Foundations, roles, and the supervision relationship
We start with why supervision exists: to protect clients, develop supervisees, fulfill licensure requirements and form professional identity. We also cover what supervision isn’t, namely therapy, consultation, a staff meeting or a training seminar with a clipboard. You’ll get an overview of Oregon’s Supervisor Candidate and Approved Supervisor pathways, and we’ll start mapping power from the very first email with a potential supervisee.

Activities: a role-sorting exercise (supervision, therapy, consultation, staff meeting or training?), a supervisor roles map of the roles you know well, avoid and overuse, a supervision values inventory, and a power map of a first contact: who chooses, who pays, who evaluates, and who gets believed if there’s conflict.

Oregon compliance, contracts, informed consent, and supervision plans
This is paperwork week, taught as care rather than punishment. We turn Oregon’s requirements into a working system: what has to happen before an associate starts practicing, what happens every month, and what happens annually and at the end. We also cover plan approval, title use, informed consent, the limits of supervisee confidentiality, group supervision rules, and what goes in a supervision file.

Activities: building a four-part Oregon compliance checklist, reviewing sample associate bios for title problems, drafting the first sections of your supervision agreement, writing a confidentiality script in your own voice, working through monthly supervision math scenarios, and writing a supervision note from a risk scenario.

Supervision theory, roles in action, and clinical skill development
We treat theory as a decision-making tool, not a decorative citation garden. We compare developmental, discrimination, competency-based, reflective and systems-informed models, and practice choosing a role based on what the supervisee, the client and the moment need. We also cover active methods that go beyond case discussion, plus parallel process and how to use somatic and relational information ethically.

Activities: matching models to scenarios, role-selection practice, role-play, modeling and direct-observation planning, a somatic supervisor pause (noticing urgency, rescue impulses and defensiveness before you respond), and a lab where you draft your supervision theory statement.

Decolonial, liberatory, and culturally responsive supervision
This week treats culturally responsive supervision as part of competence, not an optional values add-on. We cover power, coloniality, liberation psychology, cultural humility, and LGBTQ+, trans, neurodivergent and body-liberatory supervision. We also work on how to repair after you cause harm, because you will, and that’s where the skill is.

Activities: rewriting deficit-based case questions (“Why is the client noncompliant?” becomes “What is this client adapting to?”), practicing broaching conversations in pairs, a liberation-lens case consultation, an accessibility audit of your supervision structure, repair practice after realistic missteps, and adding culture, power and access language to your supervision agreement.

Ethics, feedback, evaluation, remediation, and gatekeeping
Avoiding feedback is not kindness. This week covers how to evaluate clearly, give feedback early, tell developmental concerns apart from competence, ethical, impairment and safety concerns, write remediation plans people can actually follow, and gatekeep with dignity. We also cover when to consult and when to notify the Board.

Activities: sorting concerns by type, practicing feedback with a step-by-step formula, drafting a remediation plan, rewriting a supervision note that has more feelings than facts, and gatekeeping role-plays in triads with supervisor, supervisee and observer roles.

Integration, capstone, implementation, and next steps
The last week pulls everything together. Each participant gives a five-minute capstone presentation on their supervision approach, followed by five minutes of peer consultation. Then we plan your first 90 days as a supervisor and map out your ongoing consultation and supervision-of-supervision support. You’ll also get certificate instructions and hear about the optional supervision-of-supervision consultation group. Thirty hours is a foundation, not a personality transplant.

Activities: capstone presentations and peer consultation, first-90-days implementation planning, consultation network mapping, course evaluation, and a closing ritual.

Yes, but it’s manageable. Most weeks you’ll revise or draft a piece of your supervision starter packet, such as your values statement, supervision agreement, monthly tracker or feedback script, and bring a de-identified or imagined scenario to work with. You don’t need to bring polished drafts. Something real enough to work on is the goal.

You’ll be invited to, never surprised into it. Every skills practice comes with written instructions, choices about which role to take, and the option to observe. Observing counts as participating.