Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses

97 Choosing the Right Online Supervision Course: A Peek Behind the Curtain

August 30, 2024 • Dr. Kate Walker Ph.D., LPC/LMFT Supervisor • Season 3 • Episode 97

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Are you struggling to find a supervision training course that genuinely delivers value? Discover the secrets to choosing the right 40-hour supervision course and avoid the traps set by some providers who profit from missed deadlines. Learn from Dr. Kate Walker's extensive experience in both face-to-face and online training environments, and get essential tips on engaging with course content that ensures real learning. Understand the critical demand for more supervisors in Texas, especially in underserved areas, and how you can be part of the solution.

Dive into the ethical responsibilities of course completion, focusing on the importance of a 90-day deadline and maintaining access to materials post-course. Learn how to select a course format that fits your unique learning style and get access to invaluable resources like the Clinical Supervision Survival Guide. Plus, don't miss out on the benefits of joining Kate Walker Training for your continuing education, with free CE opportunities and expert-led webinars designed to keep you motivated and effective in your supervisory role. Listen now and start making a significant impact in your community!

Get your step by step guide to private practice. Because you are too important to lose to not knowing the rules, going broke, burning out, and giving up. #counselorsdontquit.

Speaker 1:

If you're shopping for a 40-hour training, be aware of some things Like. One of the things we talk about is that if you're hitting 90 days and your course provider says, ok, well, we'll sell you another course and you can have another 90 days. Well, they're kind of profiting off of you missing your deadline. And if they're selling you the same course, aren't you just going to use all the material again? Aren't you just going to use all the material again? This is the Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses podcast with Dr Kate Walker, where I teach you Texans and non-Texans alike the latest research-based information to hit your income goals, stay out of trouble and make a bigger impact in your community. Join me and let's fill the gaps in access to mental health care and create a counseling career you'll love. Let's get to work. Welcome to Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses, where it's all about working smarter, not harder. And here's your host, dr Kate Walker.

Speaker 1:

Episode 97 is the last in our three-part Peek Behind the Curtain series where I'm taking you behind the scenes of supervisor training. I'm talking about what perhaps they don't teach you in every single course, and today I'm going to focus on FAQs what I get asked the most, and you're going to find out the assignment people love to hate and then they end up absolutely loving, and I'll tell you why. Don't forget to go to katewalkertrainingcom forward slash book and grab your copy of the Clinical Supervision Survival Guide and get on the waiting list for the supervision planner. I'm so excited about that. Now let's get to work. Hey, welcome to our last episode of the peek behind the curtain for supervisor training. Today I'm going to talk about what supervision courses may not be telling you Now.

Speaker 1:

I have done this for a long, long time. I've done it back when it was all face-to-face, like all 40 hours face-to-face in a room like conference room, little room, big room, it didn't matter. I've done it in all kinds of rooms and if you ever took a face to face course for me, you know what I'm talking about, right. Then we went to hybrid, where some of it could be outside assignments, homework, things like that and some of it was face-to-face. And then in 2019, hallelujah the course was allowed to be taught completely online, and so that was kind of a trick, right, because one of the things that the boards the member boards in Texas, anyway, they do a really good job of saying, like for video or for face to face, one hour equals one hour. Well, that's great, and if you are like me and you've ever had to take a defensive driving course to know, you know it's really sweet when you can like pull up that defensive driving video, hit play and then go start making dinner. No, I'm just kidding. I absolutely sit in front of the video and I watch the whole thing. Ok, I'm sorry, kidding. I absolutely sit in front of the video and I watch the whole thing. Okay, I'm sorry, I can't tell a lie. Sometimes I do let it play, but I know courses are getting better and better and better, and so, for example, I teach adjunct at the University of Texas, el Paso, and they have some really, really great training videos that are engaging and they'll ask you questions about five minutes in or 10 minutes in to keep you engaged, to keep you focused, and they're usually no fail quizzes, so I can go back and I can check my answers and then take the quiz again, and I think they're wonderful. And so when I teach online courses, I try to keep that in mind. The object is to make sure folks actually get the information. I don't want people clicking, play and then going and fixing their macaroni and cheese. I want them to actually be engaged and learn the material.

