Queen Essays

Careers in Social Work

Well, the reason we chose to ask that question is because so often when I come to classes and I ask people, what's your first impression of what a social worker might do, they say, those are the people that take children away from their home. And that's the field where child welfare comes into play, and the truth is that many times people go into the field of social work because they want to make a difference and they've heard those stories, those awful stories, so they go into child welfare so they can make a difference in that area and protect children and help families to enhance the kind of relationships they can have with children. But that is not in the field where most social workers are employed.

So, I think from here I start with telling you about my story, how I became a social worker. I started undergraduate at University of Michigan in their music school. And I quickly learned that I did not have the talent, I did not have the skills, I was not going to be a musician. And that was a letdown for me because the one passion I had was for music, so I really couldn't figure out if I wasn't going to do music, what was I going to do? This was many, many, many years ago so there were no computers, there was no internet, there was no websites. So I went to the library and I found college catalogs, and I looked through all these different college catalogs and I was still wondering is there anything I can do with music? Is there anything that I can do that will still let me, somehow or other, use my music?

And I found a new field and it was called music therapy. And I thought, wow, this is really cool. I can use my music, I don't have to be a real talented performer, because I know I wasn't that, and I can help people. And that was always a really major part of my nature, that I got a lot of joy out of volunteering, out of being a good friend to people, out of helping people in their lives in any ways that I could as a teenager. And so I thought, this sounds like a real good marriage between this part of my personality and this passion that I have for music.

But at this time, the field of music therapy was young, very young. It had started in the 1940s. This was just 30 years later and there was just about five schools across the country that actually offered a program to become a music therapist. So that's what got me to Florida. I ended up at Miami in their music school working on becoming a music therapist. The last part of that degree required a field internship, which is very much the same as the last part of our BSW degree, and which is an integrated part of our MSW program.

Now, in our program you will learn from Professor Simpson how smooth the process is to go into that internship, whether it's the BSW or whether it's the MSW, she has created relationships with hundreds of agencies in the community, and it is a very easy, laid out process for how you get to do that internship when you're in our program. But many years ago as a music therapist with so few programs even across the country, there was not that kind of support. I had to go and find my own way into a program that would allow me to get the experience I needed so I could become a registered music therapy intern. And that led to my moving to Washington, DC, and I did my internship at St.

Elizabeth's Hospital. This is the first federally operated psychiatric institution in our country. St. Elizabeth's Hospital, at its peak, had 8,000 patients. Think about that. A psychiatric setting with 8,000 patients and 4,000 people that were employed there.

So, it was built in 1855 and I came there in the '70s and, at that time, there were still thousands of patients. There was a decline because different changes were happening in the field of psychiatric therapy, but there were still thousands of patients when I began there for my music therapy internship, and there were acres of land with 70 buildings across the hospital. And I was told to go to the different buildings where they housed different populations and to create interventions, and to meet the patients, and to provide music therapy.

So I had not been aware that Walter Freeman, who was known as the father of the lobotomy, had been a director at one time in St. Elizabeth's Hospital, and one of the first places that I went to provide intervention was to the geriatric building. And that was the first time for me that I worked and met people who had lobotomy's performed on them. Lobotomies is when they took an ice pick and put it in the brain to disconnect parts of the brain, because they thought that that would help people get well. It was a real eye- opening experience for me. And so I worked in the geriatric population, and then I went to another building. Lots of buildings where there were just your garden variety of people who had serious mental illnesses. So the population there were indigent people with very severe mental illness.

They had a component there was called John Howard Facility for the Criminally Insane, and I worked with the criminally insane. A few years after I left, John Hinckley, who is known for his attempt to assassinate Ronald Reagan because of his obsession with Jody Foster, he was admitted to John Howard, and from what I've heard, he is still there today, and this is 30 years later. So this was where I went to do my music therapy internship.

I was told that I would have the opportunity, in all of these buildings where I was meeting these patients, to attend of the team meetings, the interdisciplinary team meetings in each of these buildings. There were psychiatrists and psychologists and social workers, and then lots of us interns from music, or psychodrama, or dance, but this was my first time of being introduced to people who were social workers. I was not familiar with that profession before I came to St. Elizabeth's. And probably, there were more social workers working at St. Elizabeth's than any other profession at the time that I was there.

And I was intrigued at these leadership meetings where we talked about the different patients that were in those units, by the kind of insight that the social workers offered in those interdisciplinary teams. And so I was then offered the opportunity to work with the social workers. And I joined them and assisted and co-led in some of their groups in these different buildings with these populations, and that's where I really got to know even more about the kind of people that chose that profession and the kind of work that they did. It was amazing. Across the board, these were people who showed the utmost respect for these patients. And think about the kind of patients I'm talking about and how difficult it can be to really, from the heart, be respectful, and compassionate, and wise, and

creative, and knowledgeable. And I saw them do work with these patients that just amazed me.

So when I finish that internship, I had an image about the profession of social work and about social workers that was very positive. But I now had my degree as a music therapist, and I was a registered music therapist. So I wanted to get a job in my field. Remember, no internet, no computer, no websites. We were ready to go back to Florida, so I pulled out yellow pages. Do y'all know what the yellow pages are? Yellow pages from all the different cities up and down Florida to look up different facilities that might be able to utilize a music therapist to work with their patients.

I typed 100 letters that I sent to all these different places throughout Florida. Do you think I got a job as a music therapist? Anybody? No, I did not get a job as a music therapist. So after several months, I got a job that was supposed to be for a BSW, for a student who had a bachelor's in social work. They could not find a student that had graduated that has a BSW for this position, which is what they wanted, but they hired me instead. And in this position, the person who trained me was a BSW. The person who was the director of the agency was an MSW. And I went to people's homes, because that's oftentimes what social workers do. In our understanding of the power of the environment that affects people, we're often right in there in that environment where our patients live, and where they work, and where they attend different aspects of their lives, work, and so forth.

