DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

Contents- Update on past events- Summary from working groups- Publications and guidance documents- Feature article: Nadine Mirza in conversation with Dr Iyabo Fatimilehin from Just Psychology CIC- Peer support network- Get in touch

Welcome - Vanessa Yim, Lead Editor

Welcome to the first issue of 2021. In this issue, I have summarised the work our committee members have been involved in, especially around race and inequality, as well as support and considerations for minority groups during Covid-19. We have been involved in various events, working groups and guidance documents, which we hope you will find helpful. For the feature article, our assistant editor Nadine spoke to Dr Iyabo Fatimilehin, the director of Just Psychology CIC. As always, please get in touch if you need support.

All the best for the applicants for the 2021 intake, and we hope everyone is getting on okay with training, studies or their jobs remotely in these challenging times.

Take care and stay well.

DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

Update on key past events

Racial and social inequalities in the times of Covid-19 - listening event, September 23 2020

Candice - Parent and carer lead

Minorities sub-committee representatives Runa Dawood, Samantha Rennalls (former committee member) and I worked alongside a dedicated working group to produce a document which discussed the racial and social disparities within the context of the pandemic.

A listening event held on 23 September focused on ways to take actions forward and the future of the campaign, led by the BPS presidential taskforce on diversity and inclusion.

Reflective and powerful conversations between members of the working group and guest speakers supported the engagement of the audience, including the opportunity for a question and answer panel.

This was followed by nourishing presentations about maintaining a sense of humanity in the face of challenge, and acts of pledging commitment to anti-racist practice.

The event appeared to generate meaningful dialogue and action which we hope continues to ripple through.

It was a pleasure to be a part of the event and work alongside a group of professionals with shared passion and hopes for addressing racism and inequality.

The DCP racial and social inequalities in the times of Covid-19 working group has produced a position paper.

Minorities in clinical psychology application preparation event (Northern: October 21 2020, London and Southern, November 3 2020)

North West application event

Camilla - Mental health lead, Yasmine - Faith and race and culture committee member

The third Northern minorities group application event was held online on 21 October 2020. David Murphy opened the event by speaking about applying to the Clinical Psychology doctorate programmes.

We then hosted question and answer sessions with a tutor panel, followed by a trainee panel. Tutors and trainees were from the Bangor, Lancaster, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester and Sheffield courses.

https://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Member%20Networks/Divisions/DCP/Racial%20and%20Social%20Inequalities%20in%20the%20times%20of%20Covid-19.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Member%20Networks/Divisions/DCP/Racial%20and%20Social%20Inequalities%20in%20the%20times%20of%20Covid-19.pdf

DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

We had lots of questions coming in, at one point there were more than 100 unanswered questions, so we tried to pick a diverse range of questions to pose to members of each panel to answer, as well as typing answers in the chat function. These questions and answers are being compiled into a document and will be made available on our social media platforms as soon as possible.

These events couldn’t go ahead without the help of all involved, from those who attended and contributed to the discussions, to the tutors and trainees who give up their time, to David for speaking, as well as the BPS staff who handle the bookings and ensure that the technical side of the webinar runs smoothly! Thank you to all those involved.

We look forward to welcoming you again at the interview event, which we hope to hold in the spring.

London and the South application event

Zinny and Aisha - Event officers

In planning this year’s application event, it was with some uncertainty about how to reproduce this online in a way that captures the essence of similar past face-to-face events.

This meant, to adapt to online, we thought differently about how to engage participants and create a sense

of community and safety such that attendees build connections.

The main speaker, Dr Roberta Babb, shared her journey into clinical psychology, the power of knowing and owning our individual selves, and key points to hold in mind when reflecting on who we are on the application forms – ‘own it, be relevant, be specific’.

Attendees found Dr Babb’s talk inspiring. One person commented “I really appreciated [her] authenticity and the focus on being yourself and using that to your advantage as a clinician”. The panel was made up of trainees from London courses as well as Oxford, Essex, UEA, Hertfordshire and Saloman’s.

