PSA on The Centre of Therapy
I'm a student with The Centre of Therapy and Counselling Studies (CTCS) on their Level 11 CBT postgrad programme (Scotland).
I'm posting this here as a PSA for anyone looking to train as a psychotherapist in Glasgow/Edi.
If you're looking for a programme with support and guidance, especially if you're changing careers like I am, PLEASE do your research before studying with this organisation. However, I'd personally recommend that you... don't.
Their Level 11 is now awarded by Abertay University, so I enrolled thinking that though they're a charity, the programme would be run at a professional university level. This has not been the case whatsoever. Abysmal doesn't begin to describe the experience I've invested nearly £10K into. I genuinely can't get over how they're even still in business at this point. No consistent student support. No clear communication. Awful.
Tutors never seemed to know what the details of specific assignments were and had to ask the admin team (???), there were similar issues with supervisors. Constant uncertainty. Never any straight answers. Safety planning was covered months after we started with real placement clients. So unethical. The list goes on and on. Absolutely nothing was straightforward and the entire experience has essentially been self-led and just so so disappointing.
There were even instances where many in my cohort felt concerns were minimised and dismissed when we raised them internally with staff. I will say the majority of staff/tutors seem like competent psychotherapists at the mercy of a poorly constructed programme though. However, their CEO seems to deflect real issues unlike anything I've ever seen. The irony of someone, who is a therapist themselves, not taking accountability for the state of this programme is beyond me. And Abertays lack of oversight is worse. This experience has taught me that regulation needs to be so much tighter in this vocation.
On that note, I should say that I've heard CTCS are trying to make improvements because of recent complaints put into Abertay by some other students but, in any case, my experience (and my wider cohort's) has been so bad that I felt it was almost a duty of care to post this for anyone looking to start training. Maybe I was naive and this is a common experience within other therapy training programmes, but I thought I'd share all the same.