Speaker 1:

I've already told you all of my scary stories, right? A couple episodes ago, I talked to you about why supervisors never supervise. Right. I talked to you about why they'll supervise one supervisee things go sideways and then they quit and they never do it again. So I have a mission, a dream, a calling. Call it whatever you want. I want more providers out in the world, especially in Texas, where we're number 50 as of this recording. We don't have enough providers in rural, underserved and frontier Texas, and supervisors are key to that. I want more of you out there. So we do provide the warm fuzzy frameworks. I did write the book, the Clinical Supervision Survival Guide, with all the resources you can download. We do have kind, nurturing Facebook pages with highly experienced individuals who will walk you through questions that are never silly, they're never redundant, we never shame you for asking the same question over and over again. And oh yeah, by the way, we have a ton of free resources, right, we need supervisors. So whatever I got to do to make that happen including these three episodes, the peek behind the curtain episodes I'm going to make sure my supervisors that I teach stay in business and that they keep putting more excellent therapists out into the field.

Speaker 1:

So back to what supervision courses may not be telling you. Well, because our number boards don't tell us what text translates into an hour. Right, it may be hard to judge which courses are actually giving you 40 hours of material. Which courses are actually giving you 40 hours of material. Let me explain. So when you take a 40-hour course, it's supposed to be 40 hours, like that's just the nature of continuing education. If it says 40, it's got to be 40. For this course particularly, it is comparable, or it's supposed to be comparable, to a postgraduate, a doctoral course in supervision. So it says in our member board rules you can take this as a continuing education component from somebody like me or you can get it in your doc program. So you have to have this course and it's got to be rigorous. Forty hours is 40 hours. So and yeah, I mean if it was all video and you could hit play and we could just go tick, tick, tick, tick, right, ok, that's an hour. Ok, that's an hour, but oh, my goodness right.

Speaker 1:

So here's a workbook with activities and I know for my course we have different activities as well. I ask you to create a contract. I ask you to do a reflection on multiculturalism and how you're going to teach that to your supervisees. I have you create an orientation. I have you make a video of you actually demonstrating skills. So how does that translate? Well, because the board isn't explicit about text, right, they're explicit about video. They're explicit about face-to-face.

Speaker 1:

Then I personally defer to NBCC criteria. I'm an NBCC provider for online and their criteria is 6,000 words equals one hour. So we literally take the video, we run it through our timer as we're editing, we make sure it's hour for hour. Then we look at all of the texts that we require our participants to consume Not necessarily the activities, but we do incorporate that as well and we count the words to make sure that it equals one hour. And I mean it's whiteboards everywhere, dry erase boards, where you know counting, looking, comparing, scratching things out. It's a process. So when you're taking this 40-hour training, it has to meet so many criteria. So one of the things we do include in our syllabus is a crosswalk and it allows you to see exactly which project is meeting the criteria set forth by the licensing boards and how it does it hour for hour.

Speaker 1:

Hey, clinical supervisor, I know there's a lot to be worried about, everything from supervisee liability to paperwork organization to oh my gosh, do I know when my supervisee's malpractice insurance expires. I've got help on the way. My new book, the Clinical Supervision Survival Guide, is published and ready for you on Amazon. Super easy to get you can go to katewalkertrainingcom book. And to make it even easier for you to get all of the resources that I talk about in the book I'm talking about assessments, I'm talking about templates, I'm talking about remediation plans when you use the QR code, you will get to download every single thing I talk about. I want to make it as easy as possible because, let's face it, you've got enough on your plate. So go to katewalkertrainingcom book, use the QR code. So go to katewalkertrainingcom book, use the QR code, get the resources.

Speaker 1:

And I've got a special surprise for you, because we were so excited with the way the book turned out. We are working on a planner. That's right Something. You can track those homework assignments. You can track. Hey, did I cover the rules this month? Oh, I can track my lesson plans. You can track all of those important dates in the new planner. We don't have it ready yet. But when you buy the book and use the QR code, guess what you can get on our waiting list. So go to katewalkertrainingcom slash book, grab the book and keep putting amazing therapists out into the world. Putting amazing therapists out into the world. So that's a great thing to look for when you're shopping for your 40-hour training.

