Peak Pre-Doctoral Internship

Program Structure

The Peak Behavioral Health Doctoral Psychology Internship Program is a full-time, 12-month doctoral internship designed to prepare emerging psychologists for entry into independent practice as health service psychologists. Interns complete a minimum of 2,000 supervised hours over the course of twelve months and generally participate in internship activities approximately 40 hours per week.

Generalist Training With Opportunities for Specialization

The internship follows a generalist model with opportunities for specialization. All interns receive broad exposure to the core competencies expected of entry-level psychologists while pursuing advanced experiences within selected specialty rotations.

Primary & Secondary Rotations

Each intern completes a longitudinal Primary Rotation and Secondary Rotation.

Primary Rotation
Approximately 3 days per week and represents the intern's major area of clinical concentration.

Secondary Rotation
Approximately 2 days per week and is designed to broaden the intern's experience and support generalist development.

Rotation assignments are established at the beginning of the year through the Individualized Learning Plan and may be modified to ensure adequate breadth, competency development, supervisor availability, and completion of program requirements.

Typical Weekly Allocation

Direct Client Service
15–24 hours

Documentation, Scoring, Interpretation & Report Writing
7–10 hours

Individual Supervision
2 hours

Group Supervision
1 hour

Didactic Seminar
2 hours

Consultation & Interdisciplinary Meetings
1–3 hours

Research, Professional Development & Administrative Training Activities
1–3 hours

The weekly distribution serves as a guideline rather than a productivity quota. Assessment-heavy weeks may include fewer face-to-face hours and more scoring, integration, and report writing, while therapy-heavy weeks may include more direct service.

Clinical Training

Throughout the internship year, interns develop competency through:

Psychological Assessment
Comprehensive psychological and neurodevelopmental evaluation, including diagnostic interviewing, behavioral observation, cognitive assessment, academic testing, adaptive functioning, autism evaluations, personality assessment, executive functioning, developmental assessment, and integrated report writing.

Intervention
Evidence-based psychological intervention with children, adolescents, adults, and families, including individual psychotherapy, parent coaching, behavioral interventions, family consultation, and interdisciplinary treatment planning.

Consultation & Interdisciplinary Collaboration
Consultation with families, schools, medical providers, community agencies, and professionals from multiple disciplines, including psychologists, physicians, speech-language pathologists, occupational therapists, Board Certified Behavior Analysts, counselors, social workers, educators, and community providers.

Supervision
A minimum of two hours of individual supervision each week, along with group supervision and ongoing consultation. Supervision is collaborative, respectful, and developmental.

Didactic Training & Professional Development
Structured educational activities including seminars, case conferences, journal review, workshops, professional presentations, scholarly activity, and ongoing professional development.

Clinical Population
Peak Behavioral Health serves individuals across the lifespan, with a primary emphasis on children, adolescents, and families. Interns gain experience working with individuals representing diverse cultural, linguistic, socioeconomic, developmental, and medical backgrounds.

Neurodevelopmental & Learning

• Autism Spectrum Disorder

• ADHD

• Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities

• Learning Disorders

• Executive Functioning Difficulties

Emotional & Behavioral

• Anxiety Disorders

• OCD

• Trauma-Related Disorders

• Mood Disorders

• Behavioral Disorders

• Emotional Dysregulation

Family & Diagnostic

• Parent-Child Relationship Concerns

• Personality Assessment

• Diagnostic Clarification