Your Name: Dr Faye Morgan-Rose
Job Title: Educational and Child Psychologist (“Ed Psych”)
What is your nationality and background?
I was born in England, and grew up in Cambridgeshire with my family. I originally trained to become an Art teacher and went overseas at age 24. First I went to Malawi then Thailand, with a little time in the Middle East too.
What is your profession?
I am an Educational and Child Psychologist which means I support schools, families and children aged 0-25. I had to complete 3 years of Doctorate training back in the UK to become an “Ed Psych”, as we are known.
What are the key skills and responsibilities of this role?
The role is so varied. It includes training to schools, parent support work, and individual/group therapeutic work such as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy. However, the most frequent type of work I do is carrying out assessments which aim to find out both strengths and areas of need for a child or young person. This involves gaining the views of all people involved in a child or young person’s life, so parents, schools and the young person themselves. I usually carry out an observation of the child in class (without them knowing) as this can tell me a lot about their school experience.
This is followed by a couple of hours of assessment work. All this data is then collated into one report which aims to identify not only the strengths the child has, but how we can best support them through a range of proposed strategies. This is underpinned by “psychological formulation” which means using theory and research to develop my thinking about what is happening for the child.
How did you get involved in your profession?
I’ve always been interested in supporting children and young people with additional needs, so many years ago when I met an Educational Psychologist here in Bangkok I immediately liked the sound of her profession and decided to try to become an Ed Psych too. Little did I know I would be here, 10 years later, fortunate enough to be supporting the children and young people of Bangkok and Thailand.
How does your role enhance the wellbeing or experience of children?
I am an advocate for the child or young person. This means that I have to represent the child as an individual through the data I have collected and through their views. From this, we can make plans to help the child progress which may be academically, socially or emotionally.
What challenges do your face in this role?
I am very fortunate in my role as I am working with very supportive schools and families. My understanding is, that I am the only Ed Psych going into a range of schools in Bangkok and Thailand, and as I am now receiving referrals from both ATOC and The Village, I guess it will be fitting everything in!
What do you hope to achieve within your industry?
I would really like to develop more inclusive practice in Thailand, where a wider range of mainstream schools accept and support children and young people with additional needs. I would also love to see Educational Psychology training introduced at Doctorate level, here in Thailand.
Who or what inspires you?
What I find most inspiring is that when I go into the international schools in Thailand is the enthusiasm and dedication of the staff teams. I particularly enjoy the “post-report meeting” where we talk through my report and decide on which strategies to introduce. I always walk away from these meetings feeling reassured that the child will benefit from these and that they will make good progress.
Only a Bangkok local would know…
That a traffic jam is not classified as a traffic jam until the cars haven’t moved for one hour!
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