We are rolling into the 2010/2011 year and some fresh material is required for the Alumni page. In thinking about an organizing theme for my comments, I thought it might be interesting to consider what might strike someone returning to the campus as different. How has the department changed?

Well, Corwin-Larimore, our main building, looks pretty much the same. However, adjacent to the Psychology building is the new Northern Plains Center for Behavioral Research. This new facility serves the sole purpose of facilitating behavioral research and resulted from a collaborative effort involving faculty from Nursing and Psychology. Grant-funded faculty members and some working to generate external funding have labs in this facility. As a graduate student, this might now be where you would run your studies. As an undergrad, this might be where you would report to participate in research for extra credit. 
               

The pure size of the program might be different from what you remember. Just the number of students taking Psychology courses has grown considerably in recent years. In 2009/2010, the department generated over 20,700 credit hours. Recently, I had to write a follow-up to a review of the undergraduate program completed in 2006/2007 and I noted that the number of credit hours generated at that time was just less than 18,000. How might you notice this change? Well, you might notice that it can be challenging to get into many Psychology classes. Our classes are large and at capacity. While it is obviously frustrating when classes are full, large numbers mean tuition dollars and we frequently make the case that Psychology has done far more than its share in maintaining, growing and meeting the academic needs of the student population of the university.

As a student, you might even be taking a UND psychology class while remaining in your dorm room or perhaps without even coming to Grand Forks. Technology has brought drastic changes in distance education and Psychology has been a campus leader in pushing the limits of online education. You could now complete all Psychology courses for an undergraduate major online. The department also has an online graduate program in Forensic Psychology. The graduate program mainly serves the educational needs of those already working in careers and has reached what we feel is capacity. The online undergraduate major is a little newer and is presently ramping up. Often the undergrad program serves the needs of students who left the university before they were able to complete a degree or perhaps now have an interest in adding coursework in Psychology to their original area of emphasis. How higher education is accomplished is clearly changing and the interest in alternative experiences is obviously there even among students who are on campus. This has to be an opportunity for institutions in North Dakota as we compete for the student numbers necessary to maintain quality institutions. 
                 
Students participating in the Graduate Forensic Summer Capstone Experience

Of course, there are always changes in the faculty. Our two additions this year include, Drs. Andre Kehn and Dr. JP Legerski. Dr. Kehn brings a background in forensic psychology to the program and Dr. Legerski offers a specialization in child clinical. I will try to offer a more detailed profile on new faculty members in a future post.

So, change is a constant and we are lucky to be part of may new developments at UND.

Mark Grabe

Re-accreditation of Clinical Program

The accreditation of the Ph.D. program in clinical psychology at the University of North Dakota has been extended until 2017 by the American Psychological Association at their annual July meeting. This reaccreditation period represents the maximum time permitted by the APA for clinical training programs and indicates that this UND Ph.D. program continues to provide quality education in the field of clinical psychology. Dr. Alan King, director of clinical psychology training at UND, indicated that the program maintains roughly 40 students in doctoral training at any point in time with a program faculty of eight clinical psychology members. The UND Ph.D. program in clinical psychology has been fully accredited since 1969 and represents one of older accredited scientist-practitioner training programs in the nation today. The program receives over 100 applications each year from prospective students around the nation with only 7 students selected for enrollment. Over the accreditation review period the student body was comprised of students from over twenty states with about half from this region. A large percentage of these clinical psychology graduates decide to remain and practice in North Dakota as licensed psychologists.

About 25% of the clinical psychology program is comprised of American Indian graduate students which makes UND the national leader in training emerging American Indian license-eligible clinical psychologists. The graduation rate among American Indian scientist-practitioner clinical psychology Ph.D. students at UND approximates that of all other similar national training programs combined. Dr. Doug McDonald is the long-term grant recipient of federal money earmarked specifically to assist UND in this American Indian recruitment and training effort with almost all of those graduates entering professional practice upon graduation in underserved reservation-based settings.

The doctoral clinical program and Department of Psychology were visited by a team of three APA site visitors on March 22nd and 23rd of this year. The quality of the program's students, faculty, supervisors, administrators, research scholarship, training clinic, regional practicum placements, student and faculty morale, financial support, and other aspects of program functioning were evaluated closely during the two day visit. The site visit culminated in a favorable report, and a final decision was made in July by the Commission on Accreditation to reaccredit the program without the need for another site visit until 2017. This decision represented the best possible outcome for the UND Ph.D. program in clinical psychology.

Alan King

Clinical Psychology Ph.D. Program Remains Active

Alumni from the clinical psychology Ph.D. program can keep up with the aggregate achievements of the current students and faculty by checking out the outcome statistics that we post on an annual basis. The faculty membership is also shown under an individual icon. Each year we also honor a distinguished graduate of the department with a listing of past recipients provided under the Northern Lights Conference icon. Every five to seven years we conduct alumni surveys for our routine self-study which is prepared in anticipation of site visits. Alumns from the clinical Ph.D. program should feel free to contact Dr. King (Director of Clinical Psychology Training) if interested in seeing more extensive outcome data (alumni survey results, annual student body survey results, student publication lists, EPPP results, internship matches, Graduate Student Handbook, etc.) regarding the alumni survey or our other indices of program progress at: alan.king@und.nodak.edu. We are proud of the annual achievements and continued accreditation of our clinical psychology Ph.D. training program.

2011 Northern Lights Conference

Saturday October 14 marked the occasion of the Northern Lights Psychology conference sponsored each year by the UND Psychology Department. The conference offers UND students and faculty and others from regional colleges and universities an opportunity to present their work. This year's conference exposed participants to 10 presentations, 27 posters, and a panel discussion focused on the role of academic psychology in responding to public needs. 

The conference has a history of featuring some of the most prominent psychologists as keynote speakers. This year's presentation was from Dr. Patricia Greenfield, UCLA distinguished professor of Developmental Psychology. Dr. Greenfield studies the connections between cultural and developmental change. What happens as culture changes? Included in her model of cultural change is a focus on the role of media - television, video games, social media. She made special mention of the possibility that cultural changes are not always in the same direction and she proposed several possible consequences of a general economic down turn. As was the proposed case with her general model, changes are both positive and negative.

Dr. Miller Honored at Founders Day Celebration

The University of North Dakota Founders Day celebration and awards banquet was held on Feb. 24th. Dr. Joseph Miller received a UND Spirit award recognizing his service to the clinical program and to the community as Director of the Psychological Services Center. In this picture taken at the celebration, Dr. Miller (right) appears with Dr. King (left) the long serving Director of Clinical Training.