Master's-level candidates now number 129 in twenty-six of twenty-nine institutes and four new training facilities (13 percent of candidates). There are twenty-nine master's-level graduates. In the fall of 2000, COPAP sent questionnaires to the chairs of admissions, progression, and education committees of all institutes and new training facilities of the American. COPAP also sent questionnaires to all master's-level candidates and graduates.
The aim of these questionnaires was to discern variations in selection, prematriculation, analytic training, practice, and faculty participation, as well as in acceptance into analytic communities of these candidates and graduates. Three-fourths of institutes responded. Three-fifths of master's-level graduates, but only one-fourth of master's-level candidates, responded.
Only two institutes of the American do not currently accept applications from master's-level mental health professionals. The remainder accepts applications from all types of mental health professionals, although 80 percent of master's-level applicants are social workers. The admissions process does not differ between masters-level and doctoral-level applicants, and there are no special pretraining requirements or prematriculation courses for these applicants. In 85 percent of institutes, the master's-level candidate educational program does not differ in any way.
Eighty to 90 percent of institutes note that master's-level candidates have no difference in progression, have adapted well to their group of candidates, and demonstrated no difference in their level of seminar participation or their participation in supervision compared to doctoral-level candidates. Seventy-five percent of institutes reported that their faculty showed no difference in attitude toward master's-level candidates from that shown to candidates with other degrees.
By the time of graduation there was no difference between the faculty's attitude toward these candidates and that toward other candidates, and the master's-level candidates had been well accepted into the analytic community. All had progressed on their faculties.
More than 85 percent of master's-level candidates are women. Gradually, greater numbers of non–social workers are being accepted, but currently 65 percent of candidates are in social work. Two-thirds of candidates and all graduates had participated in an organized psychotherapy training program prior to matriculation. Eighty-five to 90 percent noted that they had no special prematriculation program. Ninety percent felt they were adequately or well prepared for analytic training. No candidate or graduate had a psychoanalytic training program devised by his or her institute that was in any way different from his or her fellow candidates. One-fourth of graduates had been certified, similar to the number for all graduates.
The majority of master's-level candidates/graduates mentioned curriculum and/or supervision as the strengths of their psychoanalytic education. If deficits were mentioned, the quality of teaching was most often noted. Only 10 percent reported tension about their different educational credentials within their group of candidates. Fewer candidates than graduates experienced differences in the attitude of faculty toward them, indicating that faculty attitude is improving toward master's-level trainees.
Two-thirds of candidates and graduates felt well accepted into the analytic community. Their participation in analytic training improved their practice referrals; graduates had a mean of 4.6 analytic patients in their practice! Ninety percent of graduates are teaching on the faculty of an APsaA institute. They felt they were not treated differently as teachers compared to their doctorate-degreed peers. One-half felt they had progressed on their faculty; the rest felt it was too soon to know.
More than three-fourths of master's-level candidates and graduates reported that their institutes conveyed interest and were very supportive during the waiver process. Three-fourths of institutes favored the continuation of the role of COPAP in the waiver process; one-fourth definitely desire autonomy from the American.
Mary L. Scharold, M.D., chairs the Committee on Preparedness and Progress. She is a training and supervising analyst at the Houston-Calveston Psychoanalytic Institute.