Programs

Doctor of Marriage and Family Therapy (DMFT)

Mission Statement

The SHSS Family Therapy Doctorate in Marriage and Family Therapy (DMFT) program is committed to academic and clinical innovation and excellence, preparing students to become leaders in therapy, consultation, and offering high quality clinical services to the community. Applying a systemic perspective to both our teaching and clinical supervision, we focus on the relational strengths and resources of both students and clients.

Goals of the DMFT program: 1) reflect the diversity of our community; 2) demonstrate integrity and ethical practice; and 3) collaborate in providing clinical service to the community.

Students of the DMFT program: 1) learn how to write and communicate at a professional level; 2) learn how to present their clinical work in professional settings; 3) learn how to teach, supervise, and consult; 4) demonstrate skills as competent marriage and family therapists; and 5) enter the community as leaders in their field.

Program Objectives of the DMFT program: 1) recruit faculty from diverse backgrounds; 2) recruit, enroll, and graduate students from diverse backgrounds; 3) provide close supervision of therapy to ensure competent and ethical practice; 4) collaborate with NSU clinical services and other community agencies in the provision of clinical services; and 5) reach out to local schools and other agencies to provide training for teachers and counselors and to enhance the well-being of students.

Students of our DMFT program: 1) pass all qualifying and comprehensive exams; 2) pass internal and external practicum assessments; 3) demonstrate competence in communicating professionally; 4) graduate and secure employment in the field; and 5) secure a position as a supervisor, consultant, or senior clinician.

Program Description
The DMFT is a practitioner oriented terminal degree. The primary emphasis of the DMFT degree program is different from the Ph.D. program in that it seeks specifically to produce professionals whose chief contributions will be in the clinical rather than academic sphere. Still, there is a great deal of overlap in the core curriculum between the two programs.

The DMFT is a 96-credit-hour program designed for individuals holding master's degrees that prepares graduates for careers as private practitioners, agency administrators, clinical supervisors, and senior clinicians. The DMFT program is different from the Ph.D. program in that its emphasis is on producing professionals who contribute foremost in the clinical, rather than academic, sphere of the discipline. The program is designed to expand and enhance a student’s existing clinical skills in order to make them top level practitioners, while at the same time demonstrating the place of program/clinical research in this pursuit.

To this end, the DMFT degree requires students to complete an Applied Clinical Project (APC) rather than a dissertation. The APC requires a student to conceive, propose, implement, and evaluate the effectiveness of a particular clinical program under the supervision of a faculty member. The program should be grounded in a systems based approach to family psychotherapy, but may include large educational and/or consultation components.

Also, the DMFT program is separate from the Ph.D. program in that it is not a Candidate for COAMFTE accreditation. As the DMFT program does not have a specific dissertation requirement, it is not eligible for consideration as a COAMFTE accredited program. This means that graduates of the DMFT program will have to apply for AAMFT Clinical membership using the standard track requirements of eligibility.

The Department of Family Therapy has full time faculty and supervisors that represent racial diversity as well as diversity in gender, age, and religion. Our part-time faculty and supervisors include cultural, gender, age, sexual orientation, and religious diversity. The student body of the masters and doctoral programs reflects the rich cultural diversity of South Florida as far as race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, and age.

The 96-credit-hour program integrates systemically oriented theory, clinical practice, qualitative, and quantitative research. The core curriculum includes:

In keeping with the interdisciplinary philosophy of the School, students have the opportunity to take electives in various specialties, such as Family Systems Health Care, peace studies, and conflict analysis & resolution. Additional courses may help students fulfill many of the course requirements for licensure in Florida (and other states) as a marriage and family therapist.

A student may choose to take more electives than are required. Elective courses at the doctoral level in the DCAR department may be taken with the permission of the program director. Other elective courses available to doctoral students within the Family Therapy department are Academic Writing, Teaching and/or Supervision practicum, Independent Study, and all of the courses in the Family Systems Health Care graduate certificate program. Other courses offered within the University may be considered for elective status pending approval from the program director.

During the program, students may also fulfill the academic requirements for becoming a Clinical Member and Approved Supervisor in the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. The program's supervision class is approved for meeting the supervision course requirement for all AAMFT Approved Supervisors.

