Being an Internship Supervisor: Director Duties That I Wish I Didn't Have to Do

In the National Roster Internship world, there are two roles - that of internship supervisor and internship director. In many programs, such as my own, there is only one music therapist, so that person is responsible for both roles. The first role, that of supervisor, is mostly concerned with the teaching and mentoring part of the internship. The second role, internship director, takes care of the administrative parts of the internship - the communication, the acceptances and rejections, the day-to-day monitoring of the entire program.

Today's post is about some of the things that I don't enjoy about being an internship director.

  • I hate making decisions when there are more than one applicants for an internship position.
  • Waiting for the annual report to come from AMTA so I am sure that I have finished all of my duties as a National Roster ID.
  • Waiting for competency-based internship agreements to come from different university programs - I hate to be a nag, but there is one program in particular that does NOT ever send me these, and the people there know better - they just don't bother to communicate. It is frustrating.
That's about it. The job of National Roster Internship Director is really pretty easy once the application part is finished. Internship supervisors have the bulk of the responsibilities to the interns in each program - they are the people who oversee the day-to-day interactions of the music therapy clinic. Since I have two jobs in my internship, it is difficult to separate my roles. 

I wonder how people do things when there is more than one music therapist in the internship program. I had one job where there were three of us who were board certified, but I wasn't a supervisor at that point. I just shared an office with an intern. That was as close as I got to being a supervisor before I started my own program in a different facility several years later.

Of all the duties that I have as an internship director, the best are the ones where I am working with my interns. The worst is telling someone that I do not think they are a good fit for my clients or for me. I have learned to go with my instincts though.

I am off to do some of those administrative duties this morning before my four groups and four individuals scheduled for today. My principal informed us that we have an all-school assembly on Wednesday - streamed, so we will see if it works the way it is supposed to - if you are interested, check out Mr. Stinky Feet AKA Jim Cosgrove. (I am a bit skeptical that the electronics will actually work out the way that they are supposed to for a Facebook live stream, but that is my natural pessimism coming out...) This is something that we haven't tried before which could be wonderful but I'm not sure that the wi-fi will support the stream. I hope that it goes smoothly. This will be the second music-based assembly within two weeks that I have not been part of planning. Interesting... I'll have to think about why that is happening. Meanwhile, I am waiting on that same principal to approve my desired date for the talent show in May so I can start getting kids to sign up their acts. This will be the first talent show in three years. I finally feel ready, even though we are back to masking when we are around clients again due to COVID action in the facility's county. I am one of the only people in the school who is actively masking, but I don't want to get COVID again - too many risk factors to feel comfortable with displaying my naked face. There you go.

I hope that you have a pretty decent Monday.

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