First Approach Skills Training (FAST) Program

FAST Testimonials

Read comments we’ve received from:

School-Based Clinicians

  • Love these trainings! These are by far the most helpful ones I have been to in a while and they so perfectly fit what I have the capacity to do in a school.
  • Working in a middle school, the simplicity and workbook format of FAST programs have been so helpful. The booklet is a comfort to most students as they can see what we are doing. For many students, therapy in school is their first time doing therapy, and they are hesitant to "just talk." The booklets provide a guide for them and serve as a reference until the next appointment. FAST has been a game changer for school based therapy this year!
  • Shortened the time spent with each student allowing me to see more students throughout the year.
  • FAST is the best thing ever for me as a new clinician and other new clinicians love it too. I love how it includes predictable caregiver or client comments and how you can respond to it. And also that it gives you a topic and how to tackle it for every appointment. So super helpful when I don't know what to say to a parent's concerns to reference those scripted responses.
  • This is amazing and I'm super impressed by the content, the layout, the accessibility. A hundred million thanks. I've been a school counselor for over 20 years now and am always looking for tools and resources. This is really great.
  • FAST helps by “speaking the same language” between school and specialty care for referrals.
  • See more school-based clinician comments
    • I work with children at school and it's been great to be able to send home FAST information to parents for a quick way for me to let them know what we're focusing on and how.
    • much more effective educator/teacher and can access meaningful tools more quickly; has allowed community building and partnering between our peds community and our school community.
    • We are very thankful for this invaluable resource and look forward to partnering with the FAST team for many years to come.
    • FAST is so great in schools!
    • This is one of the best online trainings I've attended.
    • I have been using the Tech Smart Skills and Sleep Tips for Teens regularly as part of our conversations with students and parents around chronic absenteeism. They are a perfect avenue to use due to 95% of teens struggling with both of these therefore leading to various other challenges both at school and outside. Anyway, I just wanted to let you know how helpful those documents are and all of the other resources available at our fingertips! Thank you!!!
    • [FAST’s] brevity makes it easy to use in the school setting. I appreciate that the videos and handouts are open access, and have mentioned FAST as a resource for parents, even when I wasn't directly working with them in a therapist-client relationship. I also name-drop FAST to other clinicians all the time, in part because of the training available for it, in part because of its brevity, and mostly because I love the handouts. You have done a great job in making handouts for everything!
    • The presenter was fabulous and really engaging
    • Exceptionally thoughtful in applications of trauma-informed care.
    • I appreciate that FAST is designed to be digestible for short visits or infrequent visits.
    • I have the FAST program skills and tenets in the back of my head at all times when working with students. 