Program Formats
The DMFT is offered on-campus. It takes a minimum of three years to complete the program. Full-time enrollment is considered to be at least nine credit hours per trimester, including the summer. Part-time enrollment is also an option at any time throughout the program; however, students must be enrolled full-time for at least one trimester of didactic coursework.

Degree Plan
Below is a sample degree plan for a full-time student who begins their studies in Fall trimester. Degree plans will be modified based on a student’s enrollment date and pace of study.

Table 1: Degree Plan: 45 credits hours
YeaR 1          
Fall (September) DMFT 5006 DMFT 5010 DMFT 5300 DMFT 6200 DMFT 5001
Winter (January) DMFT 5007 DMFT 5110 DMFT 5020 DMFT 6200 DMFT 5002
Summer (April) DMFT 6200 DMFT 7311 DMFT 7302 DMFT 5410

Preliminary Exam
YEAR 2          
Fall (September) DMFT 5030 DMFT 5120 DMFT 6200 DMFT 5003 Elective
Winter (January) DMFT 6430 DMFT 5040 DMFT 6300 DMFT 6530 Clinical Qualifying Exam
Summer (April) DMFT 6300 DMFT 6310 DMFT 7301 Elective

Course Comprehensive Examination
YEAR 3          
Fall (September) DMFT 6520 DMFT 6320 DMFT 7360 DMFT 6950 Elective
Winter (January) DMFT 5311 DMFT 6950 DMFT 7313 Elective  
Summer (April) DMFT 6950 Elective      
YEAR 4          
Fall (September) DMFT 6950       Graduation


Program Specifics


Prerequisites
Before entering the program, all students must document at least two three-credit-hour graduate level courses covering basic family therapy concepts, as well as one course on individual and group psychotherapy. Any student who has not had these courses or their equivalent must take, as leveling courses, the following courses in our master’s program:

Practicum
Details regarding practica and the department clinic Brief Therapy Institute (BTI) are available in the Policies and Procedures Manual of the Brief Therapy Institute, available from the BTI main office.

Student’s progress through the four practica is assessed each trimester in terms of a set of skills (described below) considered necessary for the successful practice of family therapy. These criteria are divided into three levels of increasing sophistication. A student’s demonstration of these skills is assessed on a five-point scale. A "5" on an item means a student consistently demonstrated the described behavior or skill. A "4" means a student often demonstrated the described behavior or skill. A 3 indicates that a student inconsistently demonstrated the described behavior or skill. A 2 means a student seldom demonstrated the described behavior or skill. A 1means a student never demonstrated the described behavior or skill. The practicum grade is determined in the following way:

A = no more than five 4s; nothing below 4
B = more than five 4s and/or up to two 3s; nothing below 3
C = more than two 3s and/or up to two 2s; nothing below 2
D = more than two 2s and/or up to two 1s
F = more than two 1s

Students in Practica I-IV enroll for 3 credit hours of practicum per trimester, and receive 1 hour of live supervision per week from a faculty member (working with a team). Students at level one must be able to consistently:

  1. Introduce themselves and the clinic (policies, procedures, videotaping, etc.) to clients in a warm and professional manner.
  2. Follow clinic policy (paperwork, follow-up, confidentiality, legal, and/or referral issues, etc.).
  3. Conduct themselves in a professional and effective manner (attendance, punctuality, presentation of self).
  4. Maintain an active caseload.
  5. Sensitively vary voice (tone, volume, rate, inflection) and non-verbal behavior (posture, gestures, facial expressions) to connect with clients.
  6. Empathically communicate an understanding of, and respect for, the experience of clients.
  7. Ask questions in a conversational and interactive (as opposed to interrogational) way.
  8. Avoid offering simplistic advice and personal opinions.
  9. Limit self-disclosure to occasions of therapeutic utility.
  10. Explore client stories with curiosity and demonstrate patience in developing possible interventions.
  11. Attend to larger-system issues and access appropriate resources for clients.
  12. Deliver supervisor/team communications with poise and sensitivity.
  13. Actively solicit and implement supervision as an opportunity for learning, regardless of model.
  14. Challenge their own premises and biases, and expand their awareness and appreciation of cultural, gender, spiritual, and sexual diversity.
  15. Actively participate in practicum, offering and requesting constructive feedback, when appropriate.
  16. Demonstrate an understanding of, and respect for, multiple perspectives (clients, team, supervisor).
  17. Conceptualize and describe client conundrums in systemic, non-pathologizing ways.

