As a CSPP student at the San Diego campus of CSPP, you’ll have many opportunities for valuable hands-on work experience, in all fields, under the supervision of expert training staff.

San Diego MFT Consortium

San Diego MFT Consortium was established in August 2007 to participate as a regional member of the Southern California MFT Consortium. It represents all of the MFT graduate programs in the San Diego region and San Diego County Behavioral Health programs.

The San Diego MFT Consortium is housed at Alliant International University and is the administration body for two  MFT educational stipend programs. The goals of the Consortium are:

1. To promote the training and hiring of MFT practitioners to work in the public mental health workforce in accordance with the mission of CAMFT and the AAMFT.
2. To work closely with San Diego County Behavioral Health to identify local needs and opportunities in the MH workforce for MFT practitioners.
3. To ensure that resources provided by the MHSA MFT Stipend program are used to train culturally competent and recovery oriented MFTs to fill identified local needs.
4. To establish selection criteria which are unique to the San Diego region that will be used to award stipends to those who are most likely to provide culturally competent and recovery oriented care to underserved populations in the San Diego region.
5. To establish a stipend award council, which will review applications and award MFT stipends for the duration of the MHSA Stipend Program.

The Community Academy

The Community Academy program is funded by the County of San Diego, Mental Health Services through the Mental Health Services Act (MHSA) Workforce Education and Training. The program is offered entirely at no cost and provides training and support to individuals and their family members with lived experience with mental illness. In line with national recovery models, this program attaches value to the lived experience of individuals affected by mental illness and/or that gained from assisting their family members and has the end goal of these individuals along the pathway into the public mental health field.

Students accepted into this program are linked with certificate training programs through our partnering agencies; National Alliance on Mental Illness, Recovery Innovations of CA, and the Family and Youth Roundtable. Students receive a field placement, mentorship and are offered an array of additional training to tailor the program to their specific area(s) of interests as they move along their pathway into the public mental health field. A one-year commitment is required. Stipend assistance is offered on a need basis to assist with barriers that students may face as they work to obtain their career and academic goals.

How to Apply

Send an email to The Community Academy program at communityacademy@alliant.edu.

Current Literature on Mental Health Recovery and Workforce

• Framework for Health Promotion Services for People with Psychiatric Disabilities (.pdf)
• Seeing the Person Not The Illness (.pdf)
• Stigma in the Mental Health Workplace: Perceptions of Peer Employees and Clinicians (.pdf)
• Systematic Review of Beliefs, Behaviors and Influencing Factors Associated with Disclosure of a Mental Health Problem in the Workplace (.pdf)
• The Personal and Vocational Impact of Training and Employing People with Psychiatric Disabilities as Provider (.pdf)
• Training and Education Needs of Consumers, Families, and Front-Line Staff In Behavioral Health Practice (.pdf)
• Transforming the Workforce in Children's Mental Health (.pdf)