Being an Internship Supervisor - Chapter Two of Becoming a Music Therapy Intern

Becoming a Music Therapy Intern: Preparing for Your First Day of Your Internship – The graphic includes the picture of a young woman in glasses, holding some books. She is smiling at the camera. The URL of the website, www.musictherapyworks.com, is followed by the title, “Becoming a Music Therapy Intern,” with a subtitle, “Preparing for Your First Day of Your Internship.” The remaining text on the graphic includes the following: things to think about, finances, competencies, and repertoire. There is a button that states, “Link Here,” which leads to the following link: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Becoming-a-Music-Therapy-Intern-Finding-Your-Internship-Placement-11848074?st=91c53ebd2ae42e15bd29d45d0d6110d5
I spent time working on Chapter Two of my internship handbook - Becoming a Music Therapy Intern: Preparing for Your First Day of Your Internship this weekend, and I released it yesterday.

This is a project that I have been working on for a long time. I have wanted to do some sort of internship manual since I started supervising music therapy students and interns. It came out mainly because it seems that many interns (at least, the ones I have encountered in all sorts of places) do not know some of the specific rights and responsibilities that they have and that their supervising music therapists and academic faculty members have. I have been writing this resource for a very long time, and I finally woke up to the fact that I can self-publish bits rather than waiting for the entire thing to be released at the same time. So, I have started.

I am using my TPT store as the initial platform for release because it is easy for me to use. As I get more chapters, I will either bundle them or move the entire thing to my website. 

What I want this text to do is to help demystify the internship process from finding an internship through terminating the intern position and heading into the professional world. It will not cover every situation and is highly biased because I am writing it from my experiences, but it is something that is not out there yet, so I am starting the conversation. I hope.

The next chapter will be about what to expect on the first day of internship. After that, we will discuss the rights and responsibilities of all members of the clinical training team. I have the entire manual outlined and ready to be edited (or written for some of the later chapters). I am excited and terrified about this project. I hope that it finds its audience.

What types of things would you make sure to include in a manual for music therapy students and interns?

When I initially started thinking about this project, I started by thinking of all the things that I wish I had known before I started my own internship. After that, I asked music therapy interns. Over the past twelve years, I have worked with and talked to interns from all over the country, and I have collected some of their thoughts and concerns while doing webinars with them. Their suggestions turned into webinar topics which have turned into chapter ideas. The first theme from interns was the need to know more about how to find an internship. (That is the topic of Chapter One, by the way!)

Over the years that I have been working on this, I have placed topics on the list of things to cover and then taken them off again. For now, I have a list of topics to work through. I will continue to revise and add things to this manual as I can.

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