I was dismissed from the Psychology and Counseling program after 4 years of good academics and struggle to get adequate placement and supervison in an itnernship with Goddard College. The program was a 2.5 year degree. About 3 semesters into the program, I began to feel as though I was not going to get a placement with them for an intrernship. When I contacted internship sites, I was told that other schools do the placements and supervision.
I was led to believe that this crucial component to a counseling related degree was totally my responsibility. After years of contacting sites, I had to take 2 leave of absences in order to find them. Eventually I found placements on my own with inadeaqute supervison. Issues arose on the internship sites that are part of the normal learning. I was not given support and supervision form Goddard and subsequentaly dismissed after thousands of dollars in student loan debt, and no degree.
I was told by a friend who was a psychologist in Burlington Vermont that is was inadequate for a training program. She said with Antioch New England, that she was given site recommenations, placement, and triple supervision by professors, site supervisor, and classroom feedback. She graduated in 2.5 years from Antioch with a degree towards licensure, and said the program was, "Seemless." When I told her of my problems with Goddard College, she said, "Shut em down." The therapist said I wasn't the first client she had seen who came to her with distress about Goddard. A few years earlier, a client of hers completed an education program without a satisfactory practicum placement for her degree in education, and had to go to another college and take the entire program over again in order to work in the teaching profession.
This was a warning sign. This information along with stories I had heard about classmates in New York State who were removed from internship sites in that state because New York State did not recognize the validity of the program, put me in consumer advocacy mode. I contacted all of the New York State students I knew in the program begging them to question if their degree was going to be valid in New York state, I also cc'd my academic adviser who then became enraged with me for doing so.By this time I had pretty much completed the core 48 credit degree.
When I began a search for a supervisor to help me do my work in Vermont, a woman who has reputation of supervsion for grad students in Vermont, told me that, "You will not get adequate training with Goddard, cut your losses." I should have listened to her, but I contined for another 2 years trying to salvage my work and degree.
After this information was revealed to me, I drove to the college to speak with the President of the College Mark Schulman with my concerns about New York State, and whether the program was seaworthy at all. I was sent to his secretary Jeffifer Trip Meade who basically dismissed me in person and over the phone and email.
When I asked the internship director of Goddard"s psychology and counseling program, Michele Clark, in 2008 to provide me with the names of alumi who have actually gotten a counseling licensure from the state of Vermont, she said there was only one she could think of, but that he was probably too busy to speak with me and never gave me his name.
Working with the Vermont Department of Labor, I contacted the mental health licensure board in Vermont, which told me that a degree from Goddard was still considered an adequate degree for licensure in Vermont, so I continued to persue my degree towards licensure.
It just never happened and I never got much support to make it a reality. And I even went as far as to ask the school to give me a Master's Degree in independent studies early on as well as shortly before my dismissal. I was told by my academic advisor that this was impossible without sacrificing the lions share of my credits.
A classmate who now holds an MA from Psychology and Counseling from Goddard and is living in Ohio, is having trouble getting her states licensing board to recognize her degree. Another alumna living in New York, had been unable to get her counseling credentials in New York.
I and about 10 others per semester are lured into Goddard's Psychology and Counseling program by a brochure that said they had a "Sexual Orientation Concentration." I wrote the majority of my papers and thesis on LGBT related issues. I begged the director Steven James and my academic advisor Jim Fitzgerald, both out and proud gay men, to help me get a placement with Vermont Cares, a statewide AIDS organization, and heard nothing.
A group of Goddard College students from the state of Maine actually had to go to that state licening board themselves, and fight for the validity of their work with Goddard.
When an alumna who is from Connecticut who suffers from MS asked for special accomodations, she was required to do additional academic work in order to get her degree. She completed an entire workbook on statistics as part of Connecticut's requirements, and then was told by Goddard that she only needed to complete 1 chapter of the book to recieve credit from the school, and then her work was never read.
I think many consumers are lured into the program thinking they will become qualified therapists at the end of it, but many states including Maine, Connecticut, New York, and Ohio are not convinced, and consumers are holding degrees that only allow them to get bachelor's level employment.in my estimation, an MA from Goddard College in psychology and counseling does not give students any professional advatntage over the Bachelor's Degrees they held before their work with Goddard.
Goddard College provides no direction or assistance to ensure that students meet any state regualtory requirements. Often what happens because of inadequate supervision, students find themselves going extra semesters in order to get viable degrees from them. I believe that Goddard College is not able to live up to their advertized mission statement as a, "Leader in Progressive Education." Since their Master's Degree in psychology and counseling is fraught with so much difficulty in the region, I wonder why Goddard's regional accreditation with the New England Association of Schools and Colleges is intact. This seems inexplicable to me and other frustrated students I have heard from.
Respectfully submitted
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