At this critical time in our history with more and more people needing mental health treatment and with the current opioid crisis in this country, it is not time to decrease access to treatment but to expand access.  CACREP only is limiting and self-serving and does not take into consideration that there are numerous, well-qualified experienced counselors who have done a good, or dare I say excellent, job in treating people who are not from CACREP instititions.  The reality is that learning how to provide quailty therapy comes with personal maturity and time spent from working in the field.  To think this is not the case is naive.  While coursework is important and we need to learn all about diagnosing and treatment, in my years in the field, I have not met one clinician who did better work than another because of the school they attended or their accrediting body.  I realize that the argument is that this is not the case ... but as I stated above, that is a self-serving approach.  Instead, what makes the difference was commitment to the work, the ability to understand and empathize with clients or patients, and the willingness to learn more each day as they work in the field. In fact, is this not what it is about?