Licensure Archives - Page 15 of 17

The Last 100 Hours, Part 1: Introducing Jeff Liebert

February 27, 2016February 10, 2016 by Jeffrey Liebert

track-running-lanes [Ed. note: With this post, I’d like to personally welcome Jeff Liebert, MA, to the Psychotherapy Notes team. Jeff is from Sacramento, currently lives and works in Los Angeles, and is ever-so-close to completing the journey to MFT licensure. His first few posts here will focus on the big decisions that come with the last 100 hours of that journey. Welcome aboard, Jeff! -Ben]

It’s here at last: The final 100 hours. I am so close to completing my supervised experience, which is the most extensive requirement in my way of being a licensed therapist. As I sit here on the edge of licensure, I am full of both excitement and dread.

California’s MFT Clinical Exam is still a test of reading speed

January 7, 2016 by Ben Caldwell

By Ryan McGilchrist [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons California debuts its new exams for MFT licensure this week, reorganizing its exam process into an MFT Law and Ethics Exam and an MFT Clinical Exam.

Preparing for California’s new MFT Law & Ethics exam

November 7, 2017November 3, 2015 by Ben Caldwell

Golden gavel 1, By walknboston (Flickr: Gavel) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons California’s licensing exam restructure for marriage and family therapists (MFTs) takes effect January 1, 2016. Here’s how the new exam process will affect you.

Changes to California MFT intern hours: An (updated) explainer

October 1, 2015October 1, 2015 by Ben Caldwell

In September 2015, Governor Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 620, a Board of Behavioral Sciences-sponsored bill that will change how MFT intern hours are counted toward licensure. What is the new law, and why is it happening? This explainer is meant to answer the most common questions about the changes. (Ed. note: This was originally posted in November 2014 when the changes were just a proposal. It’s been updated in October 2015 to reflect the law as adopted.)

Licensing exams get a failing grade

July 11, 2017June 9, 2015 by Ben Caldwell

Note: The following is an edited excerpt from Saving Psychotherapy: How therapists can bring the talking cure back from the brink. You can buy it on Amazon.

Licensing exams do not assess your effectiveness as a therapist. They aren’t meant to. That bears repeating: License exams do not assess your effectiveness as a therapist. They are a licensing board’s best effort at assessing whether you have the minimal knowledge (not skill, knowledge) to be able to practice independently without being a danger to the public. That’s all. When therapists decry the fact that license exams are nothing like doing therapy, they’re right – and their point isn’t relevant. Exams aren’t supposed to be like therapy. If you want to know how good you are as a therapist, look elsewhere, because exams are not and are not intended to be a barometer of clinical effectiveness. They are a somewhat crude assessment of safety for independent practice.

With that aim in mind, do they work? Do licensing exams make therapists safer?

There’s remarkably little data to answer that question.