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 arenāt meant to. That bears repeating: License exams do not assess your effectiveness as a therapist. They are a licensing boardās 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. Thatās all. When therapists decry the fact that license exams are nothing like doing therapy, theyāre right ā and their point isnāt relevant. Exams arenāt 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?
Thereās remarkably little data to answer that question.