Coursework and Training

Training in our Integrated Training Program comprises three components:

  • Course Instruction

  • Control Analysis Supervision

  • Personal Analysis

CFS-NY Has Two Training Tracks: A and B

Both Tracks A and B Engage in the Following Course Instruction:

  • Two classes each trimester. (There are three trimesters per year.)
  • Seminars meet on Monday evenings for 1-1/4 to 1-3/4 hours.
  • Candidates who complete all coursework, control analysis work, supervision and case write-up requirements and successfully complete a Final Case Presentation receive a diploma from the PTI of CFS.

Track B (Additional Requirements for NY State License in Psychoanalysis):

Students in Track B complete the same requirements described above, including a personal analysis and two control analyses (supervised analyses with patients). The PTI provides office space in which Track B candidates conduct their control work as required by New York State.

Additional courses required in Track B to meet the training requirements for becoming a licensed psychoanalyst (LP) as delineated by the New York State Education Department are:

  • Psychoanalytic research methodology
  • Ethics
  • Preclinical first year experiences in preparation for conducting supervised psychotherapy in year two.
  • A two-hour course on the identification and reporting of child abuse and maltreatment
  • LP enrichment course covering clinical preparation for work with patients
  • NOTE: Additional tuition and fees are required for the psychoanalytic research and ethics courses and for first year preclinical experiences

Upon completing the number of clock hours for personal analysis, control case supervision and control analyses, as well as the required coursework required by New York State for the LP, the candidate will receive a Certificate of Completion from the PTI of CFS. This Certificate, along with documentation of 1,500 clinical hours of work with patients, supervision, and professional development, qualifies the candidate to apply to the New York State Education Department to take the licensing exam in Psychoanalysis.

Please visit the New York State Office of the Professions website (http://www.op.nysed.gov), which describes the requirements for taking the license-qualifying examination in Psychoanalysis (LP).

Course Instruction

Years 1 and 2: Developmental Sequence and Listening Series

These two courses are taught simultaneously during the first and second years. Students are encouraged to take a one-year course in Infant Observation prior to or during Year 1.

Developmental Sequence (6 courses): Infancy, Toddlerhood, Oedipal Phase, Latency, Adolescence, Adulthood

Listening Series (6 courses): The first year focuses on basic concepts and the second year on diagnostic thinking.

Readings and clinical material describing both child and adult work will be used to illustrate the basic concepts and diagnostic thinking taught in the listening series. Relating the two courses each semester will offer opportunities for expanded learning and integration. As an example, during the first year, “Listening for Defenses” is taught simultaneously with the course on “Toddlerhood.” Instructors use both adult and child clinical material to illustrate the key psychoanalytic concepts of defensive behaviors and defense mechanisms. The complex interactions between constitutional/maturational factors, environmental experiences and introjective/projective mechanisms are examined as an intersecting matrix in the development of the mind.

Year 3: Freud’s writings/Psychoanalytic Technique I, II, III

Freud’s clinical cases, technique papers, sociocultural thinking and later contributions are covered.Technique seminars focus on developing clinical skills for moving patients from psychotherapy to psychoanalysis as well as working with various diagnoses and pathologies.

Year 4: Post-Freudian Theoretical Developments and Controversies/Continuous Case Seminar

Year 4 focuses on the evolution of psychoanalytic thought and views of psychopathology. The analytic listening sequence continues with continuous case seminars. Both child and adult clinical material will be used to deepen an understanding of diagnostic formulations, pathogenesis and therapeutic action in Years 3 and 4.

Control Analysis

Candidates who have passed readiness-for-control may do their control work with child or adult patients, or with both.

This is an essential and vital part of psychoanalytic training. Candidates conduct their own analyses of patients under weekly supervision by a PTI Training and Supervising Analyst. By graduation, the candidate will have conducted at least two control cases under the supervision of two training and supervising analysts.

Yearly case summary reports, a critical tool for understanding the progress of the case, are part of both the candidate’s clinical responsibility and learning experience. Candidates discuss the summaries each year with a member of the Progression Committee and an independent case summary reader. These write-ups provide another valuable learning experience in addition to coursework and supervision .

The length and number of cases will vary among candidates. The minimum requirement is approximately one three-year case and one two-year case. That said, many candidates opt to see more than the required two cases and thus take longer to graduate. The decision to do so is made in consultation with the candidate’s supervisors and Progression Committee representative.

Adult Analysis

  • Candidates must conduct a minimum of two control (supervised) analytic cases
  • One case must be seen in person four to five times a week. The second case may be seen three to five times per week.
  • Cases will be supervised by two different training and supervising analysts from the PTI of CFS.
  • A minimum of 200 hours of supervision between the two cases is required.

Child Analysis

  • Candidates must conduct a four-times-weekly analysis of two children, one boy and one girl
  • Cases must be from different age groups, i.e. preschool, latency,adolescence.
  • A minimum of 200 hours of supervision between the two cases is required.
  • A candidate may undertake the control analysis of a child without intending to graduate as a child analyst. The candidate must enroll in the child seminar and be supervised by an IPA child analyst.

Training Analysis

Each candidate is expected to begin a four-to-five session per week personal analysis (also called a Training Analysis) with a Training and Supervising Analyst at the PTI of CFS upon matriculation.

Should an applicant already be in analysis with someone who is not a Training and Supervising Analyst at the CFS PTI and wish to continue in that analysis, discussion between the candidate and the Disposition Committee needs to take place before acceptance into the program is finalized.

For more details about the requirements for graduation please see our Candidate Guidelines.

Graduation

  • Upon graduation, our members become part of a group of psychoanalysts working and learning both locally and around the world.
  • Graduates are immediately eligible for membership in CFS, the International Psychoanalytical Association (IPA) and the Confederation of Independent Psychoanalytic Societies (CIPS).
  • Members of CFS are also eligible to apply for individual membership to the American Psychoanalytic Association (APsA).

 

 

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