The BPS state that you usually have to gain voluntary experience before you apply for paid work. Places to find relevant voluntary experience include:

• NUSU: Go Volunteer – volunteering with internal and external, local and national organisations. Related projects include: Watch Your Head, Friends Action North East, Nightline, Crisis (Register and login to see full details of all opportunities).
• Mental Health North East - opportunities across the region
• Do-it - search using the key words 'mental health' in the advanced search box 
• TimeBank- volunteering by area
• V-inspired- community volunteering
• National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO)
• Careers Service: Career Development module – you could work with children with special educational needs or behavioural issues
• Place2Be - placements for people training to be child counsellors 
• Counselling helplines such as NUSU Nightline, Relate and Samaritans recruit volunteers - see the NHS directory for specialist helplines

See Volunteering for more options. 

Part-time work can help you develop relevant skills. Care assistant roles, for example, can be useful experience for getting into psychology. To search, see Finding a part-time job.

• MyCareer - advertises paid, part-time personal carer, care assistant and support worker vacancies
• NHS Jobs – find part-time healthcare assistant or related jobs
• Universal Jobmatch - advertises part-time care assistant and similar roles
• Community Care Jobs
• jobsgopublic- includes part-time vacancies in social care
• UK Home Care Association - search for local care associations with vacancies

University psychology departments are sent paid and voluntary vacancies, so check emails from your School. Most paid opportunities sent to Newcastle University School of Psychology will be advertised by the Careers Service on MyCareer and non-paid opportunities will be sent to Go Volunteer.

Making contacts is essential for success in this sector. Work experience in this field can be gained through networking and speculative applications. You could start with:

• NCL Spark – our online mentoring platform, with graduates happy to give you advice about the kind of work they do
• Newcastle alumni on LinkedIn – find out what they did after graduation and contact them for advice
• The BPS Directory of Chartered Psychologists - contact psychologists to find out how they gained work experience. 

Social media, particularly LinkedIn and Twitter, is useful for making contacts, finding employers and opportunities and keeping up to date with the field. Find out more about how to use social media for your career. The BPS, for example, have a Facebook page, a Research Digest Facebook page  and Twitter feed.

The School of Psychology has a Facebook page where you can find out about research projects, information, and opportunities inside and outside the University. Visit the School of Psychology Twitter feed for CV enhancing opportunities.

Research project participation

Gain related research experience by taking part in a psychological project as a participant. Newcastle University staff and students conduct research in various areas of psychology. Newcastle University psychology students engage with research run in the School through the Research Participation Scheme.

This experience will give you awareness of how a research project is carried out. You will be supporting scientific research and contributing to new insights about behaviour. If you are keen, express your interest and network with researchers it’s also possible you may be able to assist with future projects.

Vacation projects

Newcastle University's School of Psychology offers vacation projects to their students. To work on a project, you need to approach the appropriate supervisor as soon as possible. The schemes encourage you to develop your own project ideas with a potential supervisor. With their help, you submit an application. Project applications are assessed on their scientific merit, and academic merit to the student.

Speculative approaches

As well as psychology research, there are also interdisciplinary areas involving psychology. Beyond research interests within the School, research takes place in academic units or groupings including other Faculties, the NHS and elsewhere in Newcastle.

Do your research. Approach academics carrying out studies in areas that interest you with a tailored CV and covering letter explaining your motivation, interest in their work and what you can offer.

Blackboard

Find opportunities to assist with research and research internships on the School of Psychology Blackboard pages. 

Use contacts (see above) to ask about Work shadowing. Shadowing relevant practitioners can develop your knowledge of a role and organisation and can demonstrate your commitment in applications. Find organisations or individuals with roles that that interest you and get in touch, always with a named contact.

Be specific about why you are writing to them and what you’re looking for. Show your enthusiasm for the sector and highlight any relevant skills. 

Don’t give up if you don’t get a reply – follow up with a phone call or email to show that you’re keen.

Use the BPS Directory of Chartered Psychologists to contact psychologists to ask about work shadowing or an information interview.

Other places you could approach include:

• Hospitals
• Schools
• Nursing homes
• Sports teams
• Community Mental Health Teams
• Social care services
• Local authorities
• Prison service
• Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS)
• Probation service

See Researching Employers for more information on finding organisations for shadowing experience.

Psychology professional placements

Newcastle University School of Psychology offers year-long professional psychology placements.  Students from all single honours and joint honours programmes can apply. Use your knowledge and skills in a practical context, and gain an advantage in a competitive job market.

Students undertake placements in a variety of settings, for example working for the NHS Foundation Trust, Northumbria Police, Newcastle University Institute of Neuroscience, and local mental health support charities.  The School has a dedicated placement team who secure a set of placements, or students can source their own placement.

Placement year module

Newcastle Careers Service also offers a placement year module option for undergraduate penultimate year students who opt not to or are unable to take the Psychology Professional Placement year.

Clinical psychology is extremely competitive. To get onto a clinical psychology doctorate, you normally need to have at least six months' paid work experience. Many Universities look for at least 12 months clinical related experience.

Assistant psychologist or research assistant posts are usually the best route into the doctorate. Jobs are advertised on the NHS website and in the local press, but you can also make a speculative approach. See the British Psychological Society (BPS) for a directory of chartered psychologists.

Experience in areas such as social work, nursing assistant or a care assistant is valuable. Anything that gives you clinical experience with a client can be helpful. The focus is usually on roles which involve direct work with people who have psychological needs.

You don't have to get experience as an assistant psychologist (although that is one of the best ways to get the right experience). It does help if any work done has links with psychologists, so you can show that you understand the role of a clinical psychologist.

The BPS and Clearing House for Postgraduate Courses in Clinical Psychology handbook detail other work experience that can help when applying for a clinical psychology doctorate.

• Experience in other related settings such as hospitals, health centres, community mental health teams, child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) and social care services can enhance your understanding of the profession and your transferable skills.

For vacancy sites, see Finding jobs on the following pages:

• Probation and Social Work,
• Community, Advice and Guidance Work
• Healthcare

Recruitment agencies can also be a source of vacancies

You could write your dissertation with a clinician or a trainee.

Sources of experience relevant to this area includes:

• working in the Probation Service
• experience in Secure Units/hospitals including secure children’s homes. These can often reflect the nature of prisons and let you see if you could cope with working in a high security environment
• work with with mental health charities like MIND - especially in an advisory or ‘appropriate adult’ role
• Samaritans volunteering
• Victim Support – have a range of specialist services
• Circles of Support and Accountability (Circles) - local volunteers work with sex offenders to try to minimise alienation, support reintegration and so prevent sexual reoffending
• Forensic Psychiatric Units
• Observing in Court can offer useful insight
• shadowing in the field would also be very helpful, though is difficult to get

You will find that some of these opportunities won’t be advertised so you’d need to make a speculative approach, where you send a tailored CV and covering letter to enquire about opportunities such as work experience or shadowing. 

Other useful resources

Because of the nature of the experience useful for forensic psychology, our armed forces and law enforcement page is also relevant.

Gaining experience within the prison environment, is helpful in deciding if this is a field you’d feel comfortable working in. 

There are many opportunities to volunteer in this sector, including:

• Official Prison Visitors
• NACRO – provide volunteering opportunities for people wanting to gain experience working with young offenders 
• Prison Reform Trust
• Independent Monitoring Board (IMB) 
• Contact local prisons to arrange a visit and enquire about voluntary work. You can search for volunteering opportunities with offenders and ex-offenders on the Do-it website.

Our social work and probation – gaining experience section and also our community, advice and guidance – gaining experience also has sources of experience that are related to this field.

Some psychology students gain experience overseas. An internet search will list dozens of organisations that offer opportunities overseas, at a financial cost. These can be beneficial, but feedback is variable, as the articles below highlight.

• BPS Psychologist article - A Cautionary tale – a CBT therapist reflects on her overseas experience
• University of Westminster - Westminster abroad blog - feedback on overseas experience from a psychology student

Do your research before using an organisation to arrange overseas experience. Read reviews, check their social media pages.  Assess what you’re paying for, and whether you should be paying at all. Be clear about the ethical and safety considerations.

If you have any questions about gaining overseas experience or you need help to find opportunities, come in and speak to us and also speak to your personal tutor.

School of Psychology events

The School puts on regular careers events for students. Look out for emails about these. 

As well as giving insight into options available, use these events to do some networking. Ask speakers for advice on how they gained relevant experience. Check if they are happy to connect on LinkedIn. They may be willing to offer you some shadowing or research project work if you are proactive and enthusiastic. 

Student societies

Joining student societies is another way to gain experience. NUSU has relevant societies such as PsychoSoc, Helping our Homeless, and Mind the Gap (the University's mental health society).

You may also be interested in the Gaining experience sections of our Counselling and Psychotherapy, Applying to Medical School,  Healthcare, Complementary Therapies and Community Work or see our other Sector-specific pages for more options.