And I would go to the homes where families had had children that were born with developmental disabilities, and they had children who were from infancy to age five. I would go to the homes, and I would get to know the families. And I would help them to make a loving and positive connection with these children, and I would help them to learn ways that they could support their children in developing different kinds of skills, and I would provide them with information about resources. And it was a really meaningful work experience for me, but what I realized was that I wasn't trained as a social worker, and I knew that I could do a much better job if I really had the education that social workers had.

So we were moving back to Michigan and I applied to go to school for my MSW degree, and I got that degree from Wayne State University in Detroit. That program had three different paths for becoming an MSW. And you'll find if you look at different schools, even now, that MSW programs are very diverse in how they train people because there are so many different ways that people end up working as a professional social worker.

So at Wayne State they had an administrative path, they had a community organizing path, and then they had the clinical social work path. And at USF, we have only the clinical social work path, and that is the path that I chose for my degree at Wayne State. they had two different field placements that you would have in the two years while you're getting your degree. We have two years to get the degree, but we have one placement that you do the whole time. So in my experience, one year I was in the school system learning

how to be a social worker in the schools, and the other year I was in a family service agency learning how to do social work in the family service.

They also had an opportunity where you could go into the hospital during the summer and be a part of an interdisciplinary team with physical therapy, occupational therapy, pharmacy. And I wanted to know more about medical social work, and so I took part in that experience. Some of you may be aware that at USF we have a place that's called The Bridge Clinic. It's a clinic on our university where, as an interdisciplinary team run by the medical students, involving our social work students and PT and some other programs, we are able to provide services directly to under-served populations in our area. And so this was kind of a similar experience that I had, just to be exposed a little bit to what medical social workers did.

When I graduated, I was employed easily, and that's been true with this degree throughout my professional career. I've never had a problem being able to find the work that I wanted to find with this degree. And that's pretty exciting especially since I never could become a music therapist. It's like OK, I made one good choice here with my education that's really been a right match for me and career.

And my first job was in a place that was in a rural community called Romulus. And it was in an old house that was called the Romulus Help Center, and that's what we tried to do, we just tried to help everybody. The director was an MSW, my supervisor was and MSW, there was me, and there was a BSW. It was just us to serve this community. And one day a week, they had to go to the high school where I could talk with any teen that was troubled that wanted to have some support. I also did home visits, because there were people in that community that didn't have the mobility or the transportation or there were things that were happening in their home that made it impossible or very difficult for them to be able to leave their home, and so I went to them.

And I also did a lot of work in the center itself. In this facility, we were partially funded by substance abuse agencies, so I also worked with involuntary patients. And these are the patients who were in prison, or they were given probation and as part of their being released from prison, or as part of their probation, they were required to see me. So that was a whole other realm of working with people in a different way than I would work with the people who were coming because they really wanted the help that we could provide.

I stayed there for a couple years, and then I began working in community mental health. I mentioned that at St. Elizabeth's the population started to decline from that peak at 8,000. And although there were still thousands when I left, over the years there became less and less and less and the land got smaller and smaller while the government preyed at other things. And right now, there's actually Homeland Security is where St. Elizabeth's once was, and there's just a little tiny area that's still St. Elizabeth's. And part of the reason that that happened was that the field of mental health began to question if these large institutions were the right way for patients with mental health problems, mental illness, to

get the treatment that they needed. And they decided that it was better to be community- based.

So here I was, about eight years or so later, working in a community mental health setting. And what I saw was that there was a lot of poor planning that happens around the services that get provided for people that have mental illness. That just because they didn't think that large, where people live for years and years, those people that I worked with lobotomy's have been there for 50 years and never had a visitor. So they thought that's a pretty horrible thing, but now if you see a lot of people that are homeless and they're on the streets, those were some of the people that would have at least gotten care in some of these bigger facilities if they still existed.

So at the time that I was hired for the community mental health, they were closing down all of those large facilities and we were trying to service some of those people who were mentally ill that were in the community and could find us, but we also serviced people of all levels of troubles. We saw people who just had different stresses in their life and needed a little bit of extra support, we saw people who had marital problems, mild depression, major depression, panic disorders, anxiety, all of the spectrum of different kinds of mental health issues is what I worked with for about five years.

And then, I was hired by a hospital. And although it was a big medical hospital, they had four units that were for psychiatric patients, and one of them was to specialize with eating disorders. I was hired to be the specialist with the eating disorder population. One of the things that became really clear to me in that position was that there's a lot of people who really respect social workers. And in this position I really felt the validation of my degree and my experience.

So in the eating disorder unit at this hospital, we had an interdisciplinary teams with the psychiatrists, the psychologists, recreational therapists, not musical therapists, recreational therapists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, nurses. And I was the leader in terms of bringing in all the information about the patient's family, because besides the psychiatrist, I was the only one that had the opportunity to meet with the family, as well as with the patient. And that's because social work is about taking it all in. It's not about isolated individual people, but it's about people in the context of their environment, and family is so much a big part of most of our environment. And so, on that team meeting, each time we met I brought in psychosocial information so that everybody would understand the context that brought this patient into our unit.

I got pregnant and I stayed home for awhile, and while I was home I worked in private practice and I worked for an EAP. And an EAP is an employee assistance program. And that's where some of the big corporations in Detroit, the automobile corporations, and IBM, and things like that, they send their employees for some counseling. Brief counseling, 10 session counseling. So while I was doing private practice with more longer relationships, I was also doing a EAP with shorter, and that's one thing that is very exciting about being a social worker in the clinical field is that there are so many different ways that you can be a social worker and learn and grow and keep changing and evolving

and getting better at how you help people. And so I really enjoyed that opportunity to be able to do different kinds of work with the different people that came to my office.