Students at Level two begin to work more independently. In addition to the above, these students (Practica III) must be able to consistently:

  1. Maintain caseload of at least one case outside the formal practicum experience.
  2. Seek and utilize supervision appropriately.
  3. Assume an active role in managing all team cases.
  4. Develop and utilize effective methods of peer supervision.
  5. Receive and utilize peer supervision.
  6. Negotiate team differences and conflicts in a way that builds and maintains team coherence and clinical effectiveness.
  7. Develop and maintain themes across sessions.
  8. Spontaneously generate relational questions and comments in the therapy room.
  9. Distinguish relevant information--in relation to model, client(s), goals, previous sessions, etc.--and organize the conversation accordingly.
  10. Weave supervisor/team communications into the conversation in a smooth manner.
  11. Contribute systemic ideas to team discussions.
  12. Appropriately generalize from supervision on a particular case to other analogous situations.
  13. Discuss and describe cases concisely within a systemic framework.
  14. Require less detailed direction from the supervisor.
  15. Identify what they wish to obtain from supervision.

Students in Practica IV must be able to integrate the skills necessary in levels one and two in a smooth and compelling manner. In addition, they must be able to consistently:

  1. Take calculated risks to expand their interpersonal repertoire (with humor, creativity, play, etc.).
  2. Handle unexpected and crisis situations with poise and skill.
  3. Describe cases and interact with clients using a variety of therapeutic models.
  4. Move toward a collegial relationship with supervisors.
  5. Articulate a coherent therapeutic orientation.
  6. Demonstrate their orientation in practice (in team discussions, invention of ideas and/or interventions, delivery of ideas, etc.).
  7. Develop and present at least one professional presentation in the community.

Students in Practica V and VI are expected to operate at the levels described above in real world settings outside of the University environment, and to be able to seamlessly integrate themselves into actual practice settings.

Client Contact Hours
In order to graduate, all students must document that they have a minimum of 1000 hours of appropriately supervised direct client contact hours. At least 500 of the 1000 required hours must be with couples and/or families present in the room.

Doctoral students who can document that their previous supervised clinical practice is comparable to that which would be received in an accredited program may petition the program to waive some or all of the required 1000 direct client contact hours. However, waiving all or part of this client contact hour requirement does not release a student from completing any of the practicum or internship requirements of the program. In order for a waiver request to be approved, the student must also provide a copy of their supervisor’s vitae or credentials. In order for their supervision to count, these credentials must indicate that the previous supervisor is an AAMFT Approved Supervisor, is a licensed MFT, received training in MFT supervision, is an AAMFT clinical member, or is recognized by a state regulatory body as being an equivalent MFT supervisor.

If a waiver request is approved, you still must document 100 in-the-room client contact hours with individuals, couples, and/or families during your time as a student in the program before beginning your clinical internship. At least half of these hours must be accrued at the Brief Therapy Institute and practicum hours may be included in the total. In order to count, all direct client contact hours must be supervised by AAMFT approved or state equivalent supervisors, who will sign and document that the hours submitted are accurate.

Documentation must include the date, type of session (i.e., family, couple, or individual), length, and location of each session. You must have access to case notes for all sessions listed. The necessary forms may be obtained from the program office. You must submit your completed forms to the program office at regular intervals (once per trimester) so that your file remains updated. Be sure to keep a copy for yourself.

Practicum Videotapes: Confidentiality and Other Considerations
Clients seen at BTI sign a Therapy Agreement that gives a student clinician permission to videotape sessions for educational purposes. BTI supplies you with the necessary tapes to record your sessions. Students may not use their own tapes for recording sessions, and all BTI tapes must remain on the premises to ensure confidentiality. Viewing rooms are available at BTI for you to watch tapes of your own work; you may not view another therapist's sessions without his or her prior approval. If you wish to show tapes in a class, or use them for your Clinical Qualifying Exam, you may sign them out for a specified amount of time. See the clinic director for details.

