Residency Program

UofL Health Care offers a one-year residency program in Clinical Pastoral Education.  This program is designed to prepare qualified persons for board certification as a professional chaplain.  Along with staff chaplains, interns and peers, chaplain residents provide spiritual care to patients, families and staff members on a full time basis and have the opportunity to develop their professional skills in various clinical settings.  Individual and group supervision provide opportunities to reflect upon and learn from clinical experience, to develop spiritual care giving skills, and learn about research in the field of spirituality, medicine, and the behavioral sciences.  Over the course of twelve months (three units of CPE), the program offers a progressive curriculum that addresses educational outcomes and objectives for Level 1 and Level 2 CPE.  Certified ACPE supervisors and an interdisciplinary adjunct faculty provide clinical supervision and instruction.  Completion of a Master-of-Divinity degree or equivalent from an accredited school and successful completion of one unit of CPE are preferred as prerequisites for admission to the program but not required.

Chaplain residents are employees of UofL Health Care and candidates interested in the residency program need to apply both online through UofL Health Care’s Human Resources Department and by submitting a regular CPE application.  Depending on previous professional ministry experience, residents’ salaries range from $26,520 to $39,790 for the duration of the one-year program.  In addition, residents receive employee benefits including: medical, dental, vision, 403(b) retirement plan, flexible spending account, life insurance, as well as paid vacation time.  Tuition for each residency unit is $375.00.  The CPE residency begins January 1 and ends December 31 of each year.  Applications will be received after the residency positions are posted as job opportunities on UofL Health Care’s website in the fall of each year.