Admissions Open House
2025-01-23 19:00 - 20:00 (America/New_York)
Learn about our extensive training opportunities for Fall 2025 in:
Advanced Psychoanalysis
Foundations of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
Child, Adolescent, Parent Psychotherapy
Couples Therapy
Join us to meet our program directors and ask questions of current candidates, graduates, and faculty.
Hear candidates discuss the transformational impact of training: deepening their work in agency settings and building/growing their private practices with the help of our collegial referral network.
With optional in-person learning and social opportunities in Westchester and Connecticut
CE credits will be offered for the coursework.
Financial aid is available to those who qualify.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals: MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT

Maintaining Professional Boundaries in Psychotherapy (Ethics Course)
2025-01-26 10:00 - 13:00
This 3-Hour CE Course meets the NYSED Office of the Professions requirement for Ethics and Appropriate Boundaries for LCSWs, LMSWs, LMHCs, LMFTs, Licensed Psychoanalysts and Licensed Psychologists.
3 CE HOURS
Presented by:
Bruce V. Hillowe, JD, PhD
The New York State Board of Regents mandated that effective April 1, 2023, psychologists, social workers and mental health practitioners (LMHC’s, LMFT’s, LPsa’s and LCAT’s) take as part of their required continuing education a three credit course on the maintenance of professional boundaries with patients. The reason for the new requirement is concern about the number of professional disciplinary proceedings by the State’s licensing boards against mental health professionals where boundaries have allegedly been violated. This course has been designed to meet the State’s mandatory CE requirement for both boundaries and ethics: courses on boundaries that cover New York laws, rules and regulations related to unprofessional conduct may also be counted toward the ethics requirement.
Topics to be discussed will include the ethical, professional, legal and clinical backgrounds for boundaries; discriminating between boundary crossings and violations; the establishment and maintenance of boundaries at the outset of and during psychotherapy including issues of multiple relationships, at- risk patients and social media; the challenge of vulnerable patients and therapists; and maintaining clinical creativity and flexibility within the therapeutic frame. The potential harm and legal consequences of boundary violations will also be reviewed. The presenter is Bruce V. Hillowe JD PhD, a psychologist-psychoanalyst and mental health care attorney who has defended hundreds of mental health practitioners in professional disciplinary proceedings in New York State, many of them for alleged boundary violations.
Presenter
Bruce V. Hillowe, JD, PhD, is a mental healthcare attorney with a law practice in Mineola, New York. A graduate of Binghamton University, Duke University School of Law, and Adelphi University Derner Institute (Clinical Psychology and Postdoctoral Programs), he formerly practiced as a psychologist-psychoanalyst, including as a coordinator of clinical training and director of a forensic mental health service. He was a teaching attending psychologist in law and ethics at a major teaching hospital for 15 years. He currently teaches courses in ethics and law as adjunct faculty at the Derner Institute. He is legal counsel to numerous mental health facilities, institutes, and practitioners and sponsors legal plans for professional associations. He has written articles and book chapters including for law reviews and healthcare publications, is listed in the Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers in healthcare law and is a “SuperLawyer” featured in the New York Times Magazine.

The "Big Shot" Raises His Fee: Social Class in the Psychoanalytic Encounter
2025-02-07 19:00 - 21:00
The role of social class in the analytic encounter has been given little attention in our psychoanalytic literature and training institutes. This dimension of the treatment relationship tends to remain invisible most of the time. However, when the analyst raises the fee, it can become a catalyst for bringing social class concerns of both patient and analyst into the treatment room. The fee increase discussed in this presentation evokes shame, envy, and guilt for both participants, each raised in a working-class home. The author considers unconscious dynamics informing psychoanalytic work between patients and analysts who outwardly appear to have no conflict about their social class origins but privately harbor much shame and anger about where they come from.

