Marriage and family therapy: licensure and registration.

Existing law provides for the licensure or registration and regulation of marriage and family therapists and interns by the Board of Behavioral Sciences and requires that applicants for licensure or registration, among other requirements, possess a doctor's or master's degree from a specified school, college, or university, containing no less than 48 semester or 72 quarter units of instruction in specified areas. Existing law requires that the doctor's or master's degree program contain no less than 6 semester or 9 quarter units of supervised practicum, as specified, and requires that the practicum include a minimum of 150 hours of face-to-face experience counseling individuals, couples, families, or groups. Existing law also requires the degree program to satisfy certain criteria in order to meet the educational qualifications for licensure. This bill would limit the application of these requirements to applicants for licensure or registration who begin graduate study before August 1, 2012, and would impose additional requirements on applicants who do not complete that study on or before December 31, 2018, on applicants who graduate from a degree program that meets those requirements, and on those who begin graduate study on or after August 1, 2012. The bill would require that these applicants, among other things, possess a doctor's or master's degree containing no less than 60 semester or 90 quarter units of instruction in certain areas, including, but not limited to, co-occurring disorders, multicultural development and cross-cultural interaction, and the effects of socioeconomic status on treatment and available resources, as specified. The bill would require that these units include 6 semester or 9 quarter units of practicum that provides training in specified areas and includes a minimum of 225 hours of face-to-face experience counseling individuals, couples, families, or groups. The bill would additionally, with respect to these applicants, revise the requirements needed for the degree program to meet the educational qualifications for licensure, as specified. The bill would make other conforming changes and enact related provisions. Existing law requires that applicants for licensure have at least 2 years of experience that complies with certain requirements. This experience may consist of, among other things, no more than 1,000 hours of experience in direct supervisor contact and professional enrichment activities, no more than 125 hours of experience providing personal psychotherapy services via telemedicine, and no more than 250 hours of experience providing counseling or crisis counseling on the telephone. This bill would instead limit the applicant to no more than 1,250 hours of experience in direct supervisor contact, client centered advocacy, and professional enrichment activities, as specified, and no more than 375 hours of experience providing personal psychotherapy, crisis counseling, or other counseling services via telemedicine. The bill would also delete the limit on the number of hours of experience in providing counseling or crisis counseling on the telephone and would make other related changes. Existing law requires that all applicants, trainees, and registrants be at all times under the supervision of a supervisor and requires that supervision include at least one hour of direct supervisor contact, as defined, in each week for which experience is credited in each work setting. Existing law requires that supervised experience be gained by interns either as an employee or as a volunteer. This bill would revise the definition of one hour of direct supervisor contact and require that this one hour be conducted within the same week as the hours claimed. The bill would require that group supervision be provided in segments lasting no less than one continuous hour and would authorize an intern working in a governmental entity or a nonprofit and charitable institution, among others, to obtain the required weekly direct supervisor contact via videoconferencing, as specified. The bill would also require that, upon application for licensure, employed interns provide the board with copies of the corresponding W-2 tax forms and that volunteering interns provide the board with a letter verifying that volunteer work, as specified. The bill would make other related changes. Existing law authorizes the board to issue a license to a person who has held for at least 2 years a valid license issued by a board of marriage counselor examiners, or corresponding authority of any state, if, among other requirements, the education and supervised experience requirements are substantially equivalent. Existing law requires the board to accept experience gained outside of California toward the licensure requirements if it is substantially equivalent and the applicant has gained a specified number of hours of supervised experience in direct counseling within California while registered with the board as an intern. Existing law also requires the board to accept education gained outside of California toward the licensure requirements if it is substantially equivalent, as specified, and the applicant completes certain coursework or training. If an applicant's education does not contain the content or units required to obtain a license, existing law authorizes the board to accept the applicant's education as substantially equivalent if, among other requirements, the applicant remediates the deficiency by completing the course content or units required to obtain a license. This bill would instead specify that the applicant remediate the deficiency by completing the content and units required to obtain a license. The bill would also repeal the provisions relating to licenses, experience, and education gained outside California on January 1, 2014, and would revise the requirements applicable to persons applying for a license after that date. Among other things, the bill would revise the requirements needed for a person's education to be substantially equivalent, as specified. Existing law prohibits a person from advertising himself or herself as performing the services of a marriage, family, child, domestic, or marital consultant without a marriage and family therapist license and prohibits licensed psychologists and licensed clinical social workers from advertising that they hold a marriage and family therapist's license. Existing law defines the term "advertise" for purposes of that provision to include, among other things, business solicitations communicated by radio or television broadcasting. This bill would revise the definition of the term "advertise" to include the dissemination of a communication by means of mail, television, radio, motion picture, newspaper, book, list or directory of healing arts practitioners, Internet, or other electronic communication.