The panellists also represented a range of minority identities within clinical psychology, who shared their application experiences. They answered questions on the diversity of their cohorts, how to reflect on identity in the application, and different topics to address in the application. A recurring theme was the importance of connecting with peers for support throughout the application and interview process.

It felt fulfilling to reach so many aspiring clinical psychologists, some of whom had previously been unaware of the minorities group. This sense of community-building feels very relevant to current times and we hope to promote, protect and prioritise this.

Summary from working groups

DClinPsy Training and Covid-19 Camilla - Mental health lead

In April 2020, as Covid-19 and lockdown was becoming an increasingly unwelcome part of life, initiatives were being set up to promote contact, connections and support between individuals.

Two of these initiatives were the minorities sub-committee slack channel, and the clinical psychology trainees WhatsApp group (please contact us if you wish to join the WhatsApp group).

Successfully bringing trainees together led to an awareness of how useful it is to have better contact with the trainers, particularly given the importance of sharing new information during the current climate. This led to a regular meeting between aspiring and

current trainees, and representatives of the trainers and the DCP and ACP, in a collaboration group.

This group currently meets monthly and is attended by the following individuals: Alexander Marsh (ACP-UK), Camilla Hogg (Minorities Subcommittee), Gary Latchford (GTICP), Katie Knott and Leanne Ong (DCP Pre Qual), Tony Lavender (DCP Chair of the Workforce and Training Subcommittee).

The aim of the group is for various stakeholders to come together to discuss issues pertinent to training during Covid, to share information and co-produce solutions.

Early in the process, we collaboratively developed a document on ‘DClinPsych Training and Covid-19’ and

have subsequently had involvement with the DclinPsy international students group, discussing their report, and discussed the impact of remote working on developing neuro competencies.

Conscious of those about to start training in the middle of the pandemic, we came together at the end of August to host a webinar on ‘Starting DClin Training in 2020’.

This event had nearly 500 trainees booked to attend, and a lively question and answer session at the end.

We are awaiting formal feedback but informal Twitter comments suggested that this was greatly valued by attendees, and is something that we have agreed to

run next year, with or without Covid.

We have been disseminating feedback from these meetings informally, but going forward we will be publishing brief minutes in the DCP pre-qual newsletter, ACP-UK buzz, GTiCP mailing list, and the trainee clinical psychologist group on Facebook.

We really want this group to be a space that is accessible and helpful for all involved in clinical psychology training in the UK, and welcome feedback, thoughts, opinions, ideas or question on either what has been discussed, is to be discussed, or anything related to training in the times of Covid.

If you would like to contact the group, please email us.

DCP Covid-19 communications teamOur committee member Homen Chow represents our group in the Covid-19 communications team, and is a member of DCP Covid-19 bulletin editorial team.

Previous issues of the bulletin can be found on the website.

Homen also wrote about the impact of the pandemic on clinical psychology training, and contributed to the resource paper on considerations for people for minority groups in the Covid-19 pandemic.

Publications and guidance documentsOver the past few months, our group led on and contributed to various guidance documents in relation to Covid-19. You can access them all below.

Supporting adults who are or have been shielding: guidance for employers and managers.

Guidance for health professionals supporting groups with specific complex needs who are or have been shielding.

Considerations for people from minority groups in the Covid-19 pandemic.

Supporting and valuing lived experience of mental health difficulties in clinical psychology training.

Guidance for aspiring psychologists and their supervisors during Covid-19.

DClinPsych training and Covid-19.

The responsibility to diversity: clinical psychology relies on the entire profession

Nadine Mirza in conversation with Dr Iyabo Fatimilehin

When Dr Iyabo Fatimilehin first went to her university careers service to express an interest in clinical psychology, she was told she was ‘barking up the wrong tree’.