Foundations and Advanced Psychoanalytic Training Programs Open House
2025-02-19 19:00 - 20:00
The Foundations of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy Training Program is a two-year program designed to provide candidates with a solid theoretical and clinical base in psychoanalytic psychotherapy. A three-pronged approach is used, which includes coursework, personal therapy, and consultation/supervision with a number of master clinicians who are a part of the WCSPP Faculty. Candidates will learn how to better recognize aspects of their work that are occurring outside the conscious awareness of the patient (or even the clinician) and how to use this expanded understanding in a dynamic, transformative way.
The Advanced Psychoanalytic Training Program is open to graduates of the Foundations Program and/or an equivalent program at another training institute. The Advanced course is an additional three-year program (beyond the Foundations program) that provides further in-depth training in psychoanalysis. The training consists of concurrent participation in didactic course work, supervised clinical work, and a personal psychoanalysis. Such an intense immersion enables the candidate to transform experientially and deeply understand the empirical basis of theoretical formulations and to develop analytic skill in the conceptualization and execution of psychoanalytic work.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals:
MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT
Financial Aid is available for those who qualify.
Timeline:
Rolling admissions with decisions made by July 30, 2025
Program begins September 2025
We will continue to be on Zoom for the 2025-2026 year.

Reclaiming the Power of Female Aggression, a Psychoanalytic Perspective
2025-02-28 19:00 - 21:00
2 CE HOURS
NY Practitioners – LCSWs, LMSWs, LPs, LMFTs, LMHCs, LCATs, PHDs, PSYDs
This presentation addresses the fraught relationship between women and aggression, one that is troubled by age-old patriarchal forces that disparage the ambitions, assertions and voices of women.
Approached from a psychoanalytic perspective, the presentation details the sociocultural forces that infect a woman’s intrapsychic dynamics and compel her to sacrifice her goals and dreams.
The critical question of how a woman can ever succeed in this disabling environment is addressed through the stories of six highly influential women who reimagine their own “nastiness” as an innovative, vitalizing tool that powers their success.

Janet Rivkin Zuckerman, PhD, JD, is a psychologist, psychoanalyst, and previously practicing attorney. She is Former Director, current Faculty, and Clinical Consultant at the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis & Psychotherapy, and Clinical Consultant at the NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychotherapy & Psychoanalysis. She conducts supervision and study groups in interpersonal/relational psychoanalysis and is in private practice in Rye, NY. She can be reached at janetzuckerman@gmail.com.
Round Table Discussants
Janet Shimer, LCSW, MBA is current Co-Executive Director of the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. She is Faculty and Supervisor, WCSPP; She earned her Certificate in Psychoanalysis and Supervision at WCSPP. She is a Former Director of WCSPP Annual Conference; a Former Director of WCSPP Marketing, and Past President, WCSPP Psychoanalytic Association. She is in private practice in Armonk, NY.
Sylvia Steinert, LCSW is the current co-Executive Director of WCSPP and Faculty, WCSPP. Steinert holds certificates in psychoanalysis and supervision from WCSPP. She is in private practice in Ridgefield, CT and in Manhattan.
Diane Malkin, LCSW is incoming Co-Executive Director of the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. She has been the Co-Director of Admissions for WCSPP for two years. Diane earned her Certificate in Psychoanalysis and Supervision at WCSPP. She has a private practice in Ardsley, New York.
Jennifer Havens, MD is the Arnold Simon Professor and Chair of the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, Director of the Child Study Center at Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital, and Director of Child and Adolescent Behavioral Health Strategy & Growth in the Office of Behavioral Health at NYC Health and Hospitals. Dr. Havens is an expert in the treatment of behavioral and mental health issues in children and adolescents who have experienced complex trauma.