Around that time, my husband was working and somebody came into the business that he was working in and they asked for him by name. He came to meet with them and they put a gun to his head. They asked him to go to the vault and give them the money, and then they took all of the people that were working in the business and they had them lie down on the floor and take their clothes off. And they all thought that they were going to be killed. They did not get killed, but they also never found the person that asked my husband by name him to come, and my husband developed post-traumatic stress disorder. So first hand, I became aware of the impact of that kind of experience, and my husband was never able to return to his work. So fortunately, during all the years that he had been in this particular business, he was developing alternate [INAUDIBLE] and had actually acquired another degree, and he began to explore possibilities of a new career in Florida.

So we left Michigan and moved here where he was able to work again and able to, over time, have those symptoms dissipate from that horrific experience. And I became employed, again, very easily and very readily, in Florida at Jewish Family Services. And one thing was in Michigan, we didn't have licensure, we had a certification that I held, an ACSW, but in Florida, it was important to get licensure at this point in time. And so I had the education, I had the experience, I had the supervision, I just needed to take the exam. So I took the exam, got licensed, and worked for eight years at Jewish Family Services, and I had another one of those experiences of realizing the value of this particular degree, because I was the only professional that they had in the Jewish Family Services counseling area that they could get reimbursed for Medicare.

As a master's level professional social worker in the state of Florida, we were able to get reimbursed for Medicare. And I don't know if it's still true that other master's levels don't have that privilege, but at the time that I worked there, that's something that they really valued about my being able to do that. And I worked with Holocaust victims, I worked with the elderly that were more spry and more autonomous than the ones that I certainly had worked with at St. Elizabeth's. And I worked with families and adults of all ages also, providing all kinds of support in whatever kinds of problems that brought them in for counseling. Oftentimes it was transitions. It might have been a divorce, it might have been a death of somebody, it might have been that kind of depression that was caused by some kind of experience that they had that was fairly easy to resolve in terms of working in the relationship with them.

So I had 25 or so year career in clinical social work. And I thought to myself, I've done a lot of fabulous things with this degree, and every position that I've held has had meaning for me, has had great rewards for me. I've always been really happy with this career. And I wonder if there's something else I can do with this degree and some other kinds of skills and some other ways that I can develop myself. I decided to leave Jewish Family Services and 10 years ago I was hired here to be the advisor for the School of Social Work. And so I have been here for about 10 years, and it has been such a pleasure for me to be able to share my experiences and to support people who have thought, hmm, I'm not

sure what social work is, I'm not sure if that's what I want to do, and I've had the chance to be able to discuss that with them. And for some of them, it is the right path, and I've been able to then guide them through for them to get a BSW degree or an MSW degree and to go forward and be able to have a magnificent career as a professional social worker. And that's my story.

Hi, I'm Teri Simpson and I am a social worker. And Dr. Cooperman, at her request, we've been asked to tell our stories of how we became social workers. Mine is not quite as cerebral and planned as Amy's, things just kind of happened to me. I, unlike you, did not go– most of you– did not go to college until I was 38. Well, I started nurse's training. I had a year of nurses training right out of high school, saw my first autopsy, went home and told my dad, I don't think this is for me, dad. So I went off and had a very successful, or moderately successful, career in sales, which I still use in social work, by the way. So my husband died while he was in the military, and so at 38 I went to get my bachelor's degree.

So I came here to USF and I was getting a degree in Psychology because those are the kind of books I read for entertainment. And so I came to USF, but while I was here I volunteered for Hospice. So I'd had several losses in my life and I thought, OK, I've gotten counseling and I've survived these. I'm tough, I'm strong, I want to help other people. So you'll find that a typical response to people enrolling in the social work department.

As I volunteered for them for four years, I went to the woman who had the job I wanted at hospice and I said, I want your job. So what kind of master's degree do I need? And she said, I only hire MSW. And I said, MSWs? And like Amy said, I thought in the little black and white movies that a social worker was a mean person who took the kids away from a poorly understood parent. So I said, OK, I'll think about that, and she said, take an intro class. So it was my last semester getting my bachelor's, and so I took an intro class. And it was sitting in Professor [? Tilden's ?] Intro to Social Work that the light came on for me and said, oh my gosh, I'm a social worker. This is who I am. And now I found a path for me.

So there weren't any openings at Hospice when I got my bachelor's, so I looked around for other jobs and there was one in the paper to become a caseworker at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Tampa Bay. I thought, well, I'll just go for the interview and see how I like that. And so I went down there, and because I had worked with patients with AIDS, and this was 1993 and there were very few people that were willing to do that right then, they had just gotten a grant to provide Big Brothers and Big Sisters to children who had AIDS, were HIV infected, or were affected by the AIDS, so their parents, one of their parents, had it. And so it seemed like it was a light shining for me, like I said, not real cerebral, just kind of led me down that path, at least until hospice had an opening. I ended up staying there 16 years.

So while I was there, I entered the part time program in the MSW, still with my eye on hospice. And while I was there, I rose through the ranks and I did my internship in our

own, first I did my first part at Memorial Hospital in a day treatment program for people with dual diagnosis. So that was very interesting. But I was offered a promotion at my job, at Big Brothers, if I would do my counseling internship with them and also serve as a regional director. So I did that and I did in-home family counseling with girls, teenage girls. Tough population, let me tell you, but very, very rewarding.

So I did that and when I got my masters, then, I used the theories and principles and values that I had learned in my MSW program to complete my work at Big Brothers Big Sisters, to design policies that were social work friendly, and people friendly, and client friendly. And so that's how I use my MSW. As Amy was explaining, the various ways you can use a master's in social work, I ran an agency there, and left as a Senior Vice President after 16 years. And I came here to do this job as director of field education for the School of Social Work, which I like very much, and still continue to use my social work values, and teach them.

OK so that was our recent graduating class. These are BSW class, I think, from a year ago, two years ago. OK, so those are our BSWs, see those happy little social workers. OK I'm ready for the next one.

