Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation Postdoctoral Training - Jump Start

Childcare centers or telehealth.

Monday-Friday, 8:00 a.m.-4:00 p.m.

The post-doctoral fellow in this rotation will serve as the Continuous Quality Improvement Specialist for a large grant providing mental health consultation in childcare centers. The focus of the Jump Start grant is to improve the capacity of early care and education teachers to address challenging behaviors within childcare programs. The fellow will oversee a team of 26 mental health consultants to provide feedback on the quality of services delivered.  In order to ensure quality improvement, the fellow will analyze results of service delivery and will assist with efforts to revise or develop program materials to ensure they are meeting the needs of the participants. In addition, the fellow will assist with program evaluation and will oversee a team of research assistants who enter data into REDCap. Responsibilities will include ensuring productive research outcomes include publications and conference presentations. Additional opportunities include grant writing. This position does not provide ongoing direct services to children. Rather, the fellow provides mental health consultation to teachers, assistant, and program directors who regularly interact with children. 

• Must be willing to provide services off-campus and have reliable transportation
• Must be comfortable going into childcare centers
• Must be adept at working independently in the field
• Attend weekly individual supervision
• Attend weekly group supervision with the Mental Health Consultants
• Attend team meetings as schedule allows
• Attend Infant Mental Health trainings leading towards Infant Mental Health-Endorsement

Data is collected at a program, teacher, and child level across 26 childcare centers related to the early childhood mental health consultation model. Opportunities to lead or co-author manuscripts is welcomed and encouraged. Grant writing opportunities will be available. 

Jump Start allows for coordination between multidisciplinary teams of teachers, early childhood specialists, mental health consultants, and special education staff.

Assessments

The fellow will conduct quarterly fidelity assessments for 26 mental health consultants.

Intervention

Monitoring of program-level, classroom-level, and child-level interventions will occur for all 26 mental health consultants on a rotating basis

Consultations

Quarterly consultations are provided with mental health consultants

Prevention

Jump Start is a tertiary prevention program designed to prevent children from being expelled from preschool.

Weekly individual and group supervision. Scaffolding model with on-site supervision required at the beginning of the rotation and then as needed. 

Opportunities to supervise research assistants and practicum students.