Speaker 1:

Grab the syllabus, ask to see it and ask to see how each assignment meets that criteria hour for hour. And we had a thing a few years ago and this isn't anecdotal, this is actually something I witnessed where folks took a 40 hour training that didn't offer enough ethics and because it didn't offer enough ethics, that supervision was taken away by the licensing board. And that affects supervisees, that affects clients, that affects money. So you need to be aware of what the course is supposed to have and then ask the course provider hey, can you show me that? Can you prove that? Right? Because that's what will happen if you're ever audited. You just need to provide the syllabus. It's not involved, right? You would just need to show them. Hey, look, this is how the course that I took met the criteria that you asked me to complete when you wrote this in the rules. So that answers a couple of things, I believe.

Speaker 1:

So why I don't just do 40 hours of video? Right, because it would just be we'd all be pulling our hair out at the end. So we do at Kate Walker Training mix it up with different assignments and different types of assignments, too right, there's research, there's writing, and then the thing that scares everybody, which is the video. Folks, let me tell you why we do that. When the course went completely online, one of the things we were keenly aware of is that the person completing the material might not be the license holder. Okay, I mean, that's easy to do, right, have somebody take the stuff and then we don't know who the license or, I'm sorry, we don't know who we're giving our certificate to at the end.

Speaker 1:

So I had this bright idea. I was like I want to see people, I want to see their faces, and so by developing this video project and I'm really spilling my guts here, because I know that folks it scares them to make a video. I know when I was in my master's program, I hated doing videos. When I was in my doc program, I hated doing videos. But this is so laid back. I mean, I have participants, course participants grab a partner to be their fake supervisee. They'll grab their kiddo to be their fake supervisee. All I want to see is their amazing faces delivering supervision to someone. Even I've had people off camera, right. I just they're talking and off camera, someone is answering. I don't have to see their face, but it never fails.

Speaker 1:

The comments that I get on that assignment are always you know what this assignment helped me really understand how to put it all together right, how the fact that supervision is different from counseling. It's got to feel different, it's got to sound different, it's got to address different things. There's a different level of assertiveness involved, and this always turns out to be the favorite assignment. Assertiveness involved, and this always turns out to be the favorite assignment. Folks enjoy it and at the end they always say they learned so much. So, as you're shopping for a 40 hour training, you want to look and see. You know, how are they going to verify that I actually have the skills right At the end of this? How would I ever demonstrate that I know what I'm doing right, except when you're actually doing it? Okay, the next thing that other supervision courses may not be telling you you really only have 90 days to finish it. Okay, 90 days.

Speaker 1:

Now our face-to-face course was audited, I want to say in 2016. I could be wrong about that. Audited, I want to say in 2016,. I could be wrong about that. But one of the most glowing comments that we had from this audit by the LPC board was now we know how these courses should be taught and I was so proud of that.

Speaker 1:

But they did have some corrections for me, especially moving into the online format. They insisted that we designate a start date. Right, because when there's no face to face component, obviously if there's no face-to-face component, obviously if there's a face-to-face component, you can say, okay, when I see your face in the classroom, we can call that day one and you have to have your last assignment completed 90 days from that day. Right, that's the beauty of doing a hybrid or a face-to-face course With online we have to designate day one for the purposes of counting that 90 days. Now let me pause a second. I'm going to go back and tell you the why for the 90 days. Right, because it's similar to the same. Why for the 40 hours? This course has to be comparable to a PhD level course. So if you think of a semester of school. That's about 90 days. So if you're taking this course and I'm talking to Texans now right, I don't know what the rules are for other states, but in Texas for social work, lpc and now LMFT thank you, lmft board you must finish your course in 90 days, which means there has to be a designated day one.

