I am the director of a counseling program in Pennsylvania, Arcadia University; our graduates practice in various states, including Virginia. Our program is accredited by the Masters in Psychology and Counseling Accreditation Council (MPCAC), we are the recipient of the Pennsylvania Counseling Association Outstanding Counselor Education Award, and our students regularly win regional and state counseling awards. Our graduates are highly valued by the communities they serve, where they provide clients with essential evidence-based, trauma informed, and multiculturally sophisticated services.

I am joining counseling professionals from across the country to urge you to stop the proposed counselor licensing regulations that would require graduation from a CACREP-accredited program for licensure in Virginia. The large number of counselor training programs are not CACREP-accredited. This is a time of great need for mental health services, not a time to restrict licensure to a minority of graduates. This is also not a time to cede State licensing board authority to protect the public to a single outside organization.

If you look carefully at the data, you will notice that research does not indicate that counselors who have graduated from CACREP programs are more effective in their work with clients or in their service to their communities. There is also no evidence to support that counselors from CACREP-accredited programs are more ethical or more helpful to clients or the communities within which the counselors practice.

The people of Virginia need a strong Board that continues to protect their rights to access readily available and quality mental health care. A regulation limiting practice would not serve the people of Virginia well, as it would reduce the services available to Virginia residents; increase the cost of graduate education; and increase the difficulty for qualified counselors in relocating to Virginia—as many do, after graduating from rigorous MPCAC-accredited or unaffiliated programs. I urge you to stop this proposal and ensure that the people of Virginia will continue to rely on the strength of your licensing Board, knowing that it didn’t relinquish its decision-making power and oversight to a single outside organization.

Respectfully,

Eleonora Bartoli, Ph.D.

Director, graduate program in Counseling

Arcadia University