The woman at the careers office said: ‘I would never get into clinical because I was a woman, I’d want to have babies and the training takes a long time. They absolutely refused to help me’. For Dr Fatimilehin, this was a first.

DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

mailto:dcppqc%40bps.org.uk?subject=https://www.bps.org.uk/member-microsites/division-clinical-psychology/resourceshttps://www.bps.org.uk/member-microsites/division-clinical-psychology/resourceshttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Member%20Networks/Divisions/DCP/DCP%20Covid-19%20Bulletin%2010%20-%20October%202020.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Member%20Networks/Divisions/DCP/DCP%20Covid-19%20Bulletin%2010%20-%20October%202020.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/coronavirus-resources/public/considerations-minority-groupshttps://www.bps.org.uk/coronavirus-resources/public/considerations-minority-groupshttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Policy/Policy%20-%20Files/Supporting%20shielding%20adults%20-%20guide%20for%20employers%20and%20managers.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Policy/Policy%20-%20Files/Guidance%20for%20Health%20Professionals%20Supporting%20Groups%20with%20Specific%20Complex%20Needs.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Policy/Policy%20-%20Files/Considerations%20for%20people%20from%20minority%20groups%20in%20the%20Covid-19%20pandemic.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Member%20Networks/Divisions/DCP/Lived%20experience%20of%20mental%20health%20difficulties%20in%20clinical%20psychology%20training.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Policy/Policy%20-%20Files/Guidance%20for%20aspiring%20psychologists%20and%20their%20supervisors%20during%20Covid-19.pdfhttps://www.bps.org.uk/sites/www.bps.org.uk/files/Member%20Networks/Divisions/DCP/DClinPsych%20training%20and%20Covid-19.pdf

DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

“I was born in London but I grew up in Nigeria, and it’s a very ambitious society. My family, community and teachers had very high expectations of what I would achieve. No one had ever said to me you can’t choose which career path you want to go down. I look back and I realise she probably said that to lots of other people, and you know once I was qualified I’ve come across more and more BME young people who’ve been told by their careers service you can’t do it. I didn’t realise how widespread it was. I thought it was just her and me. But it’s bigger than that”.

Today, consultant clinical psychologist Dr Fatimilehin is no stranger to the intersection of the minority experience and clinical psychology. Currently the director of Just Psychology CIC, a Manchester-based social enterprise that champions cultural competence and diversity in mental health services, she has been working in the field for 30 years. Her expertise lists trainer, clinical tutor, expert witness and therapist, along with 20 years in the NHS under her belt. Her role as service lead led to an award-winning specialist CAMHS for BME children and families in Liverpool.

With her mother being an educational psychologist, knowledge of the subject area was at the forefront of her upbringing. She also believes she may have defied expectations interviewers had about her on the clinical psychology journey.

“They would look at my name and they would have one view of who was going to turn up and I would turn up. And I could speak the language. I don’t mean I could speak English. I mean I could speak the scientific psychological knowledge, the UK day to day, the slang. If they said ‘there’s an elephant in the room’ I didn’t look around, I knew what they meant. I could make them feel like I was one of them. I wasn’t threatening to them at the interview stage.”

This familiarity with British culture was only enhanced by a confidence in her own abilities, which she attributed to her upbringing in Nigeria - “in a country where everyone who was in any position of authority was Black. So why couldn’t I do that? I didn’t come across that really until I came to the UK where people thought I couldn’t do things and I think when we had the ‘race’ and culture special interest ggroup there were very few Black clinical psychologists in the UK, very few BME clinical psychologists […]. We realised most of us had been brought up outside of the UK”. This highlights the significance of representation and the problem today’s generation faces in not seeing themselves reflected in the clinical psychology workforce, or potentially positions of authority.