OK so you are interested in working directly with people to improve the quality of life. And so, these are the populations that we work with. The typical populations, children, teenagers, adults, and the elderly, so everybody. OK, ready. And so what is social work? Social work is distinguished from other human service professions by the focus on the person, as well as their environment. So you all function within systems, right? Your a son or a daughter, your an aunt, an uncle, a student, you're a citizen, you're a variety of things, and so we always have to look at how this system is affecting the individual, and how the individual is impacting their system.

Social workers are also advocates. Oh my, you'll hear that value, ethics, advocate. You'll hear that over and over again in the social work profession, because we're looking for social justice. We want all people to have equal access to services. We also address a broad range of biopsychosocial problem areas. So we provide counseling to individuals, families, couples, and groups.

So the social work program is a study designed to respond to the identified needs in the region. So, right now we have a huge interest in veterans and military. People value our veterans, which is a change in posture and feelings from years ago. And so we have a very strong interest in social workers who want to work in the VA or work with military families, but social workers adjust to those changes. It's built upon the core information basic to social work practice, and it's followed by advanced scholarly study in preparation for clinical work.

So USF's a program in social work, Master's in Social Work, is a clinical program. So as Amy was telling you earlier, there are varied programs. There are some that follow administrative track. In the state of Florida, if you want to be licensed, it's a clinical license. And so this prepares you for your licensure. OK, that's good.

The Master's in Social Work program, we have a full time program. And so that's two years, unless you have a BSW, and if you already have a BSW, you get advanced standing, so you get to skip a semester and– kind of equates to a semester, but for the full time program it's two years and you'll go into your field placement in the first semester. So that's my job, and that's why I believe I was hired by USF because of my community relationships and the people that I know over the years, because I can form those relationships. Social work is really actually a small community, believe it or not, in this big Tampa Bay Area.

We also have a part time program. The part time program is eight semesters, including summers. That's the one I told you that I went through. So those students start in the field in their second semester and they go to school in the evening. They typically do their field placement part of the time during the day, during the week, and then part of the time in the evening or the weekend, because they're very dedicated, very hard working, want that master's degree really bad, so they do whatever they need to do to get that done.

We do individual family and group work, so at some point in your experience, in your field placement, you would do counseling with that that population. And so, when we make a partnership, an affiliation, with an agency they agree that if they take a student, they will provide those experiences for our students.

We are a values and ethics driven profession, and so we live by the National Association of Social Works Standards and Ethics. The master's degree is 900 hours in a field placement. So the Counsel on Social Work Education, which is our accrediting body, has called the field experience the signature pedagogy. Does anybody know what that means? Pedagogy. That means that's where the real learning takes place. So you may have a whole curriculum of classes, but this is your signature pedagogy is your field experience. Where you bring in the knowledge that you got in the classroom into practice and see it in real life at an agency or hospital. I can't read that last one, oh, yes, and it fulfills academic requirement for licensure.

OK, where do social workers work? You did very well when you answered that question about child welfare, because typically most people will tell you that's what social workers do, they work with children in the foster care system. And indeed, they do. And in fact, I don't know if you heard that the legislature passed a law that will be enacted in, I think, a couple years that requires that every child protection team that takes a child out of the home, has someone with a social work degree on that team. So they have to be in the home, they have to be with the team as they remove a child. That's very significant for our profession.

So we do do that, yes. And we do, and you know what else we do? We work with families to keep their kids out of foster care. So if they've been identified as a threat, we'll do in-home family counseling. We'll bring them to whatever our agency is and do groups with them, parenting groups. Help them so their children don't have to enter the foster care system.

They work in hospitals, that's for sure. 42% of my students, my interns, right now are in a hospital setting or a clinical mental health setting. So I have students in All Children's, students in St. Joseph's Children's, Women's, [INAUDIBLE]. So they go there, they're learning to do medical social work, and they'll be there for two years or four semesters.

I do have, also, I wanted to make sure I told you this. Right now, there is a federal law that requires that all dialysis unit have a licensed clinical social worker on the premises. So many of our students are in dialysis center. And do you know that only 10% of people receiving dialysis are on a waiting list for a new kidney? Only 10% that qualify. So you know that 90%? They know this is their life. So they deal with depression, and angst of having this situation, and also their family sitting in the waiting room, and how their lives are changed. So our students are helping them with that.

We also have that Northside, MHC, big community mental health centers here. We have some of our students, actually, in private practice, learning cognitive behavioral therapy in a large practice. So as long as a practice can offer our students a large variety of things like individual, group, family, counseling, then we'll consider them as a possible affiliated partner.

We also have about 10% of our students right now are doing school social work. So they want to work with kids, so this is a great opportunity for them. They're learning what it's really like there. Only about 10% of our students are actually in child welfare agencies right now. I expect that will increase because of the new legislation. We have about 10% of our students working in substance abuse field. So they're working with people with drug and alcohol and other addictions. We have about 12% of our students right now are either at a VA or in a military setting.

We also have people in aging population, we baby boomers, we're going to need some social workers pretty soon, so we need to get them trained. And it's also a big area of interest and one of our better paying areas. Forensic social work, so when we have students in the public defender's office doing mitigation interview, and doing counseling with the prisoners, and then going before the judge and helping them in the sentencing process. We have our students working with victims of trauma. And so you'll see, trauma informed care is a big part of our educational process. Development disabilities, so those are kind of a wide range.

OK, that's our curriculum. I know it's small, hard to read, and looks overwhelming. But actually, it's quite doable. I know because I did it. And so you'll see there's a lot of focus on field instruction there. You'll have that every semester, and that's where you come to your seminar and you discuss what's happening in your field placement. So we get everyone's input. And so we're all about diversity, justice, social welfare, and also your clinical practice skills.

OK this is our mission statement, which we took great pains to write. The mission of the School of Social Work is to prepare graduates to achieve excellence as leaders in social work practice, research, and education at local, national, and global levels. The school, in

partnership with the university and the community, educates graduates to embrace the spectrum of social work knowledge, values, ethics, and skills to promote social and economic justice for diverse, vulnerable, and under-served populations.

