My name is Claudia. I like the beach, I like dancing and I have been a Behaviour Support Practitioner for a year and a half and I recently just got my provisional psychologist registration about a month ago.
I took two years off school had a good think about what I really wanted to do.
I initially went into Bachelor of Arts and transferred to Bachelor of Psychology, so you can get into a different degree and just do psychology subjects and then transfer over.
I would say don't discount it if you didn't get the ideal ATAR, or you didn't get the grades, or you just think you won't be able to make it all the way to honours or anything like that. Read up and find your interest. And if you do have an interest, go for it.
To be a Behaviour Support Practitioner, you don't need to have six years of study. My goal is to become a Clinical Psychologist, but you can go into the behaviour support field and a lot of other mental health fields with just a three-year degree in Allied Health. So, you can do nursing, you can do social work. So don't think that you need a six-year degree to go into the mental health space.
Mental health is not just about the individual and about treating the mental illness in itself. Mental health impacts everything from the person participating in society in their job, in their friendships.
So, you might start with a client that you know is severely depressed, they’re in bed every day. They can't even muster the courage to get out and have a shower. You go from that to them having an active social life, they're back in their job or they've gotten a job, they’re exercising and just to see that turn around and you to be able to go, you know, you've got this now.
That's extremely rewarding.
Read our fact sheet with Behaviour Support Practitioner Claudia Grenfell-Uijland, to learn more about a career in mental health.