Intermediate Systemic Practice with Families and Couples PgCert

About the course

This course is designed to help nurses, social workers, teachers, counsellors and other health professionals develop their knowledge and increase the effectiveness of their work with families, couples and individuals.

It is built on the theoretical and practice frameworks established in the foundation year, and is both an intermediate year of training for systemic psychotherapy and end-stage training for the systemic practitioner.

This course is delivered in partnership with the Institute of Family Therapy in London.

Why choose this course?

This course equips participants with a systemic approach to working with individuals, couples and families at intermediate level. About one third of our students finish at this level and add the skills to their professional practice, as a systemic practitioner. About two thirds of our students continue to the MSc in Systemic Psychotherapy.

The inclusion of a wide range of systemic approaches has been considered an important characteristic of our courses across the two courses and the four years of the training. It is part of the philosophy of the course to encourage a critical approach to theory and practice in the light of inequalities and differences of race, class and gender, and to encourage an anti-oppressive approach to working with clients. Developing self-reflexivity, the awareness and utilisation of the person of the practitioner in action, is also a core aspect of the course.

How will I be assessed?

The course employs a range of assessment strategies, all of which include a theory and a practice element. For practical reasons the assignments are split between the theory and skill units. Although the assignments are allocated to separate units, they each contain a theory and an application of theory element. In addition you are expected to develop self-reflexivity and this is also included in each assessment. Each assignment gives you the opportunity to show your ability to express systemic theory and describe your systemic practice in writing to a post graduate academic standard.

Applicants should have a good undergraduate degree at Honours level, or equivalent. Applicants must have successfully completed the foundation year in systemic practice at the University of Bedfordshire or its equivalent at another university. An RPEL route is available for students with substantial prior experiential learning. Applicants would usually have a relevant previous professional qualification such as psychology, social work, medicine, nursing or education. This is an AFT requirement for applicants progressing to years three and four, the systemic psychotherapy qualifying years. As this is a practice based course applicants must currently be working with families or couples in a professional context.