So if I'm interviewing you for a field placement and you come and you tell me, I only want to work with middle-class people, I'm going to say what attracted you to social work? We're looking for oppressed populations. We're looking to help people that have been under-served and perhaps, have had a direct result of that on their life experiences.

That's our faculty and our staff. I also wanted to tell you one thing I didn't tell you earlier is you will find our students in agencies. The COO of the United Way of the sun coast, one of the largest in the state of Florida, is an MSW. I, of course, was an MSW. We have all around the city, the three county area, you will find people in leadership in agencies, nonprofit agencies, that have master's degrees in social work.

And I think you want to know about the salaries, right? [INAUDIBLE] hear it, yeah. Well you know, we're not famous for making a lot of money, right? You've heard that. But I want to tell you that, I explained to our students that if you take private practice out of this mix for now, because that can either be very lucrative, or not so lucrative depending on your clientele and your situation. So, right at the top tier, coming right out of your MSW is a veterans, Veterans Association, the health administration. And they pay $47,000 a year to a brand new MSW. Now, after you're there for two years, for those two years they're going to provide you supervision toward your licensure, which has a great monetary value. And then, when you get your license, you automatically go to $52,000. Now that's not even any step increases, so that's pretty good for right out of a master's degree.

Right under that is nephrology social work. So they're social workers that work in the dialysis units. They make they make pretty good money, too. So they're probably around $40,000 starting out. And then right under there are the school social workers. And of course, at the bottom, the job that tears your guts out but you love it anyway, is child welfare. So they are the least paid, but they get their rewards in other places.

OK, so what makes a good social worker? Compassion, and empathy. When I am doing an orientation for our brand new social workers, just accept it, I tell them you are probably the one in your family, in your social group, at your school that everybody went to when they had a problem. You're the good listener, you're the empathetic ear, you're the compassionate person. And that seems to be who we draw. For most of our students, that's innate. I believe that social workers are born and they come to classes to get the education they need to do the work that they want to do. You need dedication and you need passion and drive, because sometimes you have to have the drive for your clients who don't have it right now, so you have to have it for them.

You need critical thinking skills. You need to step back and look at the whole situation, because typically your clients are in a situation where they can't do that. So you have to be able to critically look at it. You have to be able to analyze what you've done, to be

open to that, to critique yourself, as well, and learn from your own critiques. And you have to be flexible. Oh my, you have to be flexible. Because you may go into a job thinking you're doing one thing and then, no, you didn't get any of that stuff on your to-do list done, because this came up and it needed your attention. That's typical social work for us. You have to be flexible, especially when you're in an agency where things are happening all the time. You will never be bored, I promise you that. To me, that's the worst job you can is a job that you're bored in. You will never be bored as a social worker.

And you need to be a lifelong learner. As I told you, we're adjusting now to the needs of the community and the VA, certainly, learning how to help our vets with PTSD and other issues that are facing them is huge. The Polytrauma unit over there, where the guys have pictures of themselves on their doors how they looked when they first went in the military, because they're afraid you won't recognize. They want you to know that I'm still that person. That is really a hard place for our students to go. But you know, the ones that go there feel so rewarded when they leave. To help their families with that adjustment and to help the vet, as well.

They will come to me, we have about an hour interview, they've submitted an application where they list about five things that they're interested in. Some of them come to me and they're all over the place. They just want it all. I want to do this, I want to do that. But what I do is I help them narrow it down, and then we will, based on that information, then I'll select a field placement for them. And they will go and interview and make sure it's a good fit for them, and the agency also that they feel that the student's going to be a good fit for them.

So they stay in the same place for the whole time?

Yes, the goal is that you'll stay in the same placement all four semesters, and I'll tell you why. The feeling of the people at the School of Social Work is that the longer you're there, the more they learn who you are, the more they invest in you, the deeper and richer experiences they're going to entrust in you. So if I move a student the semester that they go into their family counseling, and they have to find a family to do counseling with, and the agency doesn't really know who they are yet, it's very difficult for them to entrust one of their families. And so it seems to work very well for us. There are instances where I do change placements for students. Oh, I was wrong. This really isn't for me. I'm not, I'm really– like I did for nurses training. Whew, that's not for me. So they come to me and they say, oh, you know what, I was wrong. Or their field instructor at the agency leaves, so they have we have to have an MSW there with two years experience. So if that person leaves and there's no MSW, no one else can supervise our students because their education has to be protected.

So I can speak a little bit to the difference between psychology and social work, OK. One difference is your educational path. To do everything that you would want to do in psychology, a PhD Is pretty much a requirement, and at USF and in many places, it's a research-based school experience. And even more so than that, I think when we think

about the differences in people who work in counseling fields, you have psychiatrists who are able to provide medication and prescriptions because they're physicians. You have psychologists who their expertise is in testing, and that's why the research piece is so important. And they're the only ones that really have what they need to have educational wise to do diagnostic kinds of testing.

And with social work, what we call the terminal degree is the master's degree. And what that means is that yes, we have a PhD, but in order to do almost anything that you would want to do in our field, the master's degree will open the door for you. If you want to be a tenured professor in a school of social work, then you need a PhD But other than that, the master's degree prepares you for any of the different kinds of work in the profession that you might want to do. So that's kind of a difference with that.

There are some similarities between how the BSW and the MSW degrees are, both in terms of the flow of curriculum and in terms of admissions. So for both of our degrees, there are certain criteria that have to be managed, minimum criteria. With the BSW degree, you have to have a minimum of 2.75 to be eligible for our program. With the MSW program, like most of the programs at a graduate level, you have to have a minimum 3.0 GPA when you're graduating. And that 3.0 is taken from your last 60 credit hours. So if you've had problems your first couple years adjusting and being a student, but you're able to pull it together in your last couple years. You are able to really shine out and show what kind of academic student you are, that works. As long as you have a 3.0 with the last 60 credit hours, you're eligible for the MSW program.