Start of the Spring Trimester
2025-03-04

WCSPP Film Night: "The Quiet Girl"
2025-03-07 19:30 - 21:30
2 CE Hours available to NYS
LCSWs, LMSWs, LPs, LMFTs, LMHCs, LCATs, Psychologists and PsyDs
This film is available for viewing on Kanopy, Amazon, Google Play and other Streaming Services
Watch the Movie before the Event — then Join Us To Discuss!
A discussion will be facilitated via ZOOM by Sarah Fisher, LCSW & Carter Thornton, LCAT, LP
Co-Hosted by WCSPP’s Child Adolescent, Parent Psychotherapy Training Program (CAPP)
This film provides a unique opportunity to reflect upon the vulnerability both children and parents feel as they experience loss, and grief, over the course of their development. It also sheds light on the impact of different caregiving styles and the challenges of economic hardship.
Sarah Fisher, LCSW, is finishing the CAPP program at WCSPP and is co-chair of the Film Committee. She has over 25 years of experience working with children, adolescents and families in Westchester County. She is currently working with Westchester Jewish Community Services (WJCS) as Director of WJCS’s Mobile Crisis Response Teams (MCRT), which provide mental health co-responses to police departments in Northern and Central Westchester County.
Carter Thornton, LCAT, LP, is a Psychoanalyst and Creative Arts Therapist in private practice in Westchester County, NY. Thornton teaches at WCSPP and is co-chair of the Film Committee. He is a graduate of the Institute for Expressive Analysis, where he teaches, supervises, and has served on the board as Program Chair. He is also a visual artist and musician.

CAPP Training Program Open House
2025-03-15 12:00 - 13:00
Learn about our extensive training opportunities for Fall 2025 in: Child, Adolescent, Parent Psychotherapy
Our program weaves together the study of individual child & adolescent, and parent development through understanding the impact of psychological histories, relational patterns, intergenerational effects, and changing social contexts and constructs. Training is based on a psychodynamic, relational orientation to change, integrating parent guidance and advice as needed.
We welcome all mental health practitioners, whether your work is exclusive to children & adolescents, primarily serves adults or some combination. We never forget that there is, after all, a child’s history within each adult and the challenge of growing within every child, adult, and parent.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals:
MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT
Financial Aid is available for those who qualify.
CE hours available for some coursework for eligible NYS LCSW, LMSW, LMFT, LMHC,LCAT, LP and NYS Psychologists and CT Social Workers through NASW CT.
Timeline:
Rolling admissions with decisions made by July 30, 2025
Program begins September 2025
We will continue to be on Zoom for the 2025-2026 year.

The Power to Heal
2025-03-16 12:00 - 14:00
2 CE HOURS
NY Practitioners – LCSWs, LMSWs, LPs, LMFTs, LMHCs, LCATs, PHDs, PSYDs
This clinical seminar offers an overview of neurodevelopmental disorders and learning differences that interfere with academic, social, emotional and behavioral development. Participants will learn how to incorporate a neurodevelopmental perspective in their ongoing diagnostic curiosity. A key component of the seminar will be addressing the psychodynamic challenges people with neurodevelopmental issues and learning differences face, how these constant challenges are understood as microtraumas that affect the nervous system and affect dysregulation and how that in turn may negatively influence learning and behavior.
Sheri Perlman, OT, LCSW is an adult, teen and child psychotherapist and psychoanalyst. Sheri’s particular areas of interest include trauma, parent-child relationships, parenting, learning differences and recovery from narcissistic abuse. She incorporates a myriad of tools in an eclectic, integrated approach to her work while maintaining an analytic, neuropsychoanalytic and trauma frame. Sheri graduated from Washington University with a Bachelors of Science in Occupational Therapy and New York University with a Masters in Social Work. Additionally, Perlman received certificates from both the Institute for Child, Adolescent and Family Studies (ICAFS) and the Institute for Psychoanalytic Training and Research (IPTAR) for adult treatment. She is a member of CFS and an affiliate of WCSPP. Sheri has also trained in trauma work including EMDR, trauma stabilization, and in alternative treatment modalities such as Craniosacral work Journeying and Meditation. She sees patients in her full time private practice in person and online from her offices in New York and Israel.

Couples Therapy Training Program Open House
2025-03-19 19:00 - 20:00
Our Couples Therapy Training Program is a one-year program which teaches both basic and advanced couples therapy techniques and theory with a combination of psychoanalytic and systems perspectives. Candidates are introduced to several different theoretical approaches including object relations and relational theory, self psychology, Bowenian theory and Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) with emphasis on the clinical work with couples. We also discuss issues pertaining to LGBTQ relationships, divorce, cross cultural relationships, and substance abuse. In addition to the didactic instruction, weekly supervision is provided by senior faculty for cases seen through our Psychotherapy Service.
The Couples Therapy Training Program provides a solid introduction to couples work and provides an opportunity to join the warm, supportive community at our institute, build your referral network, and be exposed to the many and varied learning opportunities provided at WCSPP.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals:
MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT
Financial Aid is available for those who qualify.
The Rosalind Cohen Scholarship fund will award one fully paid scholarship for course work and supervision to qualified applicants to WCSPP’s Couples Therapy Training Program.
CE hours available for some coursework for eligible NYS LCSW, LMSW, LMFT, LMHC,LCAT, LP and NYS Psychologists and CT Social Workers through NASW CT.
Timeline:
Rolling admissions with decisions made by July 30, 2025
Program begins September 2025
We will continue to be on Zoom for the 2025-2026 year.