If you wish to write about a case seen at BTI and you need to transcribe interviews, you may sign the tape(s) out to do so, but any audio tapes dubbed for this purpose must be subsequently erased, and identifying information about the clients must not appear on written records of the sessions.

If you wish to show a tape to a professional audience outside of NSU, you must re-contact the family members seen on the tape, explain to them what you intend to do, and get a release signed by them in advance of your presentation.

Tapes will be supplied as the need arises. All tapes assigned to you during your time at BTI must be turned in to the clinic director at the end of your fourth practicum, whereupon they will be erased.

A technical note: If you intend to use your tapes as part of a research project and/or a professional presentation (such as your Clinical Qualifying Exam), it is essential that you record your sessions on the fastest speed possible (2 hours for a standard VHS tape). The audio and video quality of tapes recorded on slow (4 hour) or super slow (8 hour) speeds is not adequate for the purposes of research and presentations. FTA will supply the necessary tapes and provide storage for them for the duration of such projects.

Examinations and Evaluations


There are two levels of formal assessment a student must pass in order to complete their studies. The first is the preliminary examination, and the second is a series of qualifying examinations. Each is described in detail below.



I. Preliminary Exam
Admission into the program is provisional until a student passes the Preliminary Examination. Students register for preliminary examination during their third trimester in the program. There is no charge for enrollment. The preliminary exam entails a formal assessment by the faculty of a student’s progress in the program. Some of the data for it may include grades, practicum, and writing evaluations from the first two trimesters (supplied to the faculty by the staff), and a three- to five-page (double-spaced) self-evaluation submitted by the student at least one week in advance of the preliminary examination meeting.

The self-evaluation should provide an in-depth accounting of your accomplishments as well as any difficulties in the clinical and academic areas of the program. Is should also include a clear indication of your plans and aspirations for the next year. It must be typewritten and should be free of errors. In addition, the faculty will consider all of the student evaluation criteria described in the catalog.

The meeting, lasting approximately ½ hour, and will be attended by the student and a committee of faculty representatives. Successes and challenges will be discussed. Following the meeting, the committee will make one of the following recommendations to the full family therapy department faculty:

  1. Pass review, effective immediately.
  2. Pass review, with faculty recommendations for changes.
  3. Please Note: In order to obtain one of these recommendations, all your grades must be B or higher, with no grades of incomplete. Courses with a grade C may have to be retaken, pending the recommendation of the committee.
  4. Repeat Preliminary Review, with continued enrollment contingent on the student satisfying one or more specified criteria in the course of a specified amount of time.
  5. Dismissal from doctoral program.

The family therapy faculty votes to accept, question, or reject each committee's recommendations. If the faculty accepts the committee recommendation, the student will receive a letter informing them of the faculty’s determination. If the faculty accepts a committee recommendation for dismissal, it becomes effective immediately. Tuition and registration fees for the trimester in which you were presently enrolled would, in such a case, be fully refunded.

If the faculty votes to question a committee recommendation, the student will receive a letter explaining this, asking them to attend a meeting with the director and the faculty as a whole. During this second meeting, the student’s situation will be discussed and the student will have an opportunity to present their case. Subsequent to this second meeting, the faculty will come to a decision regarding the student’s status in the program, and the student will be informed of it by mail.

Students have the right to appeal any such faculty decisions. See the section in the catalog on Student Appeals for procedural information.

II. Qualifying Exams
There are three components to the Qualifying Examination Process.

  1. Clinical Qualifying Exam
  2. Course Comprehensive Exam
  3. Applied Clinical Project

Each qualifying examination is intended to address major training and academic goals of the program. Successful completion of each of these exams indicates that the student has demonstrated the skill and readiness necessary to successfully complete increasingly sophisticated projects that require professional levels of thought and motivation. Thus, the exams are intended to assess a student’s overall level of professional development and independence in terms of actual clinical skills, conceptual/theoretical sophistication, and program evaluation expertise. The three exams are described in detail below.

1. Clinical Qualifying Exam
During the Winter trimester of a student’s second year in the program, a student is required to deliver a formal presentation of their clinical work to a committee of family therapy faculty members. This Clinical Qualifying Exam should not exceed 90 minutes (including time for questions), It is intended to provide an opportunity to demonstrate clinical competence and creativity, theoretical clarity, and clear integration of clinical and theoretical concepts, and should be viewed as the culmination of the live supervised practica sequence.