With the BSW degree and the MSW degree, it's a very lock step, structured, sequenced program. So you might have noticed it looks so overwhelming, the brochure part that listed all those courses– you don't have to think about it. The reason you don't have to think about it is, if you're admitted, we got it all planned for you. You're admitted, we tell you what to take, you have to take it at the time that we offer it, and you go through the program, which is very exciting for our students, in a cohort model. Whether it's the BSW or the MSW, the people that you're– I think something shut off. Should I keep going?

OK, so the people that you're admitted with into the program that you're going to graduate with, you go through each semester together as a group of students. You might have a couple sections, but you really get to know your fellow students and you get to do group work together, you study together, you go through the program together because every class you take is pretty much laid out for you. It has to be completed successfully before you can enter the next semester of classes and follow through with the program. So that is true for both the BSW and the MSW. The downside of that is if you're working full-time days, then you're not able to do either of our daytime, full-time MSW program. And the only program we offer for the undergrad is a full time undergraduate program. So there is some level of flexibility with the BSW program when you're at the very end with that field, but in order to go through these programs, you need to be able to make school your focus and your commitment so that whatever days that we tell you you need to be here, you can do that.

For the BSW program, you come to classes a maximum of three days per week until you hit that last semester when you have the internship, which is pretty much Monday through Thursday, and you're on campus on Fridays. With the MSW program, you come two days per week to campus 8:00 to 5:00, and then the other three days, 20 hours or 2 and 1/2 days out of those three days, you're at that field work. And so there's a lot of similarities in terms of structure that's really important to know up front because it really does require you to put this as your priority in order to get these degrees.

The part time program, and Teri mentioned that earlier, that has more flexibility but not so, because most of the people in there are working full time during the days. So it's flexible in the fact that it's nighttime, primarily, with those daytime that you fit in, or at least four of the hours that you fit in weekly for the field placement. But again, even our part-time program, students are taking pretty much three evenings a week, and they have to take those courses as we schedule them, those evenings in order to move into the next semester and so forth. So all of our programs are sequenced and that's just part of how these degrees are able to be made available to you. Anything else about the curriculum?

GRE.

GRE. We do not require a GRE for our MSW program. In the past, we did. And research has been done that shows that, at least for social work, there really isn't a correlation between how well you do in a GRE and how well you do in the master's program in social work. So we don't require a GRE but 3.0 is the minimum GPA. It doesn't automatically mean that you're admitted to the program. And our application is really holistic, and that's true for both the BSW and the MSW. We are looking for you to show that you've have some investment in helping people. So in your references, one has to be from a supervisor in some kind of a human services area. So if this is a field that you think you may want to go towards, start to get some volunteer work. Doesn't have to be a paid position where you have a supervisor, even a volunteer situation that you've done with some consistency where that supervisor's gotten to know you and can complete that recommendation for you. That works for us.

Another reference will come from a professor. And then with a third reference, it could be another professor or somebody where you've worked that isn't human service oriented. So we have those three references as part of the application for the MSW, a resume that you provide, and then there's two essays. We call one an essay, but it's really a personal statement. So we really want you to do some thinking if this is the right area for you, because it isn't for everybody. And that's why we're here and we're so happy to have the opportunity, because some of you may be still floundering and when you hear this, you go, that is a match. Like for both Teri and I, we recognized that was a match.

But for many of you, you know that there's something else out there, or it's not going to be this. And so we want people to have some definition within themselves that this is the right path. And so one of those essays is your personal statement to share that with us, so that we get to know you and we know that about you. And the other is a critical thinking essay and, as Teri mentioned, we know that being able to critically look at issues and

being able to back up why you would handle them a certain way, is an important mindset to have in our field.

And for all graduate schools at USF, we have the graduate application, which is separate from the School of Social Work application. And so both of them have to be completed. And for those of you who might be already juniors, already seniors, there are deadlines. And February 15th is the deadline to apply for fall of the same year. So we're already finished with the receiving of our applications for our fall admissions. So every year for that full time program, February 15th the application has to be in and ready with all of those materials to be admitted for fall.

I think that's-

We want to open it up, see if you have questions, yeah?

So, the social workers that work with the school and the children at home, do they closely work together, I guess?

Social workers in the school system and social workers, if they have a common family? So the question is, if you have a family who's being seen in the school and that same family may be in another system where they're providing help, is there some collaboration? Absolutely.

Yes.

Absolutely, that whole interdisciplinary, and even within the same discipline but in systems. That's another thing about the coolness of our cohort model is that when you graduate, you've met a lot of people who are then going to work with you in different agencies throughout your community and with the same families and be able to collaborate and work together.

Good question.

So you told us about the program and your stories, and stuff, but I'm still a little confused what a social worker is? So, are you guys some sort of therapist or psychologist, kind of, for families?

Well–

A social worker is all those things.

But with different degrees. I mean everybody has a different degree and a different focus. So as a social worker, we're going to work with people and our special population is going to be people who are vulnerable. So there are going to be people who may be vulnerable because of their age, or because of their stage of life, or because of the condition in their neighborhood, their in poverty, and we're going to help them to have a

better quality of life in whatever way we can through some kind of counseling type of thing, or linking to services. Does that help?

Yeah. So you talk about how these people are under served, and stuff, so are you guys talking about the government, or how are you guys–

It depends on where we work. If you work for an agency that's funded by the government you can, or a nonprofit, or private, I mean, you might want to speak–

And if you have a license, you're a third party payee and as Amy said, you can open your own practice and you can bill Medicare, Medicaid, or–

Blue Cross Blue Shield.

In fact, the majority of the people who come and interview with me say, in five years, I want to be in private practice. We know that the reality is that in three years our graduates are supervising someone. So they may be doing clinical practice and supervising other clinicians, or they may be in an agency. But typically they go into a leadership role pretty quickly. So in the matter of fact, most private therapists will tell you that the best way to a private practice is through the agency. So cut your teeth here and learn, and learn to be a good clinician, and then you'll be perfect for private practice.