Exploring Political Polarization in America and How to Bridge the Divide
2025-03-22 10:00 - 12:00
2 CE Hours available for
NY Practitioners – LCSWs, LMSWs, LPs, LMFTs, LMHCs, LCATs, PHDs, PSYDs
This presentation will feature a dialogue between psychoanalytic psychotherapists and authors Ken Barish, PhD, and David Lotto, PhD.
Ken Barish will address the urgent questions explored in his most recent book, Bridging Our Political Divide, focusing on how Americans can listen to and engage with one another constructively, with less hostility and contempt. He will outline principles of constructive dialogue and reasoned debate, offering alternatives and solutions to the angry, repetitive, and unproductive arguments that currently dominate American political culture.
David Lotto will explore concerns about the potential erosion of democracy and fears of fascism, alongside anxieties surrounding the rise of racism, xenophobia, homophobia, misogyny, and gun violence. Inspired by Ken Barish’s ideas, he will strive to understand the current wave of American discontent.
The presentation will consist of lecture, discussion between the presenters, and a question and answer period.

Ken Barish, PhD, is a graduate and faculty member of the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. He also serves on the faculty of the William Alanson White Institute Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy Training Program. In addition, he is a Clinical Professor of Psychology at Weill Cornell Medical College and a Visiting Professor at Tongji Medical College in Wuhan, China. Outside of his academic and clinical work, Ken enjoys playing jazz trumpet.

David Lotto, PhD, is a graduate of WCSPP and has been in practice in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, since 1977. He serves as the editor of the Journal of Psychohistory and has published extensively in psychoanalytic and psychohistorical journals.

Foundations and Advanced Psychoanalytic Training Programs Open House
2025-04-06 12:00 - 13:00
*Advanced Psychoanalysis
*Foundations of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
Join us to meet our program directors and ask questions of current candidates, graduates, and faculty.
Hear candidates discuss the transformational impact of training: deepening their work in agency settings and building/growing their private practices with the help of our collegial referral network.
WCSPP PLANS TO OFFER ONLINE LEARNING
FOR THE 2025-2026 ACADEMIC YEAR.
CE credits will be offered for the coursework.
Financial assistance is available to those who qualify.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be NY or CT licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals: MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT

CAPP Open House
2025-04-23 19:00 - 20:00
New York and Connecticut mental health professionals, join us to meet our program directors and ask questions of current candidates, graduates, and faculty.
Learn about our extensive training opportunities for Fall 2025 in: Child, Adolescent, Parent Psychotherapy
Our program weaves together the study of individual child & adolescent, and parent development through understanding the impact of psychological histories, relational patterns, intergenerational effects, and changing social contexts and constructs. Training is based on a psychodynamic, relational orientation to change, integrating parent guidance and advice as needed.
We welcome all mental health practitioners, whether your work is exclusive to children & adolescents, primarily serves adults or some combination. We never forget that there is, after all, a child’s history within each adult and the challenge of growing within every child, adult, and parent.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be NY or CT licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals:
MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT
Financial assistance is available for those who qualify.
CE hours available for some coursework for eligible NYS LCSW, LMSW, LMFT, LMHC,LCAT, LP and NYS Psychologists and CT Social Workers through NASW CT.
Timeline:
Rolling admissions with decisions made by July 30, 2025
Program begins September 2025
We will continue to be on Zoom for the 2025-2026 year.

