09/01/2015

AASCB 5-year plan on license portability

The American Association of State Counseling Boards has issued a 5-year plan on license portability to their member states. Their plan takes a wise and reasonable approach in addressing education, licensure, and experience issues. Here is their release:

August 17, 2015

Dear State Counseling Board:

The American Association of State Counseling Boards, an organization composed of State Boards from across the country, has been grappling with the problem of licensure portability for a number of years. This letter comes to you to in the form of an initiative supported by AASCB that we believe will further the portability process.

The issue of portability of licensure continues to be a huge dilemma for most licensure boards and for licensed counselors across the United States and its territories. Because of the process by which licensure was gained, state boards have a patchwork of statutes and rules that often preclude the possibility of licensed counselors in one state having the mobility to improve their lives though a job change to another state, of following a spouse whose work requires a transfer to another state, or of providing distance counseling to a client who has moved to another venue and desires to continue an already established counseling relationship. Licensure Board members at the annual AASCB conferences over the last several years always name the issue of portability as one of the top problems they face in dealing with public protection.

A significant focus of AASCB over the last several years has been that of identifying where statute and rules agree rather than that of looking at where they disagree. All states require a Master’s degree in counseling; in some cases a degree in a related field is also accepted. This degree must come from an accredited university or, in some cases, an accredited program. The majority of states now require a 60-hour graduate degree. An examination that tests knowledge (either the NCE, the NCMHCE, or both) are used by the majority of states. The average number of experiential hours required for licensure hovers around 3000.

Analysis of all of these issues for a newly-minted graduate of a counseling master’s program and/or for an individual who has just completed accruing experiential hours requires a licensure board, whose mandate is the protection of the public, to be vigilant in making sure that all requirements have been appropriately met.

However, what about the practitioner who has received a license in one jurisdiction, has successfully worked in an agency or a private practice setting for a number of years, and who may or may not have fulfilled every single idiosyncratic requirement that a state to which the counselor wishes to move may have? Is there a way to establish a more respectful relationship with other state boards?

AASCB proposes the following:

A fully-licensed counselor, who is licensed at the highest level of licensure available in his or her state, and who is in good standing with his or her licensure board, with no disciplinary record, and who has been in active practice for a minimum of five years post-receipt of licensure, and who has taken and passed the NCE or the NCMHCE, shall be eligible for licensure in a state to which he or she is establishing residence. The state to which the licensed counselor is moving may require a jurisprudence examination based on the rules and statutes of said state. An applicant who meets these criteria will be accepted for licensure without further review of education, supervision and experiential hours.

AASCB is aware of the recent proposal endorsed by ACES, NBCC and AMHCA that suggests allowing portability of license after two years of practice. AASCB appreciates ongoing efforts from these and other organizations in striving toward portability. Given the number of states already implementing this five-year proposal, AASCB continues to encourage this proposal.   It is our understanding that eight states and the District of Columbia currently have five year rules or policies. Other states have the policy under advisement. AASCB’s proposal honors the reality of experience as a way to level the differences in state licenses that have plagued the portability issue.  A counselor who has been licensed, based on the statutes and rules valid in his or her state, and who has actively practiced for a minimum of five years, has been tempered by experience.   Given our mandate as regulators to protect the public, at this time we will stand by the five-year proposal.

AASCB is open to research supporting a shorter time period if the research indicates no difference in disciplinary issues with those licensees who have less experience.

Portability of licensure is a need that the profession must deal with now. Taking this step would protect the public and add to the strategies through which licensed professional counselors across the country may provide the critical services for which they are trained, while at the same time creating a network of reciprocal relationships across the country. AASCB respectfully requests that the members and directors of your state board carefully consider this direction.

Please place this correspondence on the agenda of your state board’s next meeting for discussion. Should you wish to patch in a conference call during the board meeting concerning the initiative, please contact the Managing Director of AASCB, Deneen Pennington, at (918) 994-4413, to discuss this process.

If AASCB can answer any questions or be of service in any way, please let us know. We hope to see you at the annual conference in Tampa in 2016.

With best regards,

AASCB Executive Committee

Karen Enegess, MA, LMHC, President

Susan Hammonds-White, EdD, LPC/MHSP, Past-President

Susan Meyerle, PhD, President-elect

Mary Guth, MS, LPC-MH, LMFT, Treasurer

Erik Oosteninck, MA, LMHC Secretary

Mary Alice Olsan, Executive Directors Representative