For Dr Fatimilehin, past role models of ambition may have been instrumental in driving her. Whether it was writing letters to hospitals all over the UK, asking to work with their psychologists as a psychology technician, the role we now know as assistant psychologist, completing her clinical training while being the only Black trainee on the course, or spearheading various jobs in Nottingham, Leicester, and finally as a consultant in Liverpool. Through the course of this, a theme was prominent, one she would find years later written in application forms that had been stored away in trunks: “wanting to contribute to a multicultural clinical psychology because the UK is a multicultural society”.

Even during training this was something Iyabo advocated for. Her handwritten memoirs from 1996 stated the following: “[There was] no teaching of race or culture in the first two years. No discussion of cultural issues generally”.

“When I was a trainee, I tried. I talked to the course about getting someone in to talk about race and culture and they asked me to do it and I said I can’t do it, I’m a trainee, I’m still learning. In third year we were asked if there were any additional topics we wished to cover and a group of us asked for teaching on race and cultural issues. The course organiser said she did not know of anyone who could do this teaching […]I was given a deadline in which to provide a name but although I returned the information within the given time I was told the day had been allocated to someone else.”

More than 25 years later, the curriculum still requires change. It’s something she still wants to push for and believes we in the Minorities Group have a right to demand.

“Yes, there’s representation, but actually you’re getting lots of BME people and training them in Eurocentric psychology. I’ve said this for decades now - it shouldn’t be a special topic. I won’t do a special topic on ‘race and culture”. I’m quite happy to come in and talk about race and culture in relation to parenting, but I’m not a specialist in older adults or people with learning disabilities and so every single topic has to have this. Every teacher on the course should be looking at their materials and critiquing them on the grounds of who is this theory validated with, where did it come from. There’s nothing that’s valid across all cultures, so which cultures is it valid for, how do you work with BME families, what are the key issues, what are the things you need to be aware of? That review of the training will have massive impact”.

DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

In fact, Dr Fatimilehin has worked with the repercussions of current unchanged clinical training and a lack of representation in the profession.

“The worst scenarios are the family courts. We have psychologists in family courts assessing people from different cultural backgrounds using the Eurocentric approach. So they can end up losing their children because they don’t conform to the Eurocentric approach of child rearing. That’s the most vicious thing that I’ve seen in my career- that families will lose their children unless they can come to some kind of white Eurocentric way of parenting”.

For minorities, as both service users and potential practitioners, these paint an exhausting picture of clinical psychology, but Dr Fatimilehin was considerate of what supported her along the journey. In her first job in Nottingham she described being “allowed a lot of freedom to think about different ways of thinking so I began to be interested in how you could develop services for different cultural groups, focused particularly on the African-Caribbean community in Nottingham. [My senior colleagues and managers and I] could have discussions in the department, corridor discussions, cordially talk. It was a supportive environment. [They] got me into writing bids and supported me from day one”. The importance of connecting those in power with those at a pre-qualified or newly qualified stage was not lost on her.

Support was also explicably received from other BME people, not just for a renewed sense of representation but also for that connection with those “who absolutely understand your experience. They’ve been through it themselves, you don’t have to explain it”. For Dr Fatimilehin, this was initially the ’Race’ and Culture Special Interest Group set up in the DCP in which she was the secretary.

“It was a forum that people could come together in, clinical psychologists, mainly BME, to talk about their work; issues with race and culture. [There was] learning, or people did presentations, they had a newsletter, talks at the BPS conferences, seminars, all on issues of culture and race. We had a lot of people who were at pre-qualified stage contacting us, coming for advice”. Effectively, it was about creating a space. “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know and getting a lot of that guidance and support, it’s really important. This is the reality. What people don’t know when they start trying to apply [for clinical training] in isolation, they don’t have networks and people to talk to and things get harder over time”

Therefore, with third sector spaces allowing for more diversity and freedom to operate, it’s unsurprising that Dr Fatimilehin continues to prioritise the creation of spaces and connections, starting from within her own social enterprise. “That’s why here in Just Psychology we have that internship programme two days a week for six months. It gives people an opportunity. It’s why we provide training and consultation to staff”.

