Dear Honorable Ralph Northam and Virginia Board members,

As Counseling Psychologist (licensed in PA) and who has trained master level counselors for 20 years, I strongly oppose the current regulations that restrict counseling supervision for Virginia residents to those who hold Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) or Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist (LMFT) licenses.  It is absurd that other professionals in Virginia with a similar license and expertise to mine would be excluded as supervisors.  The exclusion does not serve the people of Virginia, but rather serves the purposes of an organization dedicated to monopolizing counseling practice.

As Director of a counselor preparation program, I affirm with my faculty colleagues the uniqueness of counselor identity, roles, and functions.  Nevertheless, we also recognize how the counseling field builds upon contributions of psychology and other mental health disciplines, and that ultimately our students will work alongside practitioners from many disciplines.   Accordingly, our students are trained by instructors with diverse professional training and credentialing.   The learning objectives/activities are clear in our courses (which maintains the integrity of our program’s counselor identity), and the faculty who teach are hired based on their competency in the content and skills to be taught.  Over the years, our students have benefited from the expertise of professional counselors, psychologists, marriage & family therapists, behavior analysts, social workers, nurses, and psychiatrists.  We know our students’ education is enriched by this diversity of professional background and expertise, and we sought an accrediting body that would support this.  And some of our graduates end up practicing in Virginia, seeking supervision for licensure in your state.

I join counseling professionals from across the country to urge you to stop this and other exclusionary efforts by CACREP to restrict counselor training and practice.  The people of Virginia need a strong Board that protects their rights to access quality mental health care.  The counselors in Virginia need access to the supervisors who are qualified—by virtue of their training and expertise, not arbitrary rules imposed by the agenda of an independent organization with no public oversight or accountability, and one that does not represent the breadth of the counseling profession.

Sincerely,

Ruth B. Palmer, Ph.D.                                                                    

Chair, Counseling Psychology Dept, Eastern University