Aponte Training Institute
Training to master the use of your personal self within your professional role of psychotherapist – with any therapeutic model, and whether you work with individuals, couples and/or families.
About the Aponte Training Institute (ATI)
Welcome to ATI
From Sigmund Freud to Theodore Reik to Carl Rogers to Murray Bowen to Virginia Satir to Salvador Minuchin – all emphasized the importance of therapists’ self-awareness and ability to use self strategically and safely in the therapeutic process to perform effective therapy. All had their respective ideas about how to train therapists to accomplish this formidable task – engaging empathically with clients/patients while being a professionally skilled therapist.
Our institute has a team of highly trained and experienced therapists to offer this training in the The Person of the Therapist Training perspective. The Institute offers a variety of instructional modalities to accomplish this goal – from talks to classrooms to addressing conferences, to 1 & 2 day workshops – to year-long intensive training experiences to, finally, expert clinical supervision to individuals.
Our Model
The Person of the Therapist Training
Our Person of the Therapist Training Model (POTT) is a methodical approach to training therapists that takes into account therapists’ own life experiences, along with their human emotional struggles, to maximize their ability to utilize who they are personally in the relationship, assessment, and interventions with clients. POTT also incorporates the perspectives of trainees along with that of their clients’ psychosocial contexts and values to gain a full understanding of the factors to consider when conducting therapy.
MSW, LCSW, LMFT
Dr. Harry J. Aponte
I am thought of as a family therapist, which I am, but one with a sound psychoanalytic professional background. I have a special interest in the work with disadvantaged families, which reflects my personal background, and in spirituality and culture in therapy.
I have been studying for years and putting into practice training therapists to make clinical use of their personal life experiences and life struggles in their relationships and work with clients along with what they personally experience in their encounters with their clients.
LMFT, CAMFT, AAMFT Approved Supervisor, Emotionally Focused Therapy Supervisor and Trainer
Senem Zeytinoglu-Saydam, PhD
I am a licensed marriage and family therapist, and an AAMFT approved supervisor in the US and a registered psychotherapist and CAMFT approved supervisor in Canada. I have been trained in emotionally focused therapy and am a certified supervisor and trainer of the model.
Aside from my faculty and trainer positions, I hold a private practice where I see individuals, couples and families and provide clinical supervision.
AAMFT Approved Supervisor, LMFT
Alba Niño, PhD
I am a licensed marriage and family therapist, an AAMFT-approved supervisor, and an Associate Professor in the Couple and Family Therapy Programs at Alliant International University. After getting undergraduate degrees in psychology and anthropology from Universidad de Los Andes, in Bogotá (Colombia), where I was born and raised, I pursued my higher education in couple and family therapy in the United States.
Testimonials
What People are Saying
Brittany Quinn, Psy.D., LMFT
I had the pleasure of going through, co-teaching, and co-supervising POTT training with Dr. Niño and it was transformative both personally and professionally. In her safe presence, learning to identify and experience how it felt to engage with my own signature theme helped me understand and recognize the moments my vulnerabilities and self-protective mechanisms start rising in my clinical work....
I learned ways in which I could use these experiences to connect, intervene, or set it aside in service of clients in session, as well as the areas in which I need to continue to nurture and explore further within myself outside of session.
Furthermore, facilitating and witnessing this process with supervisees was remarkable to say the least. I watched trainees, associates, and even esteemed professors/supervisors engage with themselves, their clinical work, and their cohorts in profound and meaningful ways that nurtured growth across the board. When supervisees took the courage to explore their own vulnerabilities in the protected space of their supervisors and peers, they fostered bonds and exploration of their clinical work that was unparallel to any other supervision I have known. I witnessed them transform their work, their relationships with each other, and their understanding of “self” as a clinician. As they observed the struggles of their peers and clients and related to them through their own vulnerabilities instead of attempting to ignore, set aside, or discredit themselves for their “stuff” coming up, they started to become inherently connected through their shared humanity. The entire POTT experience was beautiful and offered supervisees, professors, supervisors and myself with indispensable guidance on how to use “self” in service of clients. I feel deeply that this training was essential in my growth as a therapist and supervisor and that POTT supervision would benefit not just supervisees but the field as a whole.
Kelly Duggan Shearer, LMFT, LPCC
I originally fell in love with the POTT model because it is a compassionate way to teach students and supervisees the somewhat elusive task of using “clinical judgment” and developing empathic attunement. In the warm, tender care of my POTT trainer, I not only learned how to overcome impasses in treatment by reflecting on my own... vulnerabilities but I developed a newfound grace for myself as a wounded healer. This is essential work for emerging and seasoned clinicians alike.