The minorities group is of course no stranger to creating spaces, having steadfastly paved the way for continuous and ongoing improvement in diversifying clinical psychology. But, as Dr Fatimilehin points out, the very relevance of psychology is under threat. “As society is more diverse, if we can’t take account of that, if the people you’re working with don’t think it’s relevant to them then they’re not going to want to engage. […] It’s not a responsibility that rests with BME clinical psychologists. It rests with the whole profession”.

Indeed, it does.

Follow @Just_Psychology for updates.

Application support, podcasts and videos

Videos

Our committee member Farhana joined David Murphy in a two-part Youtube video about applying for clinical psychology training:

Part 1 and Part 2.

Podcast - ‘Life in the Labyrinth’ by Candice, parenting and carer lead

My colleagues and I have recently started a podcast series called ‘Life in the Labyrinth’. The series is aimed at everyone and anyone interested in clinical psychology through the eyes of parents who are working in the profession.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUkEyMG_daA&t=2s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMu09RIsAws&t=1s

DCP Minorities GroupNewsletter – Jan 2021

We have released three episodes so far, one of which is an introductory episode outlining our hopes and vision, the second episode hears presenters discuss their experiences of navigating training during the pandemic and the third episode focuses on experiences of taking maternity leave during clinical training.

We hope that, by sharing personal experiences and threads of reflection, we offer the opportunity to connect a network of parents within clinical psychology. We recognised quite early into our journeys just how helpful it was to have peer support, so we launched the podcast as a way to create a supportive space and reach out to trainees from various courses and aspiring psychologists.

We actively engage with our audience to offer episode ideas and questions about our experiences, we hope to inspire people to join the profession and validate experiences of people already working within psychology.

This experience so far has been thoroughly rewarding and offered the opportunity to meet new people outside of our local networks. The response from our listeners has been great and we were surprised at how many people have tuned in so far to hear our waffling!

Our next episodes in the pipeline include reflections from DClin course centres, fathers who are in clinical training and a qualified clinical psychologist who completed her thesis on parenting experiences during professional training.

We are always looking for guest speakers and new questions to support with thematising our discussions, so if anyone out there would like to get involved, we would love to hear from you. Please drop us an email, follow us on Twitter and check out our podcast channel.

Peer support networks

Peer support for aspiring psychologists who identify as from BAME background or have a disability. Our committee members have also established a Black aspiring psychologist peer support network. Please get in touch if you wish to be part of any of these groups.

Other networks not related to BPS

International DClinPsy Trainees Network, Black and Minority Ethnics in Psychiatry and Psychology (BiPP) Network, Black Aspiring Clinical Psychologists Network and CAPT collective for Asian psychological therapists.

Guidelines for contributors

If you wish to write an article for us, please send all copy and correspondence to the lead editor, Vanessa Yim, via email. Please ensure any article is no longer than 1500 words, is reflective in style and is related to equality, diversity and/or minoritised experiences.

Email: minorities.cp@gmail.com Twitter: @minoritiesgroup Facebook: Minorities in Clinical Psychology Group

mailto:dclin.labyrinth%40gmail.com?subject=http://www.twitter.com/DClin_Labyrinthhttps://anchor.fm/lifeinthelabyrinth/episodes/Episode-1-Introductions-and-Podcast-Vision-eh3teuhttps://bmesupport.typeform.com/to/fIxpnA https://disabilityclinpsy.typeform.com/to/KMTkW0https://www.dclinpsy-international.co.uk/ https://www.bippnetwork.org.uk/ https://www.bippnetwork.org.uk/ https://www.bippnetwork.org.uk/ https://twitter.com/bacpnetwork?lang=en https://casianpt.carrd.co/mailto:minorities.cp%40gmail.com?subject=mailto:minorities.cp%40gmail.com?subject=http://www.twitter.com/minoritiesgrouphttps://www.facebook.com/groups/711421852231602/