Courses

This seminar style class explores various and complex dimensions of diversity and inclusion in the workplace and in society. Students examine the barriers to professional advancement that are faced by non-mainstream groups. The course proposes an Inclusive Workplace Model and effective communication for managing complexity, engaging diversity, navigating difference, and removing obstacles to inclusion and to organizational effectiveness and growth.

Students bring diverse learning and skills from across their program in order to research and write and/or carry out a senior thesis or organizational project in leadership or strategic communication. Students gain skills in project management, research methodology, and integrative thinking in order to collect social scientific data, advance complex arguments, and/or help an organization achieve its communication goals. Students will gain deeper scholarly and professional understanding of communication, forge professional and academic contacts, and demonstrate mastery of relevant theory, principles and writing strategies. Students conclude the course with a public presentation to peers, faculty, and professional leaders regarding the main project.

Students are required to produce an outline of the topics to be studied in consultation with the instructor. A course of reading and writing is pursued according to the approved outline.

The course provides opportunity for the articulation of transformational leadership (both cultural and personal). It requires leaders to communicate their vision of growth and opportunity. Students gain insight into effective leadership communication as they examine the worldviews, history, and economic challenges in developing nations (in East Africa and Central America). This course explores underlying cultural and faith-based worldviews by means of an interdisciplinary travel study. Specifically, the course explores social and humanitarian responses to critical social issues in the Global South. Through readings, lectures (including field practitioners and experts), and field experiences, students are exposed to the complex nature of human problems and social responses. Students seek to understand critical social issues in light of cultural, environmental, economic, political, and historical frameworks. Of particular interest is the manner in which religious worldview shapes one's response to the disadvantaged, and how the transformational model informs leadership behaviour and the development process.

This course introduces the classic and post-modern family systems concepts and theories. Multiple models of family systems therapy will be presented to provide a framework for conceptual integration and application to clinical practice. Throughout the course students will be encouraged to assess and integrate family therapy theories with a Christian worldview. This course also provides opportunities for professional development through personal reflection and the construction of an integrated therapeutic perspective on the process of change and care within family therapy.

This course introduces students to conceptual, executive, and perceptual therapy skills, including forming a therapeutic relationship, clinical documentation, crisis management and countertransference issues. The skills will be acquired in class lectures and exercises as well as weekly practice sessions with their peers. Issues that are related to diversity and power and privilege as they relate to the areas of age, gender, sexual orientation, health/ability, culture, SES, spirituality, and ethnicity will also be addressed. Open only to MAMFT graduate students or with special permission.

This course will cover the assessment and treatment of major psychopathologies of the DSM – 5. Students will gain familiarity with the DSM, and alternative approaches to psychological distress. Students will learn about various diagnostic techniques and some psychological assessment tools relevant to the disorders studied. MFT specific assessment perspectives and practices will be covered within the course, and psychopharmacological treatment of the different disorders will also be addressed. The role of spirituality in psychological dysfunction and well-being will be explored.

This course provides students with an understanding of clinical research methods and design. Additionally, this course addresses the relevance of research to students’ clinical work. Students will investigate existing research and research methods used in MFT, including quantitative and qualitative and mixed methods designs. Ethical issues and considerations in research will also be addressed, as well as learning to critically evaluate existing research. A primary aim of this course is to help students become evidence-based practitioners and navigate how to critically evaluate current research.

This course introduces the theory and practice of multicultural counselling and family therapy including various aspects of diversity: identity formation, race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexual orientation, spirituality, ability/disability, and aging. Students will have the opportunity to explore their own culturally informed belief systems, values, and practices. Research and class content will focus on knowledge and understanding worldviews that underlie client behavior, relationships, and resources. Ethical issues and culturally sensitive therapeutic approaches will be explored. Emphasis will be placed on integration of personal awareness, theoretical knowledge, and contextual clinical competencies. Open to counselling/family therapy students, as well as chaplaincy and cross-cultural ministry students.