Psychology Predoctoral Internship Program

Welcome to the Pine Rest Christian Mental Health Services pre-doctoral psychology internship! Here you will find helpful information about our top-notch training program, wonderful faculty and outstanding training facilities.

Our program has been fully accredited by the American Psychological Association since 1982.* We had our most recent site review in 2017 and were re-accredited, with our next self-study/site visit scheduled for 2027. 

Match Numbers:

137011 Outpatient, SPMI, and SUD
137012 Outpatient, Neuro, SUD, and ASD
137013 Outpatient therapy, DBT, and psychological consultation

Predoctoral Psychology Internship

The Pre-Doctoral Psychology Internship at Pine Rest offers the highest quality training to prepare interns for the professional practice of psychology. The training program is based on the Practitioner-Scholar Model, with an emphasis on preparation for independent clinical practice. We provide excellent clinical training in all 9 of APA’s profession-wide competencies and in our program-specific competency: Spirituality.

The Pine Rest internship is designed to allow interns an experience working across our continuum of care and with our multidisciplinary teams, including senior psychologists and psychiatrists, psychiatry residents, social workers, mid-level practitioners, and front-line staff. This training equips graduates with the competencies needed to obtain employment in a variety of applied clinical settings, doing a variety of tasks, from psychotherapy (individual, group, family and couples), assessment, consultation, applied research and quality improvement projects, and supervision. Our training incorporates individual and group supervision, optimal levels of patient contact and didactic seminars to maximize training experience.

Finally, all of this takes place in an organization where psychology is highly valued (e.g. the CEO is a psychologist) and where the general morale is high. Psychology interns are valued and respected members of the inter-disciplinary teams and are mentioned by supportive and expert psychology faculty.

About Pine Rest:

Pine Rest Christian Mental Health Services is one of the largest free-standing behavioral health organizations in the U.S., providing inpatient, outpatient and residential behavioral health services for over 100 years. (For more information, see our Fact Sheet  .)

Pine Rest’s organizational mission is to express the healing ministry of Jesus Christ by providing behavioral health services with professional excellence, integrity and compassion. This mission is accomplished by:

1. Providing an exceptional care experience for patients.
2. Achieving superior clinical outcomes.
3. Maintaining Pine Rest as a great place to work.

The internship training program offers a unique opportunity for interns to learn to effectively integrate spirituality and faith with empirically-supported psychological care.

The internship year begins the first Monday of July and is a 12-month full-time program for four interns. The current stipend is $36,000. Additionally, health insurance is provided to interns, along with vision and dental benefits. Interns have 14 days of paid time off, including sick days, dissertation-related activities, and vacation. There are also six paid holidays. Required textbooks are provided for free, and there is a $100 book allowance per intern for professional development.

Located in Beautiful Grand Rapids and West Michigan

All internship rotations are located in the Grand Rapids, Michigan area, one of the hottest locations for new medical development. Since 2005, the Grand Rapids Medical Mile has been home to the Van Andel Institute (a world-class primary research facility), Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, Grand Rapids Community College’s Calkins Science Center, Spectrum Health’s Butterworth Hospital complex, Grand Valley State University’s Cook-DeVos Center for Health Sciences and more.

Grand Rapids and the surrounding West Michigan area offers a friendly, welcoming community for families as well as singles and couples. Residents can enjoy both the vibrant downtown with plenty of museums, restaurants, theater, nightlife and festivals, as well as beautiful rural landscapes and peaceful suburbs with easy access to miles of beautiful Lake Michigan shoreline. There’s always something for everyone!

Key industries in the local community include: