A Message from the Director

Counselling, psychotherapy and counselling psychology are new, rapidly developing, sister professions. Their practitioners need to have had a substantial period of supervised practice, and a sound knowledge of underlying theory. However good their training is, practitioners also need the personal maturity, which can only be gained by having lived through difficult times in their own lives. Indeed such crises may represent a special opportunity for personal development. Existential psychotherapy does not focus on what has gone wrong in a person's life, but on how a person may discover a deeper sense of being through the experience of anguish and a sense of meaning through tackling life's challenges.

The teaching and training provided by the New School incorporates this basic value by recognising that life experience, in addition to formal academic training, is a basic requirement for starting to learn counselling or psychotherapy.

There is no short-cut to learning a profession, however, and at the completion of the professional qualifications provided by the New School, students will have acquired a substantial body of new theoretical and practical knowledge, leading to a post-graduate Diploma or a Masters degree validated by the University of Sheffield or a Postgraduate Diploma or an MSc degree from Middlesex University. The complete four year psychotherapy training programme leads to professional registration with the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy as an existential psychotherapist.

The courses at the New School provide several entry points, depending on prior experience and qualifications, and several levels of qualification. If, after reading this website, you are unclear which course of study or which entry point is most appropriate to you, do not hesitate to ring us to discuss your own needs. We look forward to your call or application.

Emmy van Deurzen