The number of students in the Music Therapy program varies from year to year. Generally, the maximum number of students admitted is approximately 20.

As a music student at Laurier, you will already have technical proficiency on at least one instrument when auditioning for the Music Therapy program.

Music therapy students also must pass the keyboard facility exam before entering the program.

You will take a guitar techniques course during your third year, and you will also be expected to use your voice and various percussion instruments in your classes and placements.

No. Both the Music (Common-Year) and Community Music streams set students up to audition/interview into the Music Therapy program. Choose the degree path that is the best fit for you for your first and second years at Laurier.

So long as you complete 1,000 hours of work during your internship courses, the only thing you will have left to do after graduation is to write the Certification Board for Music Therapists (CBMT) exam. Upon successful completion of this exam, you will be qualified to practice music therapy in Canada and the USA.

You can work with a wide variety of clients once you have this certification, so long as you remain safe and ethically within the scope of practice you have trained in.

Music therapists build therapeutic relationships with their clients and use musical experiences to safely, ethically, and intentionally work towards their clients’ goals in relation to health and wellbeing.

In your third year, you will co-facilitate a music therapy group with a peer, usually within a developmental education classroom. In your fourth year, you will work one-on-one with a client in the on-campus Laurier clinic and co-facilitate a music therapy group in the community, often in long-term care or in another setting with adults. Each placement is supervised by a qualified and experienced music therapy supervisor.

In the third-year placement, you will work with children with a variety of developmental and/or physical disabilities.

In the fourth-year group placement, you will usually work with adults, often older adults with dementia. In the fourth-year individual placement, participants self-refer from the community. Clients span a variety of ages and health concerns. These placements are assigned to students based on their academic timetables.

Internship opportunities are available in a wide variety of clinical settings. Students apply directly to the internship sites they are most interested in.

Your internship will involve full-time work in a healthcare setting. Your exact day-to-day experience will depend based upon your specific site.

You can expect to lead group and individual music therapy sessions each day, which you will always document according to the standards at your site. You will attend interdisciplinary team meetings to collaborate with other healthcare professionals and meet regularly with your clinical supervisor to discuss your successes and challenges.

Current and past fourth-year Music Therapy students have completed internships within the following settings:

• community centres
• end-of-life/hospice care
• group homes
• hospitals (both adult and pediatric)
• long-term care
• mental health treatment (both adolescent and adult)
• rehabilitation

Some students have completed internships abroad in the past. However, as the internship leads to certification with the Canadian Association of Music Therapists, it is crucial that all internships be supervised by a certified MTA. If this is something you’re interested in, please speak with our experiential placements coordinator.

Absolutely. The internship is a course, so we are committed to ensuring that each student finds an internship. You will get a lot of choices in applying to sites that are of interest to you. If something falls through, we will help you to find an internship site. Some flexibility may be required in terms of location, however, the experiential placements coordinator will work with you to determine the best fit.

No, your internship replaces credits you would take in-person at Laurier.

An important part of working as a therapist is also taking care of yourself. In courses and placements, you will be encouraged to develop self-awareness and your own practices for taking care of yourself, so that you can practice safely and ethically with your future clients.

Students are encouraged to participate in music therapy seminars and events organized by the Music Therapy Students Association, which happen regularly. Guest speakers often visit Laurier to speak about music therapy business development, experiences in international music therapy practice, and other relevant topics. Music therapy students are also encouraged to attend guest workshops that are open to the entire music student body.

In 2018, Gary Ansdell, an internationally renowned scholar in Community Music Therapy, visited Laurier and spoke with our undergraduate and graduate music therapy students.

In 2018, Belgian music therapist Jos de Backer spoke to conference delegates at Laurier about listening in clinical improvisation.

If possible, we recommend that students gain experience working and/or volunteering in the types of settings in which music therapists are employed (for example, long-term care facilities, schools, hospitals, community centres, etc.). Such experiences will help you to develop the interpersonal skills that are central to your future work as a therapist.