Children's Hospital Colorado

Pediatric Psychology Internships

Pediatric Psychology Internships

Addressing the unique needs of every child so they can be their unique selves.

In order to grow the practice of children’s mental health care, Children's Hospital Colorado offers a psychology internship training program in children’s clinical and pediatric psychology. These are full-time, 12-month internships for psychology majors at the doctoral level. The internships are accredited by the American Psychological Association (APA), and our program is also a member of the Association of Psychology Postdoctoral and Internship Centers (APPIC).

In addition to internships in psychology, our training opportunities include externships and fellowships.

What to expect from a pediatric psychology internship

We offer internships in a number of disciplines within pediatric psychology. At the time of application for our pediatric psychology internships, candidates should state their pediatric specialty track preferences. Our track choices are:

Clinical rotations

Interns receive 16 to 20 hours of dedicated clinical rotations work per week specific to their track, with an additional 12 hours per week providing evidence-based assessment and treatment to patients and families in the Pediatric Mental Health Institute outpatient clinic.

Academic medicine rotations

Interns will provide 1 to 2 hours per week of supervision for a doctoral extern on up to three outpatient clinical cases. Interns will also participate in a monthly group supervision of supervision course.

Research rotation

Interns receive four hours per week of dedicated study time to complete a scholarly research project. A research mentor will help guide this process. Funding is available for interns to present their research findings at a local, regional or national conference.

Didactic seminars

We hold didactic seminars weekly that cover a variety of topics including assessment, diversity, pediatric behavioral medicine, professionalism, academic medical research, and supervision of supervision.

Salary

Interns receive a salary as well as holiday, vacation, sick and professional leave. We also provide employee health, dental and vision benefits. An intern’s training institution or the intern themselves must provide proof of malpractice coverage.

Intern evaluation

Core and specialty supervisors evaluate interns’ performance three times throughout the year using our Trainee Competency Evaluation Form, and we review the results with each intern. Competency categories include:

  • Research
  • Ethical and legal standards
  • Individual and cultural diversity
  • Professional values and attitudes
  • Communication and interpersonal skills
  • Knowledge assessment
  • Knowledge of intervention methods
  • Supervision
  • Consultation and interprofessional/interdisciplinary skills

Requirements for admission

We accept applications from doctoral candidates who are currently enrolled in an APA or Canadian Psychology Association accredited PhD or PsyD program in clinical, counseling or school psychology. Candidates are expected to have had sufficient training and experience in children’s clinical psychology in order to maximize the experiences we offer.

Prior to application, all candidates must meet the following requirements:

  • Accepted into doctoral candidacy and completed dissertation proposal approval process
  • Completed at least 3 years of practicum, field placement or work experience, which includes a minimum of 500 hours of direct clinical assessment and intervention hours (we give preference to applicants who have experience with youth 0 to 18 years old and their families).
  • Completed at least 5 child or adolescent integrated psychological testing reports
  • If you have fewer than 500 hours of direct clinical assessment or intervention hours or 5 integrated reports due to COVID-19 training delays please have your Director of Clinical Training email our training director, with an explanation of your circumstances and why you should be considered for our internship.

We may interview applicants for up to three of their preferred tracks, but applicants will ultimately match with only one track. We will inform all applicants of our interview decisions via email by the APPIC notification deadline.

Applications are due November 1, 2023. For more on the requirements for admission, download the 2024 to 2025 short form internship brochure. See the link below for the full length internship brochure for more information on our specialty tracks.

How to apply to our pediatric psychology internships

All applicants must use the APPIC AAPI online application portal. The application should contain the following:

  • A cover letter that also includes your order of interest in pediatric specialty preferences; maximum of three tracks
  • A current curriculum vitae
  • Three letters of recommendation, two of which must be from persons who have directly supervised your clinical work
  • One complete psychological testing report (a child or adolescent client) uploaded as supplemental materials with identifying information deleted
  • Official transcripts of all graduate coursework
  • Because our psychology and mental health internships are strongly committed to diversity, specifically discuss your experiences and commitment to diversity in essay #3

It is the applicant’s responsibility to make arrangements with the recommending persons and transcript offices in order to meet the application deadline.

Our training program is committed to the recruitment of culturally and ethnically diverse interns. We encourage inquiries and applications from all qualified individuals.

Helpful resources

See where our interns and fellows are now

We work hard to improve pediatric mental health care in Colorado and throughout the United States, which is why training the next generation of children’s mental health specialists is so important to us. Students who’ve completed our fellowship, and our psychology internship and externships program, are now working across the country.