Applied Division

ACAP is known for its commitment to Applied Psychoanalysis, community engagement: the application of decades of experience in working with challenging people and situations to venues outside the clinical setting  Applied Psychoanalysis

A driving force in ACAP’s programming is a resolve to make our communities better, healthier places where people can live and thrive.

We recognized that the same methods used so successfully in the clinical office could be adapted and applied in groups and organizations where resistances to cooperation or learning, interpersonal conflicts, overwhelming tasks, and competing needs can interfere with maturation and productivity. With this in mind, ACAP faculty has developed programs and seminars in collaboration
with other community resources or organizations.

For example, in co-sponsoring training seminars with DYFS for their staff, ACAP has helped more than 400 DYFS workers learn new clinical skills that help them in their important work with children, and aid in preventing burnout from the enormous stresses of their jobs.

Every year hundreds of staff from schools and agencies filter through ACAP programs, gathering skills and abilities that help them be more comfortable and competent in their work. Among the recent programs sponsored by ACAP are:ACAP and community engagement

  • Conferences — “Emotional Resilience and the Child”
  • Summer Conferences — Held at Caldwell College. Open to everyone.
  • CRPN — The Community Resource Partnering Network. An organization of more than 50 agencies developed by ACAP to help enhance availability of community services
  • Joining Forces — a grant funded program providing advanced clinical training for agency and educational staff working with emotionally and behaviorally challenged, inner city children
  • Trauma Studies — programs for understanding types, origins and methods for working with people struggling with overwhelming life experiences.
  • Friday Night Live — ACAP’s lecture series that presents the community with opportunities for discussing timely and significant topics affecting personal relationships, family and work  life, and issues confronting mental health professionals.
  • Family Matters — ACAP’s cable TV program on the Hometowne Channel presenting mental health and educational guest experts discussing a variety of topics facing families today.
  • Parenting Programs — workshops, seminars and group experiences addressing challenging issues in parenting, e.g. “Mothers-Worth”, a program to help mothers with the conflicting feelings many face as stay-at-home moms.
  • Grotta — Communication and skills training to those who work and live with the aging.
  • BBL — Monthly brown bag lunch topic that is open to the public. Our purpose is to give anyoneLearn how to help your community through psychoanalysis who needs help for themselves, or others, the ability to face their life with a new viewpoint. How do we cope with these events? Hoe can we help our children to overcome their fears? How do we develop the personal strength, the resilience to deal with the next traumatic event in our lives? These are some of the issues we will be dealing with in our monthly meetings. Please contact Mrs. Liu at [email protected] to receive announcements about the BBL events.

I was an ACAP student about 7 years ago. I’ve always wanted to either team up on or attend workshops on using psychoanalytic techniques in leadership – both in dealing with the people I lead, but also dealing with the feelings leadership uncovers. I use the techniques I learned at ACAP in my role as a school district administrator every day with students, parents and staff. In my opinion, applying psychoanalytic techniques in leadership is an underserved niche. It’s not just about dealing with those who are led, but also dealing with the feelings that arise from the mantle of leadership and that get induced in the leader.

“I went back to the office and realized I was listening to clients differently. It happened so quickly, the shift in my ability to not personalize their difficult behaviors. They responded to this more relaxed attitude by becoming more calm and cooperative. Amazing.”

“ACAP is a community of people dedicated to listening to the dynamics of human relationships and emotions. It’s hard to describe the difference the ACAP tools have made in my ability to manage staff and to tolerate a frustrating system.”

“Instead of wanting to toss something at a resistant, defiant adolescent, I learned to become curious about what the behavior was saying. I now understood it as an attempt at healthy coping in a fragile developmental stage and started to appreciate rather than resent it. What an extraordinary shift this has made in me and in students’ ability to collaborate.”