Pre-Licensed Clinicians Committee

The Pre-Licensed Clinicians (PLC) Committee maintains its commitment to creating opportunities for community building and professional development for Pre-licensed clinicians interested in psychoanalytic theory. Student membership continues to increase within the organization, and committee events draw both new and established Pre-licensed members. In its focus to aid the burgeoning clinician in becoming an established licensed professional, NCSPP and the PLC create offerings that allow for greater community building, deepen analytic understanding, and support the evolution of a clinical voice.

With this mission in mind the PLC committee hosted a variety of events this past year. Our twice-yearly Salons invite a senior clinician to engage in an interview with an audience of training clinicians. The most recent Salons featured past NCSPP President Drew Tillotson and psychologist Vivian Dent. Both clinicians explored with the audience their own journeys into becoming established clinicians. Dr. Tillotson spoke about how he moved from a life in the theatre into becoming a psychoanalyst. Dr. Dent focused on her exploration of somatic therapies and EMDR within a psychoanalytic umbrella, aiding the audience in expanding their ideas of what is possible within our field. For our twice-yearly Movie Nights, where we show a film and discuss it from a psychoanalytic perspective, we screened an apocalyptic themed movie titled Last Night. Led by Jed Sekoff, we explored the themes and anxieties brought up when one realizes they have only six hours left to live. In the spring, Neil Talkoff led us through the screening of the independent sleeper hit, Lars and the Real Girl, a beautifully crafted film about mental illness and the power of community.

To increase opportunities for Pre-licensed clinicians, we changed our yearly Outreach events to the graduate schools into a case presentation format. In participation with PINC, four students from Alliant International University, the Calif