Psychoanalytic Association Retreat (WCSPP only)
2025-05-02 - 2025-05-04
The Psychoanalytic Association presents
Failures in Treatment:
Obstacles and Opportunities
(PA Members Only)
May 2 – May 4
Early bird registration through February 14th. Regular registration through March 20.
FOR MORE DETAILS AND REGISTRATION INFORMATION, PLEASE REFER TO THE BROCHURE YOU RECEIVED IN A SEPARATE EMAIL VIA THE LISTSERV.

From Reverie to Play: Applying Psychoanalytic Principles in Work with Underserved Families
2025-05-09 19:00 - 21:00
This presentation describes a community-based psychoanalytic outreach program developed by the Anni Bergman Parent-Infant Program, which offers dyadic therapy to mothers and infants living in poverty. Drawing from two detailed clinical vignettes, the talk will illustrate how psychoanalytic principles—particularly those related to containment, maternal reverie, and the internal setting—can be applied flexibly beyond the traditional consulting room. The presentation will explore how therapists can maintain a stable internal frame amid chaotic external realities, allowing the therapeutic relationship itself to become a transitional space where emotional growth can occur. Special attention will be given to the intersubjective nature of the therapeutic process, with an emphasis on the analyst’s receptivity and the use of play, reverie, and dream life as clinical tools in work with vulnerable families.

Transformations of the Interpersonal Field
2025-05-16 19:00 - 21:00
On Coming into Possession of Oneself: Transformations of the Interpersonal Field is Donnel B. Stern’s fifth authored book, and his latest contribution to the kind of understanding of psychotherapeutic and psychoanalytic process offered by field theory. Stern’s book is essential for all psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists wishing to understand how the analyst’s interventions grow from the analyst’s emotional involvement in the clinical process. This presentation will begin with an overview of the book’s contents, followed by a question and answer segment with the audience, and then a presentation of one of the book’s clinical chapters, again followed by Q and A.

Donnel B. Stern, PhD is Training and Supervising Analyst at the William Alanson White Institute; and Adjunct Clinical Professor of Psychology and Clinical Consultant at the NYU Postdoctoral Program in Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy. He is Founder and Editor of a book series at Routledge, “Psychoanalysis in a New Key,” which has 90 books in print. He is the former Editor-in-Chief of the journal Contemporary Psychoanalysis. He has published 100 psychoanalytic articles and book chapters since he began to write about unformulated experience in his first article in 1983. He has authored five psychoanalytic books and co-edited four others. His first authored book was Unformulated Experience: From Dissociation to Imagination in Psychoanalysis (1983), which was followed by Partners in Thought: Working with Unformulated Experience, Dissociation, and Enactment (2010); Relational Freedom: Emergent Properties of the Interpersonal Field (2015);The Infinity of the Unsaid: Unformulated Experience, Language, and the Nonverbal (2019) and On Coming into Possession of Oneself: Transformations of the Interpersonal Field (2024). His four co-edited books are presentations of the theory and practice of interpersonal psychoanalysis. Dr. Stern speaks, teaches, and supervises around the world, is in private practice in New York City, and leads private study groups.

CAPP Training Program Open House
2025-05-22 19:00 - 20:00

Couples Therapy Training Program Open House
2025-05-28 19:00 - 20:00
New York and Connecticut mental health professionals, join us to meet our program directors and ask questions of current candidates, graduates, and faculty.
Our Couples Therapy Training Program is a one-year program which teaches both basic and advanced couples therapy techniques and theory with a combination of psychoanalytic and systems perspectives. Candidates are introduced to several different theoretical approaches including object relations and relational theory, self psychology, Bowenian theory and Emotionally Focused Therapy (EFT) with emphasis on the clinical work with couples. We also discuss issues pertaining to LGBTQ relationships, divorce, cross cultural relationships, and substance abuse. In addition to the didactic instruction, weekly supervision is provided by senior faculty for cases seen through our Psychotherapy Service.
The Couples Therapy Training Program provides a solid introduction to couples work and provides an opportunity to join the warm, supportive community at our institute, build your referral network, and be exposed to the many and varied learning opportunities provided at WCSPP.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be NY or CT licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals:
MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT
Financial Aid is available for those who qualify.
The Rosalind Cohen Scholarship fund will award one fully paid scholarship for course work and supervision to a qualified applicant of WCSPP’s Couples Therapy Training Program.
CE hours available for some coursework for eligible NYS LCSW, LMSW, LMFT, LMHC,LCAT, LP and NYS Psychologists and CT Social Workers through NASW CT.
Timeline:
Rolling admissions with decisions made by July 30, 2025
Program begins September 2025
We will continue to be on Zoom for the 2025-2026 year.