And I think one of the hard parts about understanding what a social worker is, is because we're all over the place doing different things. And I think that's part of probably why it's hard to say, well, what is a social worker. Well we do so many different things that you can't just pin us down, you know. I wanted to add, because you asked me to and I forgot, that along with our MSW degree, we have one dual degree. So we have one degree that goes along, if you're interested in it, it's an MSW MPH degree. A Master's Degree in Social Work and a Master's Degree in Public Health. And so, what makes it a dual degree is that there are a few courses and a few parts of the curriculum that can substitute for each other, and so instead of going the two full years for the MSW and the two full years that it would take to get an MPH, it's maybe more around three years to get both of those degrees.

And there's two concentrations for the public health degree that are possible with our dual degree. One is in mental health and substance abuse, that's one concentration, and the other is in maternal and child health. And so that's another opportunity where we are the clinical degree and they are more of a macro administrative-oriented degree. But you can, if you have an interest in both and you think that you want to be able to be hired in different kinds of roles, that degree prepares you for the different aspects of both macro and micro practice. Other questions? Yeah.

Do you have any course prerequisites that you need to take before you apply for the master's degree?

Master's degree, we have what we call liberal arts perspective, and as USF students, you definitely have a liberal arts. The only thing that could be missing is if some of you have taken for your life sciences anthropological, biology, or something else, you need to have an actual straight human biology, such as AMP or Intro to Biology for Non-science majors, BFC 105, or human biology. Those are the only three at USF that count towards, really, the life sciences.

If you came from HCC or if you came from some of the other community colleges, you may have taken a human sexuality course, you may have taken a reproduction and inheritance course, you may have taken something else that will count. So that would be something that I could talk with you about. But other than that, you've got a the liberal arts perspective way over the top. Yes.

Is it competitive to get in the program?

Competitive, well I think we have to define what that means. I think pretty much, all graduate programs have some limitations in terms of how many numbers of people that they admit. Does everybody get admitted that applies? Definitely not. I would say that the last admissions cycle before the one for this fall, probably one out of every three applicants were admitted, and I was aware that we were told that it's more between one out of every two or three for this cycle, so it varies. And it's really about that composite of experience related to social work, as well as those strong grades and your writing skills and your references. All of that together are being looked at by the faculty. Other questions?

I'm sure you'll hang around for a few minutes–

We'd be happy to. We also brought some pamphlets about the MSW program and our cards, so you can always contact us at another point if you come up with something or want to talk more with us. And as the advisor, I advise for all perspective MSW students, as well as the BSW program. Thank you.

PART 1

Slide 1 (00:18)

So, I'm Whitney. I'm a mental health counselor, like she said. I'm going to be covering a

whole bunch of different aspects of the psychology and mental health field. I'm by no means an

expert in many other areas because I'm a counselor. So, I'm going to touch on a lot of the

differences between some of the social science fields and all that kind of thing. So if you're

having questions about other fields, I may not be able to answer them as thoroughly as I can for

the mental health counseling part of it. But feel free to ask because in figuring out what I wanted

to do, those are probably some of the same questions that you might have.

So first she was saying I should probably explain what all those letters after my name

mean. I don't usually put them all up there but in trying to help you understand how to become a

mental health counselor, I wanted to include that. So all those letters after my name, not only

does it mean I spent on education but it also shows you that I got two master's degree – that's

what the M.S. and the M.PhilED degrees are. So, I got two master’s degrees and counseling

related stuff. Most people do not. Again, spent too much money on the education thing. But most

people typically to go into the counseling field will get… If they're in the master's type of field,

they're going to get an M.A, or M.S., a Master of the Arts, or a Master of Science to become a

counselor. Then the rest of it, the LMHC is a licensed mental health counselor. So, to become a

counselor you need to have a license. You can be in the mental health field without one, but to

do specifically counseling you have to have a license. Then the last part is the National Certified

Counselor.

So just to tell you about me, which my husband gave me strict instructions not to bore

anybody about myself. So, I'll try to keep it brief about myself.

Slide 2 (02:05)

But, the licensed mental health counselor is my license in what I do. That's the LMHC

part. The NCC is the National Certified Counselor.

Slide 3 (02:14)

So, I got my graduate training at the University of Pennsylvania. It's not Penn State,

they're two different schools. Most people in Florida don't seem to know that. But to become a

counselor you need to have a bachelor’s degree and to do actual counseling you need a master’s

degree or higher, which I'll get to. For me, I went to the University of Pennsylvania and I got my

degrees.

Slide 4 (02:41)

Right now I'm working in private practice. I've worked in a whole bunch of different

settings. I've worked in outpatient. I've worked in inpatient. I have some interesting stories about

that.

Slide 5 (02:50)

I love inpatient counseling, but it's also really exhausting in some ways. So, there's

definitely some exciting times. But, right now I'm in a private practice because it's what fits my

lifestyle the best right now. Again, I'm going to get to that as I explain what's going on. So to

answer your questions after today… We'll get to some of the mental health-related statistics.

Everyone is furiously taking notes.

Slide 6 (03:16)

I don't know how many people knew this, but approximately one in four Americans have

a mental illness in any given year. Not over their lifetime, but any given year.

Slide 7 (03:23)

That's a lot! How many people are in this classroom? About three-hundred, right? So,

there's about seventy of you in here who are probably going to have mental illness issue this

year. That's a lot! That's like this whole section. You guys are okay, right? So, the answer to the

question first was there's sixty-one point five million Americans in any given year that have a

mental illness. How many of you knew that? What was it? Sixteen percent of the class?

Somebody knew that? Yeah! More people have mental illness then knew the answer! Most of

you probably have known somebody with some sort of mental health problem. I think it's

actually more rare to not know someone, whether it be depression or anxiety (which are both

very common), drug and alcohol issues (that falls under the category of mental health). Some of

you are nodding your heads. As soon as I said alcohol everyone's like yup, I know somebody

with that problem. So, there's all kinds of different mental illness. I just named some of the

basics, but it's very common.

