As a licensed psychologist and educator, I strongly oppose the the Virginia Counseling Board’s stated objective to restrict licensure to those who are from CACREP-programs. 

Even though I live and work in Pennsylvania, some graduates from our program who are very talented clinicians want to move to VA and work there, but if VA restrict licensure to only CACREP graduates, many therapists who have great training in psychology and science background will not be able to move to VA. Our program did not want to pursue CACREP because its regid criteria does not fit with our training philosophy and we want to train therapists with solid understanding of psychology. 

This means people in VA will not have access to many talented therapists who received solid education from counseling psychology programs. And, it will limit the accessibility of psychotherapy in VA, which is already an issue. The CACREP restriction is only based on the interest of the CACREP and will definitely short-sighted and not in the best interest of the residents of Virginia.