Professional Rant about Professional Standards
Today I got a mass email from a case manager w/ my agency whose program was cut, and he declined the offer of a FT position. He welcomed people to keep in touch w/ his private practice website.
So I went to the website. Clicked on “credentials” and find that he claims to have a Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology from 2006 (shit, I graduated in 2004!) from “Mars Hill Graduate School,” which is no accredited school I’ve ever heard of. I go to the Mars Hill Graduate School website and find they are still in application for accreditation of their MA in Counseling program. He’s got a registered counselor number.
Do you know what it takes to be a registered counselor?
Go ahead, guess.
Four — yes FOUR hours of AIDS/HIV training.
You too can be a registered counselor with a private practice with FOUR hours of HIV/AIDS training. Not something important like — oh, crisis intervention and management or anything additional. I’m not saying that HIV/AIDS training isn’t important. It is — as is training on other blood-borne pathogens.
So yeah. I’ve had my Masters of Social Work from a respected, well regarded, highly ranked school that has been accredited and approved for years. And as part of that training, I have 4 hrs of HIV/AIDS training and have had continuing education on blood-borne pathogens since. I was in a clinical social work track in school, and by graduation had 1200 hours of internship/practicum under a licensed independent social worker in Illinois. I have had over 800 client contact hours since I started working in the field, post-graduate. I have worked with acutely mentally ill adults in an inpatient setting, with criminal charges pending, many with co-occuring disorders. I have done 1-1 and group therapy and served as an advocate. I am a card-carrying member of the National Association of Social Workers and believe in their Code of Ethics, which I try to follow.
As such, I do not believe it is ethical for me to enter private practice without a substantial amount of verified, quantifiable, post-graduate experience under supervision of a trained, licensed social worker in my field. It is annoying, because it’s hard to get supervision that way, and it means I have another year or so before I qualify to get my LICSW in Washington State, but seriously — liability insurance? I would not want to even start private practice without liability insurance, and I think the best liability insurance I can have is knowing that I’ve gone the extra mile to get real-world training in the field before going at it alone and unchecked.
No one is perfect, and even people who jump through all the hoops and get all the licenses can fuck up and do horrible things… but I want the people I serve to feel like they have a right to good service and people who actually help — and don’t hurt — them.
Is it the difference between people who are doing the work for themselves and doing the work for others?
Sometimes I wonder if this really is the field for me, because my standards are so high sometimes — not so much for the my clients or “The System,” but mostly for my peers who are supposedly in the same gig I am.
Granted, my current position is a Senior Clinician position, and not a case manager.
But fuck? Don’t people deserve to have decent case managers? I mean, at least in Illinois, the people I knew who fulfilled that function at LEAST had BSW’s.
…and why the fuck go to some school in a program that has no possibilities for licensure?
Oh, wait, because you can have no degree at all and call yourself a counselor in Washington State and be in private practice.
Idiots.
Tags: social work
March 7th, 2008 at 10:14 am
Mars Hill Graduate School is accredited by the Transnational Association of Christian Schools (TRACS). MHGS alumni can pursue licensure in Washington and many other states per the processes defined by those states. MHGS is currently candidating in the self study phase for regional accreditation with the Northwest Coalition of Colleges and Universities (NWCCU).
March 8th, 2008 at 4:52 pm
Re: Clarifying
I think the question is not that an alumni could pursue licensure, for under the RCW, it’s possible that TRACS is sufficient for granting the study required for licensure. Mars Hill Graduate School has been in candidacy for 3 years now.
So long as people are doing the post-graduate experience necessary, and getting licensure beyond “registered counselor” before doing private practice, I’m peachy keen. The problem is not just with a Mars Hill graduate having an RC and doing private practice - the same goes with a UW student who has graduated from the program, but doesn’t have the requisite experience for licensure. It’s irresponsible and makes for bad clinicians, because it does not encourage an individual honing their skills with someone with greater experience.