The Clinical Qualifying Exam offers student’ a forum for developing a professional clinical presentation similar to that which might be expected in a job interview situation. Successful completion of this exam indicates the faculty’s belief that the student is clinically prepared to perform successfully in real life situations and outside clinical settings. It is expected that a student will conduct themselves in a professional and collegial manner, in the preparation of both their written and oral materials. Care should be taken regarding appropriate dress, professional demeanor, clarity of presentation, and respect for clients and colleagues.

An edited videotape of the student’s work must be included in the presentation. This means that specific, brief segments of tape must be selected and edited onto a master tape to create a polished, succinct overview of a case. This tape may be produced at no charge through the Media Center on the main campus; alternatively, students may simply use two VCRs or a camcorder and VCR to edit their own tapes. The videotape should be of high quality, both technically and clinically. In any professional setting poor audio or video will detract significantly from the presentation, and thus it is also the case for the evaluation. The video is to be used in a focused way to demonstrate your clinical skills and to allow the audience to understand the progression of a case from beginning to end. The presentation should clearly show how your clinical work is consistent with the stated theoretical approach and understanding the theory of change. While it is not necessary that all of the video segments are examples of clinical “magic moments,” your clinical effectiveness and theoretical understanding should be apparent throughout.

The case may be selected from a student’s work at BTI or at an off-campus setting, but is limited to work completed during your time as a supervised student in the doctoral program. If an off-campus based case is selected, you must secure the appropriate releases in order to use the session tapes for educational and training purposes. Practicum cases may be used; however, you must first consult with the practicum instructor who supervised the case. In such cases it is important you to focus on your own clinical work rather than on a supervisor’s work. Clearly, the work of the entire team will be represented, and as such, you should acknowledge this during the presentation. However, video segments should focus on your work in the room.

We also encourage inclusion of client voices in the presentation; this could take the form of follow-up interviews (videotaped if possible), letter writing, or video segments of the clients’ active participation in co-directing the therapy. Thus, we do not expect you to simply show evidence of your own interventions or “expertise.” We hope, rather, that the presentations will demonstrate your ability to work relationally and involve clients in the process of therapy. In this spirit, if you use practicum cases, we encourage you to consult with, and perhaps interview, colleagues who served on the team during the case, as they may have invaluable input in the development of the presentation.

Students may request feedback from faculty on ideas for your presentation, and students may certainly discuss with the faculty cases they are considering for the Clinical Exam. However, faculty members may not assist students with any aspect of preparing the video or scripting the presentation. Students will provide a concise, clear, and referenced handout (to be given to all audience members) that briefly describes the case to be presented, the focus of each of the video segments, and the clinical and theoretical influences on the work. The rationale guiding the clinical work should be included, allowing audience members to follow the presentation clearly. All identifying material about clients should be disguised, and transcript materials distributed at the exam should be re-collected by the presenter when finished.

Because we view this as an opportunity for you to demonstrate growth and development as a clinician within this program’s community, the presentation will be open to all NSU family therapy faculty and doctoral students. All doctoral students are encouraged to attend in order to both show their support and to contribute to the professional conversations that will result. Given the clinical (and thus confidential) nature of the presentation, you may not invite family members or friends outside the program.

Students will present for a maximum of one hour. Videotaped segments should contribute no more than 20 minutes of this time, and should be selected carefully to represent specific points. Lengthy, content-based segments should not be shown. The presentation should focus on the progression of the case and the clinical work itself rather than on ancillary details about the family. After one hour, a member of the faculty committee will moderate a 30-minute question and answer session. At the end of this discussion, you and all audience members will be dismissed. The faculty will each complete an evaluation of your performance, including numerical ratings on specific criteria and narrative comments (see below). The program director will inform you of the results of the Exam within 48 hours. The Clinical and the Course Comprehensive Exams must be successfully passed in order for a student to officially begin their Applied Clinical Project.

To pass the Clinical Qualifying Exam, students must receive an average grade of 4 or higher (on a five-point scale) on at least 6 of the criteria listed below. If a student receives an average score of less than a 4 on any of the criteria, the faculty may recommend they complete remedial work. If a student receives an average score of less than 4 on four or more of the criteria, less than 3 on three or more criteria, or a 1 on any criteria, they will be required to deliver a second presentation within 6 months. If a student does not satisfactorily pass a second Clinical Qualifying Exam, they will not be allowed to continue in the program.