Speaker 1:

Now we're very clear about that in all of our material, from our syllabus to our marketing landing page, to all the emails that we send out. The day you purchase your online course is day one for the purpose of counting the 90 days. So we can't wiggle, we can't change that. You know that's something that would compromise our ethics. If we gave you an extra week and I know life happens We've had, especially during COVID, oh my goodness, there were so many things that our participants were coming back and telling us and we empathize. We are right there with you, but we cannot change that due date because we designate that day one, that purchase date, as the day one for counting the 90 days.

Speaker 1:

So, as you're shopping for a 40-hour training, if you're shopping for a 40-hour training, be aware of some things Like one of the things we talk about is that if you're hitting 90 days and your course provider says Okay, well, we'll sell you another course and you can have another 90 days. Well, they're kind of profiting off of you missing your deadline. And if they're selling you the same course, aren't you just going to use all the material again? So I don't know that. That just hits me wrong. I don't want to profit off of anybody who's suffering already because they've missed the 90 days for a course that they paid good money for. But be clear. Make sure there's something in your hand that states what day one is.

Speaker 1:

What happens if you don't meet that 90 days? I know for Kate Walker training. You own the course. It's yours. You'll get a certificate. It won't allow you to get the supervisor designation from us, but you're not going to lose those CE hours that you spent your hard earned money on. So you'll have the tools. You'll have everything you need and then if you go get the course from somebody else, you're still going to have our resources. That course isn't going anywhere. So you can use it to complement other courses or you can come back next year, because every single year we revamp the course and we put it out as a new course and it's got new materials. It's updated to the latest laws so that everybody's ready to go and hit the ground running with the new stuff.

Speaker 1:

So just be sure, as you're looking at 40-hour trainings or any clinical supervision training, if there's a deadline, that two things. Number one, make sure it's in the syllabus. You want to see in writing when day one is and how they determine the final day. When day one is and how they determine the final day. And you want to make sure that certificate indicates that you finished in 90 days, right, what was your start date? What was your end date? Again, I've got a fully online course, so it's not just the date that the assignments are finished, it's the date that they've completed the online component as well. So it's important that the you're kind of in the dark and nobody's really telling you what's going on or the emails are. You know you're not getting any contact at all. That's something to watch out for. You want to make sure that you're able to schedule a phone call, that you're able to interact and have email exchanges. You want to make sure that you're able to really fully understand, with a clear syllabus, what it means to begin and end the course successfully and on time.

Speaker 1:

All right, so I know this is a little bit quick today because, honestly, there are so many excellent providers out there. There are great courses that you can take. It really just comes down to your learning style, right? Are you an online course taker? Do you love online courses? Do you need the convenience of online or do you need face-to-face, right? Do you love online courses? Do you need the convenience of online or do you need face to face, right? Do you need somebody in your face talking you through things and available in real time to answer questions? We have a study hall. We have a virtual study hall. That happens weekly, but you may need the interaction of a classroom. So really look inward, do that little self-awareness check before you pay good money for a course that's so important.

Speaker 1:

I believe this is actually one of the most important postgraduate courses that you're going to take, just because of what it does for the profession. You know you're a mentor, you're a colleague, you're putting excellent therapists out in the field and, no matter which course you take, don't forget the Clinical Supervision Survival Guide is available. It's been published, it's out there. It's got all of the resources you need to be amazing in the supervision field and to keep putting excellent therapists into the world. So keep doing what you're doing. I think you're amazing.

Speaker 1:

I'm Dr Kate Walker. I'll see you. Thanks so much for listening. I want to give you a free CE Now. If you don't need a CE, which is another word for continuing education, totally okay. You're still going to love the experts that we host every single month at Kate Walker Training. It's easy to attend Just go to katewalkertrainingcom. Forward slash free webinar and I will see you there. I'm Dr Kate Walker. Thank you so much for listening to Texas counselors creating badass businesses. Thank you to Ridgely Walker for her lovely voiceovers at our introduction, and do me a favor when you get a second, please like, share and subscribe and write us a review. That's really how we get picked up by other RSS feeds and we get this information out to the mental health badasses who need it. Thanks again and keep saving the world with excellent therapy. Thank you.