Welcome to Morningstar Counseling and Consultation, P.C.! Thank you for taking the time to review our site. At Morningstar, we are committed to supporting the development of multiculturally-competent and ethical professionals with specific expertise in working across the lifespan with and within tribal nations and communities.
Interns receive training on the history of tribal communities, specifically with the Winnebago and UMÓⁿHOⁿ Nations in Nebraska. They will hear from elders, community members, and professionals working in the communities to learn about family structure, kinship roles, and traditional healing practices. Additionally, interns will receive extensive training in historical trauma, life on the reservations, and training focused on their own development of cultural humility and practice.
It is an honor to be invited into someone’s life to support them in their journey of healing. This invitation creates a relationship between the counselor and relative that is intimate and built upon trust. We honor this by recognizing those we serve as relatives due to the respect we have for that relationship and that individual. Interns have the opportunity to work with relatives across the lifespan and across sites at our K-12 tribal schools, the tribal colleges, the Morningstar outpatient clinic, and in integrated behavioral health through our partnership with the Nebraska Urban Indian Medical Center.
Morningstar has developed a decolonized model of supervision focusing on four quadrants of supervision training. Our first quadrant focuses on the systemic and societal norms (e.g., historical trauma, conflicting worldviews, and privilege) that impact training and supervision. The second quadrant focuses on the protection of providers (i.e., supervisees) who often experience secondary trauma, burnout, microaggressions, and imbalances in power throughout their training experiences. The third quadrant highlights the exclusion of culture in supervision models and training and ways supervisors can adapt current models and practices to address power differentials in supervision. The fourth quadrant speaks to the clinical adaptations that can be made (e.g., aesthetics of clinic, cultural integration, and policies and procedures) to ensure that supervision and training are equitable and responsive to all supervisees’ needs.
Consistent with our model, interns are intentionally integrated into our staff community. We welcome interns as equally contributing members of our team and value the expertise they bring to Morningstar over the course of their training year. We invite them to learn from a diversity of perspectives, become exposed to professional life, and participate in a multitude of training experiences. Our staff are dedicated to our tribal communities and the work we do to support health, healing, and hope. Here, you will become a member of a community that embraces cultural humility, integration of culture into practice, and fun!
I hope the information provided below is useful regarding our programs' components, goals, and application process. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to me at dr.hinojos@morningstar-counseling.com.
With best wishes,
Belinda Hinojos, PhD
Training Director
This program is a unique, specialized learning experience, working with tribal nations and communities across Nebraska. Interns will work collaboratively alongside psychologists from Morningstar Counseling and Consultation, P.C., (MCC) who have extensive experience in treating trauma, issues in diversity, and serving rural and reservation areas. This focus ultimately serves to reduce health disparities among Native/American Indian peoples while providing interns with diverse and comprehensive training opportunities. These training opportunities include outpatient treatment, school consultation and treatment, collaborative opportunities in integrated behavioral healthcare, and consultation, treatment, and outreach with tribal colleges. Our partners include: the Santee Sioux Nation, UMÓⁿHOⁿ Nation Public Schools, Winnebago Public Schools, Lincoln Public Schools, Nebraska Urban Indian Health Medical Center, Little Priest Tribal College, the Nebraska Indian Community College, and other tribal nations and colleges across the U.S.
In addition to Morningstar’s decolonized model of supervision, we also follow a culturally-adapted developmental model. In this culturally-adapted developmental model of supervision, interns will have the opportunity to observe/shadow MCC clinical staff during the intake process, and on-going sessions, prior to taking on their own caseload. We hope this will reduce any anxiety about working with the community and help interns feel more knowledgeable about Native/American Indian behavioral health needs prior to seeing relatives. Our goal is that as interns move through the internship year, they will begin to work more independently and begin to create their own collaborations and professional relationships within the reservation and nearby communities.
Morningstar provides services on the UMÓⁿHOⁿ Nation Reservation in Macy, NE, the Winnebago Reservation in Winnebago, NE, at our outpatient clinic in Lincoln, NE, at schools within the Lincoln Public School district, Lincoln, NE, and at Urban Indian Medical Center in Lincoln, NE. Morningstar makes efforts to place interns at sites based on their interests and chosen emphasis for the year. Interns are encouraged to live in Omaha to facilitate easy travel between the reservations and sites in Lincoln. This also allows interns to foster relationships with other interns in the NICPP cohort and to more easily attend monthly consortium meetings and events.
Morningstar requires each intern to participate in four full clinic days and dedicates one full day to secondary supervision and didactic training. Interns typically provide 15-20 hours per week of direct client contact (e.g., individual therapy, family therapy) and 25-30 total hours of direct contact activities, which include therapy, outreach programming, report writing, and case management. Additionally, 10-20 hours per week are allocated to didactic training and professional development. Interns receive four hours of supervision weekly, with the total time commitment at Morningstar averaging 40-45 hours per week.
Interns receive a minimum of two hours of weekly individual supervision by a licensed psychologist. A supervisor is on site with the intern and at minimum 50% of individual supervision is in-person, face to face. In addition, interns receive supervision for group therapy, supervision for the provision of supervision, assessment, supervision during the intern case conference, and supervision during the weekly intern meeting with the Training Director. Typically, interns receive a minimum of 4 hours of supervision per week (two hours individual and two hours in group supervision or case conference). In addition to their own supervision, interns may have the opportunity to provide supervision to our master’s level externs in the form of group supervision, consultation, and training. This opportunity varies by training year and depends on the size of the extern cohort.
*Additional meetings/supervision may need to be scheduled depending on the activities the intern is involved in (i.e., group supervision, supervision of supervision, outreach).
Interns training with Morningstar can expect to receive didactic training in Native/American Indian behavioral health, historical and intergenerational trauma, cultural healing practices, and a thorough introduction to the UMÓⁿHOⁿ Nation and Winnebago Public School systems. They will also be introduced to Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) that has been adapted to working specifically with the Native/American Indian community. These training techniques will guide interns in the treatment of multiple forms of trauma, grief, adjustment disorders, and other serious emotional concerns. There will be opportunities to administer assessments to children and adults for PTSD, ADHD, ASD, depression, anxiety, and other disorders that impact daily functioning. As part of our orientation, interns will receive clinical and cultural training along with introductions to Morningstar and our community partners.
Stipend is $40,000 with paid health insurance. 11 paid holidays with up to 10 days of PTO. Interns have use of MCC laptops, Google Workspace services, Zoom Workplace accounts, copying and phone services, and media services for development of presentations.
A completed application for the doctoral internship in health service psychology through NICPP at Morningstar Counseling and Consultation, P.C. (APPIC program code #141619) must be received no later than November 1, 2024 at 11:59 p.m. CST for the 2025-2026 training year.
For details on the steps for completing the NICPP application, please go to the NICPP website.
Program Match Number 141619
Training year: August 1, 2025 to July 31, 2026