Primary Care and Community Clinicians

  • The ability to provide and see clear positive outcomes for patients has been incomparable!
  • [FAST trainings] have increased my confidence ten-fold!
  • The FAST programs are easy to use, and resonate with kids and families. The FAST consultation calls are indispensable for diving deeper into clinical concerns and always yield helpful feedback and suggestions from the consultants and the group, often with ideas about how to continue to serve families using FAST.
  • I am so appreciative of the FAST consult groups. They are so informative and help make sure I am using FAST to the best of my abilities to better serve the needs of my patients and work effectively within this integrated role.
  • FAST programs are incredible additions to our program — the regularly updated materials, ongoing consultation, and readily accessible trainings help both new and seasoned staff deliver the best evidence-based care to young people.
  • FAST is an incredible program. It is nice to work in pediatrics and have resources that are evidence based and organized… I appreciate the consult options and the team is incredibly supportive. You all are amazing individuals and clinicians. Thank you.
  • Thank you, also, for bringing these therapeutic, focused interventions to life with your manuals and your amazing team! You are truly helping improve the lives of innumerable young people by training folks to apply these concepts such a meaningful and specific ways.
  • The training and consultations are so helpful. I also like the fact that the programs are often updated. I appreciate all you have done and helped to make our work easier.
  • I absolutely LOVE the way you have consolidated the central tenets or skills from EBT programs into these brief treatment modules with video and workbook supports. I work with a transient military population and these tools are very useful and valuable for this population. Thank you for all of your great work!
  • See more primary care and community-based clinician comments
    • FAST is an incredible program that helps increase provider confidence and treatment delivery. Having self-paced and guided education modules is helpful for increasing access to the clinical educational material. As often I am in a role of consultant or providing recommendations to another clinician managing mental health conditions in primary care settings, I feel very confident in my recommendations for the FAST programs.
    • I appreciate all of the work that folks have done to develop and train these programs. These trainings have enriched my practice and led to improved outcomes for my clients.
    • I have found FAST to be incredibly helpful. I especially appreciate the written resources for parents.
    • I plan to propose to the CMO of our org that FAST programs be used by all of our peds-serving clinicians.
    • This is a great program with a variety of resources to help clients. It is especially helpful when dealing with children in split homes to provide consistency between them.
    • As a newer clinician I appreciate the structure to build off of.
    • I love all the FAST program and the continuous effort to make improvement. I also appreciate the consultation opportunities, and I hope everyone can attend or choose to attend.
    • I think the FAST programs have been very helpful and have provided a sound foundation for my counseling practice. I think that FAST-A and FAST-B are particularly adaptable and well-received by patients and families and I have seen great changes as a result of implementing these interventions.
    • We really appreciate having this foundational curriculum for our clinicians. Thank you for offering these trainings at no cost. It has been super helpful.
    • I'm so indebted to and grateful for the FAST interventions and especially the ongoing expert consultation from the FAST team. When FAST materials are able to be updated, I feel so confident that I am delivering the best evidence-based care available.
    • I am grateful for the content in the FAST programs. It is a wonderful resource to share with clients and families and eases my use of appropriate brief interventions with clients.
    • It is user friendly and allows for flexibility while also being ready-to-use.
    • The FAST programs have allowed me to help families quickly and easily with the resources, handouts, and training material learned at the live sessions and online. Thank you!!
    • I really appreciate the program and materials, the expert consultants have always been so nice and helpful and the materials are really amazing!
    • As an LICSW who has been doing this kind of work in integrated primary care for over 5 years, it has been a valuable complement to my work. I also have really appreciated the consults, being able to connect with other colleagues across the state, and talk through difficult cases.
    • FAST is an incredible program. It is nice to work in pediatrics and have resources that are evidence based and organized.
    • I appreciate the consult options and the team is incredibly supportive. You all are amazing individuals and clinicians. Thank you.
    • We provided brief intervention and FAST programs work very well meeting the needs of our youth and families. I love the program and the consultation. I appreciate the support from all the staff.
    • Over the past 6 years working with Seattle Children’s FAST — you just make my work so much easier, it’s just really nice.
    • Thanks again for holding these priceless consult sessions.
    • I just constantly have success with FAST-A. 5-6 sessions and they‘re done.
    • You and your team are amazing human beings! And as a former elementary teacher, I can say your materials are so helpful in helping to shift the thinking patterns with the parents/guardians raising kids today.
    • I use fast all the time, so thankful these programs exist!
    • This training is INVALUABLE, THANK YOU for making this available!!!
    • The value of FAST continues to pop up in a number of different places for me and I continue to be so impressed by what your small and mighty team has accomplished!
    • I am grateful for the content in the FAST programs. It is a wonderful resource to share with clients and families and eases my use of appropriate brief interventions with clients.
    • I work within a brief treatment model, so for those patients who come in with a clear complaint of depression/anxiety, it has been nice to have a structured resource to use. FAST A was particularly helpful with one youth I met with this year, and they planned to continue brave practice themself after our sessions ended.
    • Provides a common language and strategic approach
    • The FAST programs have allowed me to help families quickly and easily with the resources, handouts, and training material learned at the live sessions and online. Thank you!!
    • It provides the structure and treatment plan for an issue that both the client and clinician can address together.
    • I really like having a curriculum to work from and feel confident telling them it was developed by psychologists at Seattle Children's. I think that adds credibility to assist with buy in.
    • FAST has been very helpful in the integrative care setting. I am very grateful for the consult groups and free, easily accessible resources online both for myself and families.
    • Ease of materials, great two pagers for screening calls, great talking points for team supervisions.
    • I am very grateful for the FAST programs. They have been absolutely essential in helping me to provide effective mental health support in an integrated setting. The FAST consult calls have also been a huge support to me in providing the best care I can to my patients. My work has been greatly impacted by these programs. Thank you!
    • FAST has provided a framework that is easy to follow and creates a good timeline for efficient services.
    • I think the focus on parenting is really effective and has made my work more grounded in research.
    • It has helped parents grasp what is happening to their kid, and be there with them in it.
    • I have found the FAST programs immensely helpful and feel that they include many things that parents/families don't get to learn in such a digestible way.
    • The number of kids and families that have had their day to day lives improved by having access to the FAST programs is too numerous to count. I am always singing the praises of FAST whenever mental health and children/families comes up in conversation.

Patients and Families

  • I feel so excited, this is working! (teen referred for depression symptoms)
  • We got a compliment from the teacher about her behavior. This program has changed our lives!
  • We look at him in a different way now. He's so capable!
  • I no longer feel embarrassed to take my child to the store because of his tantrums. No more tantrums. Life is so much better now.
  • I understand how [anxiety] works now. It’s not so scary and I know what to do about it.
  • I came into this for help with him and realized I was the one who needed some extra support.
  • See more patient and family comments
    • The program is the best! We are no longer stressed, we have a good time together!
    • I can tell she worries less and she seems so much lighter now. She can talk rationally about her worries with me. It’s made a huge difference for our family.
    • We are so happy with the changes in his behavior.
    • Since my son and his stepdad started doing Special Time, they've been able to bond a lot more and it's really improved their relationship.
    • I will tell anyone and everyone what a blessing this program has been. When I’ve told my friends or neighbors about the program, they all want to know "How did you get that? How do we start something like that for our child?"
    • You’ve helped me so much over the last months and I just wanted to say thank you for everything. There is a lot that I can do and experience that I never would of thought I’d be able to. You have really changed my life.
    • We were at such a low place when we started. I felt so lost and didn't know what to do. You have taught me a lot about myself and how to see him and you have given me a level of confidence I needed.
    • This really impacted the way we even see ourselves as parents and it helped us reflect on how we were parents and how that comes up for us now.
    • Everyone should have this!
    • [Anxiety] used to control everything he did. We now have the tools to handle this. I didn’t know what to do before. I’m not worried anymore because I know what to do about it and we have a plan that we can use if anxiety were to come back.