Education:
Internships & Mentorships
Help Support Aspiring Professionals!
If you are a practicing Registered Horticultural Therapist, please consider what role you could play in supporting someone else starting out in the profession. Supporting aspiring professionals in their career provides opportunities for all of us to advance the discipline by sharing expertise, knowledge, and connections.
If you are an experienced HTR or HTM and would like to learn more about becoming an HT mentor or providing an HT internship with your organization, please contact [email protected].
Horticultural Therapy Internships & Mentorships
HT Internships and Mentorships are opportunities which allow someone to directly apply their HT education and put their learning into practice with supervision and direction from an experienced HT professional.
Both Internships and Mentorships include an HTR/HTM supervisor, a student (Intern or Mentee) who has already completed their HT education requirements, and a paid HT/TH position in which the student is currently employed.
HT Internships
Overview:
A CHTA Horticultural Therapy Internship enables an individual to integrate and apply previously mastered studies into a planned and supervised work setting. It will be customized to fulfill the individual educational and professional needs of the intern. Elements of the internship must include horticultural therapy program planning and application, direct contact with clients, assessment, and documentation.
Supervision:
A horticultural therapy internship is supervised onsite by a Registered Horticultural Therapist (HTR/HTM) who is a professionally registered member in good standing of the CHTA. The HT internship includes an Intern, an Internship Supervisor (HTR/HTM), and an internship site where both intern and internship supervisor are employed.
Hours:
All hours of an internship must be paid at a rate equal to or higher than the Canadian standard minimum wage. A CHTA HT internship is a minimum of 500 hours, but can be more.
HT Mentorships
Overview:
A CHTA Horticultural Therapy Mentorship is guidance-at-a-distance from a Mentorship Supervisor to help the Mentee integrate and apply previously mastered studies into a paid HT/TH work setting. The Mentorship will be customized to fulfill the individual educational and professional needs of the mentee based on the Horticultural Therapy Core Skills and Knowledge.
A Mentorship is 1:1 direct contact time spent outside of your paid unsupervised employment. This is time spent discussing the goals of your programming, outlining the objectives in achieving these goals, and reflecting on the outcomes your clients experienced, as well as other topics from the Horticultural Therapy Core Skills and Knowledge.
Supervision:
A horticultural therapy Mentorship is supervised by a Registered Horticultural Therapist (HTR/HTM) who is a professionally registered member in good standing of the CHTA. The HT mentorship includes a Mentee with paid unsupervised employment in HT, and a Mentorship Supervisor (HTR/HTM) that will provide guidance about this employment in Horticultural Therapy.
Hours:
A Mentorship relationship should be a minimum of 25 hours, but can be more, to ensure a consistent professional relationship.
