Dear Governor McAuliffe and Board members,

Please vote no on CACREP.  I am currently embarking upon my 2nd career to become a licensed professional counselor.  The decision to start all over again in my 40's didn't come easily, but I felt a calling that I could no longer ignore.  GMU's degree in community agency counseling has everything I was looking for in a counseling program.  It meets all of Virginia's standards for counselor education but offers even more - an intensive focus on multiculturalism and social justice.  

As many have rightly pointed out, as a nation we are facing a shortage of mental health care providers.  CACREP will only make it harder for many of us to do the work we feel so honored to do.  Please don't force the field of counseling to become a divisive and exclusive profession.

Sincerely,

Allison Ober