Yale Doctoral Internship in Clinical & Community Psychology
Program Overview
The Psychology Section within the Yale Department of Psychiatry offers one of the nation’s premier internships in clinical and community psychology, developing the next generation of leaders in this field. Over 15 students are accepted annually to this program, which has been accredited by the American Psychological Association since 1970.
Interns in this program are referred to as "psychology fellows." The internship begins on July 1 and concludes on June 30 of each academic year.
The Yale Experience will change you professionally — and personally.
Interns in this program train in one of the world’s most vibrant academic medical centers where the emphasis is on state of the art clinical care, professional education, and research. The interns have access to an enormous range of medical school and university resources.
The training program has three overarching goals:
Goal 1: Provide a doctoral internship of exceptional quality that combines intensive and diverse professional experiences, supervision and mentoring from a skilled faculty, highly interactive seminars, and opportunities for scholarship.
Goal 2: Foster the development among fellows of an intermediate level of competency in the program’s core competencies.
Goal 3: Promote the career development of fellows, facilitating an informed choice about their next steps professionally.
The philosophy of this Doctoral Internship in Clinical & Community Psychology is built on six core elements: a scientist-practitioner model of training; evidence-based teaching approaches; diversity; a nurturing community; professional development; and continuous quality improvement.
Internship training occurs within the Connecticut Mental Health Center and Yale-New Haven Hospital. Doctoral fellows are based in one of these organizations and select from among 11 different placements.
All doctoral fellows meet together weekly for a 2½ hour Core Seminar that covers a diverse range of topics taught by the best educators within the university community. This is complemented by seminars within the placement sites that emphasize knowledge and skills necessary to work with the populations served and clinical and consultative approaches used within the site.
Yale faculty members are leaders within the fields of mental health and addictions, and within the discipline of psychology. There are over 200 psychologists on the faculty of the Yale Department of Psychiatry. Many of these serve within the internship program as advisors, supervisors, seminar, leaders, and lecturers.
The stipend for the 2019-2020 internship year will be $32,781. Fellows receive fully paid healthcare coverage through Yale Health for themselves, spouses, same-sex partners joined through civil union, and children.
Applicants to the doctoral training program must be enrolled in an APA or CPA accredited doctoral training program in clinical, counseling, or community psychology. The program participates in the APPIC match. Candidates complete the APPIC Application for Psychology Internships (AAPI), a standardized application for use by students who are applying to internship programs.
Questions related to the program’s accreditation status should be directed to the Office of Program Consultation and Accreditation, American Psychological Association, 750 1st Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002. Phone: (202) 336-5979; E-mail: apaaccred@apa.org.
Program Leadership
Amber Childs, PhD, Director
Rajita Sinha, PhD, Co-Director
Download the Psychology Section Executive Training Committee flyer to meet members of our leadership training team.
Doctoral Internship Flyer
Download the Doctoral Internship flyer for an overview of our program.
Key Dates
Application deadline:
Nov 1
Notification of status:
Dec 4
Visit days:
Jan 6, 10, & 13
Admissions, Support & Initial Placement Data
Self Care
Taking care of your mental and physical health is crucial to your success in the training program. Access a website on self care developed by Yale psychology fellows.
