Fellowship Description: This Advanced Social Work Fellowship begins in September, 2026 and finishes in August, 2027. The training experience involves the opportunity to provide clinical services and to take part in advanced training opportunities. This fellowship is full time, and is divided between an urgent care walk-in clinic (four days per week) and a psychiatric emergency service, PES (one day per week). For the urgent care/ walk-in service component, trainees have the opportunity to see clients emergently as well as for ongoing treatment, and to be a member of a multidisciplinary clinical team. For the PES component, the trainee will also have the opportunity to be a member of an interdisciplinary team and to provide psychiatric consultations to patients in an emergency room. Trainees are required to be on site for a total of 40 hours per week, including one evening/week. Postgraduate trainees receive a stipend (including health insurance), and four weeks of paid vacation.
Trainee Duties and Clinical Responsibilities: In the ambulatory urgent care clinic, social work trainees collaborate in a multidisciplinary team to conduct individual psychosocial evaluations and crisis interventions. They also provide individual, group, and occasionally, couples and family psychotherapy to patients. They will treat children, adolescents, and adults. The social work fellow will carry a caseload that will comprise about 16 hours of their 40-hour fellowship, consisting of evaluations, crisis intervention, treatment planning and referrals, time-limited cases, a limited number of ongoing psychotherapy cases, and group treatment. They will collaborate closely with the multidisciplinary team, which includes the team psychiatrist and APRN, residents, social workers, psychology trainees, RN, peer support specialists, recovery coaches, and caseworkers, as well as our community mobile crisis team partners. In the psychiatric emergency service, the trainee will also be a member of an interdisciplinary team. The trainee will collaborate closely with the other team members, including the attending psychiatrist, psychiatry residents, social workers, psychology trainees, and ER staff. In the PES, the trainee will offer crisis evaluations, risk assessments, determine level of care, and provide referrals for adults, children and families with psychiatric illness, substance abuse, and medical illness.
Trainee Supervision: Each social work fellow receives a minimum of two hours of individual supervision, as well as weekly Unified Protocol supervision. All supervision is provided by independently licensed social workers, as well as senior staff in other disciplines. Additional specialized supervision is arranged as needed.
Orientation: At the start of the training year in September, incoming fellows will be expected to participate in hospital-wide orientation programs, as well as orientation specific to social work, the adult OPD, and to psychiatric emergency services. Trainees will also learn to use EPIC, the electronic medical record.
Urgent Care Team Meeting: This interdisciplinary weekly meeting is comprised of trainees and staff. During this meeting, completed evaluations can be presented, cases are reviewed, clinical consultations are extended to all team members, and basic clinical teaching is conducted. The meeting is held on Thursdays, from noon to 1:00 pm, and is required of all staff and trainees. Additionally, trainees will attend two daily team huddles with members of the Urgent Care, Mobile Crisis Team Partners, and Psychiatric Emergency Service staff, to coordinate care and discuss cases.
Treatment Modalities: The trainee would be given the opportunity to practice using a wide variety of evidence-based, goal-directed treatment options including: UP, CBT, DBT, Motivational Interviewing, Solution Focused Treatment, Short-Term Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, Family Systems Treatment, Trauma Focused Treatment, SUD treatment interventions, and Group Psychotherapy. There will be a particular emphasis on Unified Protocol training, and the fellow will treat clients throughout the year, using the Unified Protocol. In addition, the fellow will also have the opportunity to provide psychodynamic, goal-oriented, time-limited treatment to one client, supervised by a clinician with short-term, psychodynamic psychotherapy expertise.
Outpatient Psychiatry Department Seminars: A wide variety of seminars are offered and encouraged, including: Grand Rounds, an Acute Crime Seminar, a Child Psychotherapy Seminar, a Short-Term Psychodynamic Seminar, a Multicultural Seminar, and an OPD Case Conference. In addition to these seminars, additional training may be offered including CBT for psychosis, CBT for depression, and CBT for Complex PTSD.
Professional Development Seminar: SW fellows from our eight fellowship programs meet biweekly, and have guest speakers present on multiple aspects of the social work profession.
Application Procedures
Fellowships are available to students who have completed an MSW from an accredited institution. Social work fellows are awarded an annual stipend of approximately $62,000 for a 12-month training year, with a 4-week paid vacation, holiday and sick time included. Fellows will be expected to have received their LCSW by the fall of 2026.
Trainees who are best matched to the fellowship program are mature and experienced students with varied clinical backgrounds and strong recommendations from both academic and clinical settings. Applicants for advanced social work training should submit a cover letter, C.V. and three letters of recommendation by March 27, 2026 to our program coordinator, John MacCumascaigh, at jmaccumascaigh@challiance.org.
Phillip Brown, LICSW
Director of Social Work Training
Chief of Psychiatry Social Work