the large geographical area of North Wales, which extends from Wrexham to Pwllheli, Holyhead to Newtown and Dolgellau and cover post-industrial towns and cities as well as rural communities. Placements may also take place in north Powys, e.g. Newtown or Welshpool. 

Welsh speaking trainees are often allocated placements where they can use the Welsh language clinically and where possible with supervisors. 

Placements currently available include: 

• Adult Mental Health: including secondary care mental health services, stepped care service, inpatient services, eating disorder service, perinatal mental health, substances misuse services, early intervention psychosis service. 
• Older Adults including memory clinics and community teams. 
• Child and Adolescent: including CAMHS, child health, inpatient adolescent service, neuro-developmental services 
• Intellectual Disabilities: child and adult services
• Forensic services: medium secure unit and prison 
• Brain Injury: child and adult services.
• Health Clinical Psychology: including renal care, pain management, diabetes, chronic fatigue services, oncology and palliative care, paediatric services, critical care, inherited bleeding disorders, artificial limb service, musculoskeletal service, weight management, cochlear implants.
• Staff wellbeing and support services 
• Therapeutic approaches used include, CBT, CBT for psychosis, Dialectical Behaviour Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Schema Therapy and Compassion Focused Therapy. 

Placement agreements are negotiated by the supervisor and you, in conjunction with programme staff.

These agreements are reviewed mid-way through the placement for satisfactory progress.

Each placement is evaluated by the clinical supervisor, assessing a full range of clinical and professional competencies.

You provide feedback on all placements to ensure that the high quality of clinical experience is maintained and improved. 

Clinical assignments

• You will complete a report of clinical activity (RCA) relating to your Foundations of Assessment, Formulation and Intervention placement.
• You complete a report of clinical activity (RCA) relating to your Intervention I placement
• You complete two RCAs from your longer Intervention II placement, one where you formulate a piece of work from two different theoretical or therapeutic approaches and a second where you will orally present one other of your clinical pieces of works. 
• One of your RCAs has to be a CBT-RCA
• You need to submit a recording of a session where you used CBT, which is rated using the CTS-R, or other relevant assessment tools.

c)    Research

The aim of the research curriculum is to ensure that you gain experience in using a range of research approaches and obtain a sophisticated understanding of and can critically appraise the evidence base underlying clinical practice. Training in research skills occurs throughout the three years.

Research assignments

There are three research projects to be completed over the three years.

• You start with a data analysis project, using large publicly available data sets to answer set questions.  
• The service-related research project is a highly applied piece of research, such as an audit or service evaluation, completed during the second year of the programme.
• Finally, there is the large-scale research project which forms your doctoral thesis, which you work on throughout the programme. 

The thesis comprises a systematic review or meta-analysis; an empirical study; and a paper on the clinical and research implications of your work.

This work is expected to be of a publishable standard and in the last five years alone over 30 trainee papers have been published in academic journals.

In your final year you have a viva voce, where you defend your thesis.

The research team members endeavour to support you to do projects in your areas of interest, rather than being assigned projects from a list.

Research supervision is provided by the programme team, local clinical psychologists, and colleagues in the university. Research in clinical and clinical health psychology is one of the strengths of the School of Psychology and Sports Science. The programme supports research projects from across the scientist practitioner tradition, using both quantitative and qualitative methodologies.

Recent areas in which trainees have carried out research:

• The VaLuE Study: Valuing personal experience of mental health difficulties in clinical psychologists and therapists.
• Adventure therapy alongside other mental health provision: Exploring integration and staff perspectives of an intervention.
• An exploration of trans people’s experiences of eating disorders and gender affirming healthcare.
• Gender and Body Image: Health Outcomes When Body Ideals Does Not Conform With 'Traditional' Norms.
• Exploring the UK Filipino community’s experiences of mental health, literacy, stigma, cultural capital and help-seeking.
• Postnatal emotional wellbeing and the parent-infant relationship: interventions and experiences of out-of-area service provision
• Forgotten Others: Teachers’ and Siblings’ Experiences of Intentional Self-Injury in Young People.
• Tidy house tidy mind? The unexplored house: A narrative investigation of mid-life hoarders’ (30-55) relationship to hoarding.
• Experiences of intimate partner violence.
• Getting help with persistent physical symptoms: An exploration of accessing healthcare for support.
• A systemic exploration of type-1 diabetes in childhood: Experiences of parents, clinicians and school staff.

We hold an annual research conference where the trainees present their research projects through presentations and posters. We invite new entry trainees to this conference before they start on the programme.  

ASSESSMENT

• There are no unseen written examinations on the programme
• You will complete a total of 10 assignments, including a final thesis. At the end of the third year, the thesis is evaluated by viva voce examination.
• Although the format of the assessments is set, you decide on the clinical topic area you want to address.
• External examiners with extensive experience of clinical psychology training programmes play an active role in benchmarking our marking system.
• Welsh speaking trainees have the option of completing your assignments through the medium of Welsh.  The programme organises translation services.

THE PEOPLE PANEL: OUR EXPERT BY EXPERIENCE ADVISORY GROUP. 

The programme’s expert by experience advisory group was named by its members the ‘People Panel’.  Established in 2008, the panel aims to enhance trainees’ learning from a service user and carer perspective.

We have trainee representation from all cohort years on the People Panel, thus providing regular opportunities for trainees and service users and carers to consult with each other on a wide range of clinically relevant topics and areas of development.

Trainees regard this experience as positive and comment that they appreciate People Panel members’ advice, guidance, and feedback.

Currently the panel comprises individuals who have been involved with clinical psychology services in a range of settings, such as adult mental health, clinical health psychology, older adult and child and adult intellectual disability services.

The People Panel members are involved in a range of different aspects of the training programme.

• They represent the panel on all programme committees.
• They play a key role in our selection procedures for trainees and staff.
• People Panel members co-facilitate CBT workshops where they give feedback directly to trainees on their performance from a service user and carer perspective.
• They are actively involved with several teaching sessions on the programme.
• People Panel members also act as consultants for the Problem Based Learning assignment.

Trainees regularly ask the People Panel to comment on aspects of their research projects, from early design ideas to participation information sheets and consent forms and present their projects at various stages of development for advice and feedback. 

People Panel members attend the annual research fair, where BCUHB clinical psychologists share ideas for research and academic assignments with the trainees.

The People Panel are currently reviewing the client consent guidelines for trainees on placemen, and forms for service user feedback to be completed at the end of the trainee’s involvement. These were originally designed by the People Panel.

At the last BPS and Bangor University accreditation visit in 2019, the programme’s People Panel was commended as follows: the engagement of a diverse, committed and passionate group on the People Panel (Service User group), who positively feed into the programme is an area of good practice.

Programme Staff 

Please see our website for a list of staff with day-to-day involvement in the Programme.

Additional contributions to the Programme are made by colleagues from the School of Psychology and Sports Science, Bangor University and Clinical Psychology Departments of the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board.