Foundations and Advanced Psychoanalytic Training Programs Open House
2025-06-04 19:00 - 20:00
*Advanced Psychoanalysis
*Foundations of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
New York and Connecticut mental health professionals, join us to meet our program directors and ask questions of current candidates, graduates, and faculty.
Hear candidates discuss the transformational impact of training: deepening their work in agency settings and building/growing their private practices with the help of our collegial referral network.
WCSPP PLANS TO OFFER ONLINE LEARNING
FOR THE 2025-2026 ACADEMIC YEAR.
CE credits will be offered for the coursework.
Financial assistance is available to those who qualify.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be NY or CT licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals: MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT

CAPP Training Program Open House
2025-06-18 19:00 - 20:00
Mental health professionals, join us to meet our program directors and ask questions of current candidates, graduates, and faculty.
Learn about our extensive training opportunities for Fall 2025 in: Child, Adolescent, Parent Psychotherapy
Our program weaves together the study of individual child & adolescent, and parent development through understanding the impact of psychological histories, relational patterns, intergenerational effects, and changing social contexts and constructs. Training is based on a psychodynamic, relational orientation to change, integrating parent guidance and advice as needed.
We welcome all mental health practitioners, whether your work is exclusive to children & adolescents, primarily serves adults or some combination. We never forget that there is, after all, a child’s history within each adult and the challenge of growing within every child, adult, and parent.
Who is eligible and should apply?
Applicants must be licensed Masters or Doctoral-level mental health professionals:
MD, PhD, PsyD, LCSW, NP, LMSW, LCAT, LMHC, LMFT and LP
Financial assistance is available for those who qualify.
CE hours available for some coursework for eligible NYS LCSW, LMSW, LMFT, LMHC,LCAT, LP and NYS Psychologists and CT Social Workers through NASW CT.
Timeline:
Rolling admissions with decisions made by July 30, 2025
Program begins September 2025
We will continue to be on Zoom for the 2025-2026 year.

Admissions Round Table
2025-06-27 13:30 - 14:30, 2025-07-30 20:00 - 21:00
At this event we will answer any questions you have about our programs, the application process, and the experience of our community.

Admissions Round Table (Advanced Analytic program)
2025-07-08 14:00 - 15:00

Admissions Round Table (Child/Adolescent Training Program)
2025-07-16 19:00 - 20:00

Talking Against Each Other
2025-07-27 10:00 - 12:00
LIMITED TO 30 PARTICIPANTS!
To allow for depth of clinical discussion and a true sense of our formal coursework, participation will be capped at 30 therapists.
The writing of this paper was inspired by observations that public discourse, political policymaking, internet barking, and even conversation within psychoanalytic institutes too often relies on signaling affiliation at the expense of dialogue and discovery. Such flag waving stops rather than promotes conversation. Too many of us seek safety and resonance within familiar groups, where a kind of intellectual inbreeding can limit growth. “Penetrating Language” argues that foundational principles of psychoanalytic listening and engagement continue to offer an attitude and an orientation to finding out sorely needed in so much of today’s fraught communication.

Sylvia Steinert LCSW is in private practice in Ridgefield, CT, and Murray Hill, NYC. She is faculty supervisor and instructor at the Westchester Center for the Study of Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy (WCSPP), where she served as executive director from 2021-2025.

Parenting in Today's World: Clinical Conversations
2025-09-19 19:00 - 21:00
CONTINUING EDUCATION – 2 CE HOURS
The intersection of parent therapy and couples therapy provides an opportunity for clinicians to engage with families to achieve substantial and lasting growth in parents and their children. This presentation will showcase the work of Dr. Ellen Wachtel who has been working at that intersection during her lengthy career and has written volumes on these subjects.With the use of clinical material and through conversations organized around questions and answers, Dr. Wachtel will demonstrate her ways of working to help identify and organize the valuable material of everyday sessions into templates for changing lives. Her tools and techniques will likely become additions to each clinician’s style of working within families, adding to trusted guideposts from previous training.

