About Our Program

Welcome!

As Director of Training in the Counseling Psychology Ph.D. Program at the Lynch School of Education, and on behalf of our faculty and students, I thank you for your interest in our training program. The current Boston College program began when a handful of visionaries decided to leverage the enormous strengths of Boston College and the impressive Boston psychological community to train Counseling Psychologists equipped to advocate for social justice through their clinical work, research, teaching, leadership, and outreach. They succeeded in developing one of the most vibrant doctoral programs in the country.  The social justice agenda has taken root in many doctoral programs in the U.S., which we believe is a welcome development in our profession.  In this context, we are very proud of our role as a trailblazer of this movement and a continued leader in shaping the dialogue about how professional psychology can enhance its impact to be truly inclusive and transformative for people and communities.

The Boston College program is fully accredited by the American Psychological Association and has a deep commitment to training students using the scientist-practitioner model. Our degree candidates have access to a wide breadth of top-notch practice opportunities in diverse mental health settings, including universities, schools, hospitals, and outpatient community mental health facilities.  Students are closely mentored by our internationally recognized counseling psychology faculty, who are applying their cutting-edge and purposeful research to address some of the most complex and challenging questions facing our society. Students are exposed to areas of research spanning school, workplace, community, and international concerns, including immigration, trauma resiliency and recovery, domestic violence, the psychology of working, bias-based bullying, culture, race, and gender issues, youth mentoring, and positive youth development.   Graduates of our program are working in a wide array of contexts including academia, community mental health centers, Veterans Administration centers, major teaching hospitals, research centers, university counseling centers, and various clinical practice settings.  

While we aim to produce outstanding scientist-practitioners, we also emphasize the importance of training in a context that develops well-rounded individuals.  To this end, we provide an intimate setting of safety, diversity, and mutual respect that encourages self-exploration and personal growth, as well as meaningful involvement in our own community and our wider society. Together, we aim to advance knowledge and engage in practice that will build relationships beyond our classrooms, create synergies among diverse disciplines and connect colleagues to create new scholarship and models for change, all with the ultimate goal of enhancing the human condition.  

We hope you will consider joining us on this fulfilling journey.

All the best,

David L. Blustein, Ph.D.
Professor, Counseling, Developmental, and Educational Psychology
Director of Doctoral Training, Counseling Psychology