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About the fellowship program

The Social Work Fellowship Program at Boston Children's Hospital is committed to offering advanced training for clinical social workers.

Additional information

  • Post-graduate fellowships are offered in various areas of the hospital.
  • Positions are part time or full time, depending on the particular fellowship.
  • All fellowships except LEND provide full-time salary plus benefits.

Fellowship descriptions

Fellowship in Adolescent Health

Application deadline: Feb. 1, 2023

The Boston LEAH (Leadership Education in Adolescent Health) multidisciplinary training program has a one-year social work fellowship from Sept. 1 to Aug. 31.

Applicants must be post-master's social workers who are licensed or license eligible at a LCSW level or above, and they must have an interest or experience in working with adolescents. Boston Children’s Hospital’s LEAH is one of seven training programs in the U.S. devoted to leadership training in adolescent health, and it is sponsored by the Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Bureau of the Health Resources and Services Administration, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The LEAH program trains fellows from five disciplines: social work, medicine, nursing, nutrition, and psychology.

Clinical work occurs in the context of interdisciplinary care in the Adolescent Medical Practice, a primary care and specialty care program. The fellowship stresses competency in clinical work with adolescents, including assessment and treatment for depression, anxiety, trauma, and eating disorders, and participation on a multidisciplinary mental health team. LEAH Social Work fellows have the opportunity to work with patients for ongoing counseling as well as provide consultation and crisis intervention in the primary care clinic. The program offers intensive interdisciplinary and discipline-specific curricula on Tuesday mornings, including seminars and case-based learning in adolescent health promotion, research, advocacy, public policy, prevention, LGBTQIA+ health, teaching, psychopharmacology, health equity, and more. There is also a biweekly eating disorders case conference. Once a month there is a joint session for all fellows and faculty from the Division of Adolescent/Young Adult Medicine, during which journal club, morbidity and mortality rounds, quality improvement, and timely adolescent health topics and leadership lectures are presented. There is opportunity to attend trainings in other departments in the hospital and to participate in a project. Two hours a week are devoted to individual and group supervision.

The fellowship is full-time including one evening clinic each week and runs from Sept. 1, 2023, through Aug. 31, 2024. Applications for the Social Work Fellowship in Adolescent Health are due no later than Feb. 1, 2023.

Applications for the Social Work Fellowship in Adolescent Health are due no later than Feb. 1, 2022. Top candidates will be invited to interview, with final selection in early April.

For more information on the LEAH Social Work Fellowship Program, please email swtraininginfo@childrens.harvard.edu.

The Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Fellowship

Deadline for applications is no later than Feb. 1, 2023.

The Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences offers a full time fellowship providing a solid, broad-based training opportunity in child and adolescent mental health. The fellowship offers intensive supervision by senior staff as well as participation in numerous social work and multidisciplinary trainings and seminars. These include Psychotherapy Seminar, Social Work Didactic Seminar, Child Protection Seminar, Psychiatry Grand Rounds, and Psychiatry Morbidity and Mortality Conference among others.

The Fellow’s clinical work will be in Outpatient and Emergency Psychiatry. In Outpatient Psychiatry, diagnostic evaluations and psychotherapy with children and adolescents, parents and families form the core of the fellowship. One afternoon per week, the Fellow will work in the Emergency Psychiatry Service, learning to do emergency assessments and crisis intervention. The Fellow will spend one afternoon per week doing an elective that will be identified in consultation with the Training Director. Electives of recent fellows have included suicide prevention research, substance abuse evaluation and treatment, and research and practice with refugees and immigrants. The fellowships run from September through August. Compensation is full time salary of $43,000 plus benefits.

Pediatric Palliative Care Fellowship

Application deadline: Feb. 1, 2023

The Pediatric Advanced Care Team (PACT), the pediatric palliative care service at Boston Children’s Hospital and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, is offering a full-time, year-long social work fellowship (July 2023 to June 2024). The PACT Social Work Fellowship seeks to provide subspecialty practice and education to future practitioners and leaders in the field of pediatric palliative care.

PACT is an interprofessional team that supports the treatment of underlying illness while maximizing the quality of life in children with serious medical conditions. Through a family centered approach, PACT promotes healing, comfort, and making childhood experiences meaningful. The team includes physicians, nurse practitioners, nurses, and social workers, and works closely with chaplains, communication specialists, psychologists, child life specialists, and numerous other therapeutic and psychosocial providers.

PACT provides inpatient and outpatient care as well as support in the community and home settings. The fellow functions as part of an interprofessional team and is responsible for consultation with other medical providers. The fellowship experience includes academic opportunities such as grand rounds, a quality improvement project, and small group teaching.

As the premier pediatric palliative care social work fellowship in the country, this unique training program provides the opportunity to participate in an intensive clinical and didactic training experience. The fellow will work closely with our medical and nurse practitioner fellows, and will receive social work specific and interprofessional palliative care training. The fellow will have the opportunity to work with patients and their families as well as facilitate and administer the PACT bereavement program, including a parent/sibling bereavement group. There will be opportunities to gain knowledge and experience with related community resources, hospice, and bereavement services.

Fellows receive weekly supervision and will work very closely with social work and interprofessional mentors dedicated to the training and support of interdisciplinary fellows. The fellow will have the opportunity to attend PACT educational rounds featuring interprofessional experts in the field of pediatric palliative care and will participate in the nationally recognized Harvard Medical School Interprofessional Palliative Care Fellowship Program.

The PACT Social Work Fellowship is designed for candidates with a serious interest in the field of pediatric palliative care. It seeks to train the next generation of palliative care subspecialty clinicians and leaders. Experience in pediatrics, hospital-based work, complex and chronic illness, and/or related fields is strongly preferred. As relentless as we are in our mission to reduce the burden of serious illness for all, we are equally committed to diversifying our faculty, staff, and trainees. Serious and life-threatening illnesses know no boundaries and, when it comes to hiring the most dedicated and diverse professionals, neither do we. If working in this kind of organization and team inspires you, we encourage you to apply. This is an opportunity to work with one of the first and most established pediatric palliative care teams in the country.

Compensation is full-time salary plus benefits as an entry-level, post-graduate social worker.

Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental Disabilities (LEND) Part Time Fellowship

Deadline: Spring 2023 rolling

This is an opportunity for a Master's Level social work fellow to develop advocacy skills and learn more about developmental disabilities. This program requires 1.5 days per week, with Friday as a mandatory day.

The LEND program at Boston Children's Hospital provides interdisciplinary education (didactic and experiential) for a diverse group of fellows. Our goals are to improve the health of infants, children and adolescents who have, or are at risk for neurodevelopment and related disabilities. This program is in conjunction with the Institute for Community Inclusion at University of Mass., Boston.

Highlights:

  • Didactic seminars on leadership, evidence-based practices across disciplines, interdisciplinary collaboration, cultural awareness, public health perspectives, conflict resolution, and policy, and approaches from a family systems perspective.
  • Observation of various interdisciplinary clinical teams.
  • Participation in a three-day policy/advocacy conference in Washington DC that involve training in legislative and policy matters and an chance to advocate directly on Capitol Hill with your own congressman and senators.
  • Opportunity to work with community based organizations serving child and families with special health care needs.
  • In-home experience with a family whose child has a developmental disability through the Linking Hands program at Boston Children's Hospital.
  • Ongoing work with community-based multicultural organizations.

$4,000 stipend available.

Please note: because this fellowship is part-time, no benefits are offered.

For a LEND application and more information about this fellowship, please contact Lauren Berman, LICSW.

Contact us

For more information on the Social Work Fellowship Program, please email us at swtraininginfo@childrens.harvard.edu.

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