I support a minimum standard for face-to-face contact between students and faculty in professional psychology training, as opposed to the briefer residency periods that occur in distance-learning programs. Sustained contact is essential for role modeling, socialization into the profession, and faculty assessment of students’ emotional stability and interpersonal competence. Given the nature of clinical psychology as a profession, competent and ethical practice depends on students receiving long-term observation, feedback, and interpersonal shaping from faculty mentors.

Another concern is the degree to which distance-learning programs establish oversight and quality assurance for practicum and internship experience. Such programs have hundreds of students dispersed geographically throughout the country. It seems unlikely that programs are able to establish meaningful relationships with all of these practicum sites in order to ensure quality training experiences for students, and receive reliable feedback on trainees’ acquisition of clinical skills. Likewise, APPIC statistics suggest very low internship match rates for distance education programs, and it appears that many students arrange informal, local internships. This practice raises significant questions regarding the quality of the capstone clinical training experience for such individuals. For example, they are unlikely to have an internship cohort or an organized didactic training experience, both of which are APA accreditation standards for internship.

Distance learning should not be the sole delivery method for the bulk of educational requirements for a doctoral degree in clinical psychology. This approach undermines an essential aspect of training, which is long-term, in-person mentoring in multiple contexts (clinical, research, teaching, etc.).  Such mentoring requires extensive consideration and modification of one’s interpersonal style, biases, and effect on others, and should be a prerequisite for engaging in intervention in the lives of others. If we do not place enough value on this aspect of training for it to be a minimum requirement for licensure, then we begin to lessen the standards and rigor that are associated with doctoral-level training and the profession of clinical psychology.