Abstract:

The online graduate program in clinical mental health counseling has two required ground residencies as part of its online program: Group Counseling and Microskills Counseling. Both courses require students to demonstrate competency in their respective areas of clinical training, which we believed could only be accomplished in-person at the University's home campus in Buffalo, NY. The residencies consisted of a three-day teaching weekend, which included student demonstrations of clinical competencies.

Challenge:
Like thousands of other programs worldwide, the COVID pandemic required the program to rethink the delivery of these two residencies. Program faculty considered a variety of approaches to deliver the residencies virtually, but needed to ensure the same level of assessment could be completed by both students and faculty. This was tough given the purpose of the residencies was to actually see students in action demonstrating their skills during mock counseling sessions. Faculty were concerned some of the counseling components would get missed due to being on camera and not in an actual counseling environment, thereby compromising the integrity of the competency assessment process.

How We Addressed the Residency Challenge:
Group Counseling: The faculty accepted that the world was likely moving towards a virtual reality for telehealth for individual and group counseling, so they took advantage of the opportunity to redesigned the group counseling course to accommodate the shift in the profession. The course required a three-day, in-person residency, which required students to facilitate three different groups that demonstrated their competencies as group facilitators. Faculty were able to convert one of the group facilitations to an online group format, thereby allowing students to learn this new format driven into play by the pandemic. This resulted in a one-day decrease in the residency requirement from three days to two days, which students reported not only helped them to stay safer during the pandemic, but to actually feel prepared for a profession that was changing right in front of them and moving more towards telehealth.

Microskills Counseling:
Faculty rethought how to best deliver and assess competencies that also aligned with best practices for ensuring student skill development. Reflecting on the core learning objectives for the course, faculty realized these objectives could be met virtually if they were mindful of their process. By setting standards for properly utilizing online tools such as cameras, lighting, audio, breakout rooms, group feedback, and the chat box, faculty were able to set up mock counseling sessions that allowed the students to clearly demonstrate their microskills. Students reported by having the ability to both engage in their individual mock sessions and participate closely in the feedback process for all student sessions, they took away a deeper understanding of counseling and how to navigate microskills in counseling sessions. Many reported having had the opportunity to see the multitude of counseling styles and how microskills were used in a number of different ways helped them to feel competent and confident conducting virtual telehealth sessions, which they believed were harder to conduct than those in person. They greatly valued the redesign of the course and the opportunity to expand their skill set in the newly changing profession.

Keywords:

Remote residency, online residency course, pandemic-driven changes.