Therapy Training Boston came to be in the spring of 2009 when the Family Institute of Cambridge closed. At one time there were thirteen free standing family therapy training institutes in the Boston area. FIC was the last one standing because of generous benefactors. Due to changes in the landscape of the provision of behavioral health services it was hard to keep a small non profit training organization going. Liz Brenner was the last person teaching FIC’s Intensive Certificate Program in Family Systems Therapies when FIC closed. Due to her passion for providing family and couple therapy training, her mission is to run an efficient organization that is sustainable.

Why family systems therapy? We all come from families which are embedded in larger social systems, both of which enhance and complicate our lives. We believe that healing in relationships is critically important, having an impact that is deeper and broader than healing outside of the relational context.

Liz is passionate about providing continuing education for helping professionals that enhances the lives of our clients and ourselves. The foundation of her work rests on the training she received as a student in the Intensive Program at the Family Institute of Cambridge in 1991.

She teaches and hosts relevant, informative training on a wide variety of topics in a relaxed and nurturing environment. Liz is pleased to bring guest faculty from near and far.

Liz has 30 years of experience doing family, couple and individual therapy in child psychiatric inpatient, residential, home-based and private practice settings. She was on the faculty of the Family Institute of Cambridge from 2003 until 2009 when it closed. Liz continues to learn and be inspired by many colleagues and mentors from FIC and elsewhere. She is currently the co-director of the Harvard Couple Conference and a teaching associate for Harvard Medical School providing family therapy training to staff at Cambridge Health Alliance in the Couple and Family Therapy Program. She was a member of the Executive Committee for Clinicians United, advocating for independent mental health clinicians and their clients in the Commonwealth. In 2017, Liz was the appreciative recipient of the award for the Greatest Contribution to Social Work Practice from the Massachusetts Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers.

She has written two articles on doing intensive home based family therapy. She published a short article in the New England Journal For Relational and Systemic Therapy called Couple Therapy in the Absence of Presence: Translating Presence to the Screen. Recently she published an article in the Family Process Journal with colleagues Richard Schwartz and Carol Becker. The Development of the Internal Family Systems Model: Honoring Contributions from Family Systems Therapies