Criteria for Evaluation of the Clinical Qualifying Exam

  1. Clear and concise presentation
  2. Well-edited, high quality video (including audio)
  3. Clear demonstration of clinical skills (joining; strong and effective relationship with client; respect for and use of client resources, both in and out of therapy room; good case management, where applicable)
  4. Clear demonstration of theoretical clarity (evidence of how clinical skills are informed by theoretical perspective)
  5. Continuity between video and oral presentation (clear contextualizing of video segments; coherent follow-up discussion of each segment)
  6. Evidence of attention to ethical issues (as applicable)
  7. Professional demeanor (dress; language; respect for audience and clients; effective handling of questions)
  8. Useful and clear accompanying written material

2. Course Comprehensive Examination
The Course Comprehensive Exam will be administered on the first Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of July. It is a 3 day examination, which assesses the student’s integrative skills with regard to the 9 core doctoral curriculum courses. The exam covers the four core family therapy courses, (DMFT 5010, 5020,5030, & 5040) Quantitative Research I (DMFT 5410), Qualitative Research I (DMFT 6430), two theory courses, Language Systems (DMFT 5110) and Thinking Systems (DMFT 5120), and Teaching and Supervision (DMFT 6310). On day one, students will answer 4 of 5 questions from the above courses in a 5-hour period. On day two, students will answer 3 of 4 questions from courses not covered on day one in a 4-hour period. On the third day of the exam, students will be asked to critically evaluate a journal article utilizing information from their course work. Each answer will receive a grade of either 3 (excellent), 2 (adequate) or 1 (inadequate). A student may receive one grade of “1” and pass the examination. If a student receives 2-4 answers of “1”, they must undergo an oral examination based on the questions they received the “1” grade on. This oral examination will be scheduled through the office of the program director no sooner that 6 months, and no later than 1 year after the exam is taken. If a student fails to receive “adequate” scores on their oral exam, they must take the full written exam the next time it is offered in July. If a student receives more than four “1” scores, or if they fail to schedule their oral examination before May 1 of the following year, they must take the full written examination when it is given the next July. If a student fails the Course Comprehensive Examination twice, they will not be allowed to continue in the program.

3. Applied Clinical Project (ACP)
The Applied Clinical Project (ACP) should be seen as the capstone experience of the DMFT degree process. The ACP is the student’s demonstration of their ability to carry out a high quality, professional program of systemically based treatment. The ACP should be a project the student carries out under SHSS faculty supervision from concept, to proposal, to implementation, and finally through eventual evaluation of the effectiveness of the program. An ACP is viewed as a career launching undertaking. At the time of its culmination, the student should be able to articulate and demonstrate to other mental health professionals their unique area of systems based practice expertise. The student is allowed to select a faculty supervisor and one other faculty reviewer of their ACP only after they have completed the majority of their course work and have successfully passed both their Clinical and Course Comprehensive Examinations. All proposals, data collection, and analysis toward the completion of the ACP must be done so under the supervision of a full time faculty member. At the end of the ACP, the student will present a professional quality presentation and review of the entire project to a faculty committee and the public. The faculty committee will consist of their project supervisor, one other faculty reviewer, and any other terminally degreed professionals that the student wishes to invite. However, only full time faculty of SHSS will have the final say on the acceptability of the final product and its final presentation.

The Supervision and Teaching Course and Practica
Before taking Supervision and Teaching (DMFT 6310), a student must have successfully passed Clinical Practicum II (DMFT 6220). Students must obtain faculty approval for taking either Supervision Practicum (DMFT 6320) or Teaching Practicum (DMFT 7360). Typically, these practica will entail your assisting a faculty member in teaching or supervising a master's level course, though in some instances, helping with doctoral courses is possible.

To obtain permission to take either supervision or teaching practicum, the student should seek out the faculty member they wish to work with, and specify what capacity they would like to work with them. If the faculty member agrees to work with the student, the student should then write a brief note or email to the program director, detailing what they plan to do during the trimester and with whom. Such notice should be given well in advance of that trimester’s registration period.