Ellen Wachtel has a PhD in clinical psychology from New York University and a law degree from Harvard Law School. She is the author of Treating Troubled Children and their Families; We Love Each Other But…Simple Secrets to Strengthen Your Relationship and Make Love Last; Family Dynamics in Individual Psychotherapy (with Paul Wachtel) and most recently, The Heart of Couple Therapy: Knowing What to Do and How to Do It. Her books have been translated into a number of languages, including Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, and Arabic. She gives workshops at home and abroad and has taught courses in Couples Therapy at the Ackerman Institute for the Family.

WCSPP Special Event — celebrate and honor the life of Arnold Zinman, PhD
2025-10-04 10:00 - 12:30
No Charge for this ProgramSponsored by the WCSPP Board of Trustees We invite the WCSPP community to a special event celebrating and honoring the life of Arnold Zinman, PhD (who passed away last August).
This special morning will be a hybrid event taking place both in-person and via Zoom. Our event program includes papers from:

Ken Barish, PhD — The Single Most Important Factor Determining the Success of Child and Adolescent Therapy
Larry Rosenberg, PhD — Raising Child and Adolescent Therapists: Thoughts on Supervision, Mentorship, and Professional Development

After the papers, Debbie Verlen, PhD; John Turtz, PhD; and Jen Dirksen (Arnie’s daughter) will share reflections on Arnie. There will be time to socialize and reminisce before and after the program.
Watch the listserv for sign up information or contact assistant@wcspp.org.

A Shimmering Landscape: the Imaginative and Actual in Psychic Life
2025-10-17 19:00 - 21:00
2 CE Hours available forNY Practitioners – LCSWs, LMSWs, LPs, LMFTs, LMHCs, LCATs, PHDs, PSYDs
Why does the world feel one way when we are imaginatively alive to it and quite another when we are not? How does one both imagine and see things as they are? What happens when we cannot do so?
In this talk, I will describe the process of writing this book and what I believe are some implications of Winnicott’s suggestion that the psyche is an “imaginative elaboration of…aliveness.

WCSPP Graduation (WCSPP and invited guests)
2025-11-02 16:30 - 20:00
Join us as we celebrate this year’s graduates and honoree Constance L. Haslett, PhD at a beautiful and festive dinner in Westchester. All members are invited.
Watch the listserv for location and more details!

Film Night: Clinical Perspectives on Remarkable Movies
2025-11-07 19:30 - 21:30
ADOLESCENCE: A four-part series available for viewing on Netflix. Watch the Series before the Event — then Join Us To Discuss!
2 CE Hours available to NYS LCSWs, LMSWs, LPs, LMFTs, LMHCs, LCATs, Psychologists and PsyDs
A discussion will be facilitated via ZOOM by Janit Bliss, LCSW-R and Carter Thornton, LCAT, LP
Adolescence is a British television psychological crime drama series created by Jack Thorne and Stephen Graham and directed by Philip Barantini. It centers on a 13-year-old schoolboy, Jamie Miller (Owen Cooper), who is arrested after the murder of a girl in his school. This multiple Emmy award-winning production explores themes of technology, grief, generational divides, sociopathy, therapist-client relationship, and social/developmental challenges.
Janit Dini Bliss, LCSW-R, a psychodynamically-informed psychotherapist, is a graduate of the WCSPP Couples Therapy Training Program and currently serves as the WCSPP Psychotherapy Service Director for the Couples Training Program. She has been in private practice for nearly 30 years and has over 40 years experience in Substance Abuse Treatment and Prevention, including directing an outpatient program through Yonkers General Hospital in Pelham, NY.
Carter Thornton, LCAT, LP, is a Psychoanalyst and Creative Arts Therapist in private practice in Westchester County, NY. Thornton teaches at WCSPP and is co-chair of the Film Committee. He is a graduate of the Institute for Expressive Analysis, where he teaches, supervises, and has served on the board as Program Chair. He is also a visual artist and musician.
