Intern Narrative
Northern Suburban Special Education District - Early Childhood Program
NSSED has been such a great training experience! My placement consists of 2.5 days at Glenview District 34's early childhood program, 1 day working with an NSSED RtI Coach within Glenview District 34, and 1.5 days working with NSSED's Autism Coordinator within NSSED's member districts. NSSED certainly provides numerous training experiences, as it serves 18 member districts. Within the cooperative, I have numerous opportunities to serve students and teachers by providing informal and formal consultation, conducting assessments for initial evaluations and re-evaluations, designing and monitoring positive behavior interventions, serving on problem-solving teams, providing as well as attending professional development trainings, participating on multidisciplinary teams, participating on RtI leadership teams, and so on! Needless to say, NSSED is the perfect internship to provide both general and specialized training opportunities. I also feel lucky to have joined the ISPIC family. There are currently 20 interns, who have become my great colleagues and friends. This experience has provided me with great training opportunities, and a wonderful network full of other interns and school psychologists. If you have further questions about the NSSED internship, please do not hesitate to contact me at katherine.gioia@gmail.com
Maine East High School
Working as an intern at Maine East High School in Park Ridge, IL has afforded many valuable experiences through the year. The intern’s experiences range from administering assessments and writing evaluations to individual and group counseling to supporting the implementation of Response to Intervention. The interns have been a member of problem solving teams and individual education plan teams. The supervisor at Maine East ensures that individual and group supervision time is met each week. This high school is incredibly diverse and one of the greatest parts of interning here is getting to learn about the cultural backgrounds of many students and how language and culture play a role in a student’s education and social emotional functioning. The interns have also had the opportunity to work in elementary and middle schools in Arlington Heights School District 25 and Park Ridge School District 64 one day a week. These districts have been implementing flexible service delivery and response to intervention for a number of years and it has been very beneficial as an intern to learn from their experiences. ISPIC provides a great network of Illinois schools and interns from across the country. We feel much gratitude for the experiences and relationships gained this year and feel more competent as professional school psychologists. If you have any questions about Maine East High School, you can contact us at jennmills81@gmail.com, jillian.clarke88@gmail.com, or m_fraire@hotmail.com.
Illinois State University – Psychological Services Center
ISU has been a great training experience. My placements included 3 days per week in a K – 12 laboratory school setting, 1 day per week in The Autism Place, and 1 day per week in the College Learning Assessment Service. While at ISU, I had the opportunity to provide therapy to students in the school setting, complete a variety of assessments involving diverse referral needs, provide behavioral therapy for children with autism, and be a part of an elementary school’s RtI development team. I was able to serve students directly, consult with teachers and administrators, and supervise other clinicians. The experiences allowed me to connect with excellent supervisors and clinicians. If you have questions, feel free to contact me at renestaskal@gmail.com.
Livingston County Special Services Unit
My name is Ashley, and I am currently an intern at Livingston County Special Services Unit (LCSSU) in Pontiac. I love that my experiences are so diverse! Each day of the week I am in a different setting. One day I am in a Pre-K to 4 building running class-wide social skills interventions, attending IEP meetings, helping with RTI systems, and doing play-based assessments. Another day I am at a high school as a member of the assessment team and provide counseling services for students in an alternative learning program. Two days per week I am in countywide programs: one for elementary students with emotional and behavioral concerns and the other for preschool children with significant communication impairments (including autism). The final day of my week I work on a countywide mental health grant that is implementing systems to provide tier 1 and 2 services across the districts in the county. If you are interested in this internship or have any questions, please email me at awhittington@lcssu.org.