What's really great today is that it's talked about more than ever. So many of us when our

parents or grandparents or great grandparents were growing up, it was not something that you

talked about. It was hush-hush. Nobody talked about it. Nobody wanted to get help. It was a bad

thing. Still, we're fighting that stigma. The stereotype is if you have a mental health problem,

what do you do? Keep it to yourself? A lot of people do. Do you tell your closest friends? Do

you get professional help? Right? Thankfully so many people now are talking about it and telling

their parents/their teachers when they have a problem, that they may actually be likely to end up

in a therapist's office. But unfortunately, there's so many people that do not end up seeing

someone when they really should be. Luckily, it's not that big of a deal for many people to just

go talk to a counselor. I'm not super scary, right? I seem pretty normal. So it used to be this

stigma of, "Oh, you're going to see a shrink? Ouch, that means something's wrong with you!,"

right? But, nowadays it's pretty common. You have some sort of thing going on in your life and

you need somebody who knows what to do to help you out. Maybe you don't have the greatest

family or social support/friends, so you go talk to somebody. It's not that scary. So, thankfully it's

sort of changing. But, there's still many people. I don't have the statistics up here… many people

that don't get the help that they need. You can see one of the statistics up there.

Slide 8 (06:10)

Right here is children with anxiety disorders are least likely to receive treatment.

Slide 9 (06:16)

There’s so many statistics about different groups of people, races, age groups, genders,

that really don't have great access to mental healthcare. So, that's why it's so important to be

aware of the mental health field. Many of you may not go into mental health stuff. Maybe some

of you will. But I don't care what you do, especially if you're in a health science-related field,

you're going to end up needing to work with a mental health-related professional. Whether it be a

counselor, or case worker, psychiatrist… I'm going to explain the difference between all of those.

You're going to need to work with those people to be successful in the health science field. So,

back to my statistics.

Slide 10 (06:58)

One-hundred ninty-two point two billion dollars is spent on mental illness every year and

it's still not enough.

Slide 11 (07:05)

That's a lot of money! Whoever won the Powerball or whatever yesterday, that's still not

even close. Okay? So, why is it so expensive? Well if you need to be hospitalized because of a

major drug rehab, how long do you think you're probably there? Anybody have any idea? Three

months? Could be. Good treatment is three to six months. Most people are there about three days

until they detox and they send them home. Okay? So, that's the amount of money that's spent but

yet people are still not getting adequate care. Thankfully, with some of the healthcare changes,

and I'm not going to get into the politics of the healthcare stuff that has been going on. But,

thankfully there have been initiatives to try to figure out how to give people more access to care.

A lot of it is costs. One of the things that has not been covered in most people's insurance plans is

mental health. You have to pay straight out of your deductible or whatever. So, it's expensive to

see a counselor. I don't know how many of you want to spend a hundred dollars an hour to talk to

somebody about some school stress. Not very likely to do that, right

But thankfully insurance companies are now required to include some version of mental

health coverage, whether it be a co-pay or whatever. It's all dependent on the plan. But, now it's

easier for people. Technically now everybody is supposed to have health insurance coverage. If

you don't, you're in trouble with the taxes. Right? So, in theory that should really contribute to

the amount of people that are able to have access to care should they want to get it. Now of

course other people don't know how to go about getting it. That's also a part of what we'll kind of

cover a little bit today. Now, you know a counselor. So, it makes it a little bit easier when you

have some connections. Let's see what else.

Slide 12 (09:01)

Twenty-five years, the average decrease in lifespan of those with serious mental health

illness in America then other Americans, largely due to treatable medical conditions.

Slide 13 (09:08)

What do you think that means? Somebody? Anybody? What do you think that means?

Twenty-five years less that people are less likely to live if you have a major mental health…

Yeah, you're going to die earlier if you have a mental health problem! Now, I don't mean to scare

you guys especially since seventy of you have one. Okay? I'm not trying to scare you. But the

reason for that statistic and it's a very skewed statistic (you can look at it a whole bunch of

different ways), but the reason that is because if you have a major mental health illness… If you

have schizophrenia and you're scared to talk to anyone because you're afraid that they're going to

kill you, how likely are you to go to the doctor? How likely are you going to go get that whatever

procedure that you need done or who knows what? You're not going to talk to anybody. You're

not going to leave your house; you're going to hide in the dark. So if you're depressed, how likely

are you to be motivated to make a doctor's appointment? How many doctor's appointments

you're going to miss if you're anxious? Or maybe you have a phobia and you have a problem

getting on the mass transit system because you don't have a car? Maybe you have a fear of

driving a car?

So if you have a major mental health illness… I'm not just talking about you have a little

anxiety because you have a test coming up. If you have a major mental health illness, this is

specific to people who have really severe stuff going on (so not everyone) but if you have a

really severe mental health issue, it's going to keep you from getting access to the care that you

need. Maybe just going down the street to the pharmacy to get your insulin. Okay?

Slide 14 (10:55)

So… And then suicide… This is one that most people don't know. It's the third leading

cause of death from people for ages fifteen to twenty-four; so you guys.

Slide 15 (11:02)

Did you know that? Third leading. Good, somebody knew that! Okay? Good stuff. Not

good stuff. Suicide's not a good thing. I'm saying it’s good that he knew that. So, it's actually…

It's the tenth leading cause of death in the U.S. overall, which is more common that homicide.

How many times in the news we hear about people killing each other? A lot! It gets a lot of

press. They don't talk about the person who's seventeen-years-old and killed themselves because

they decided that they wanted to come out and be gay and nobody was supportive of them.

Right? So, mental health… My point is, mental health is a really big deal. Not just in our country,

but around the world. It effects everyone. Even if you don't have the mental health… One in four

people. You can look around you and see people that have it. Okay? So, not just because you're

in a health science class but because people that you know are going to be having some of these

issues. Let's see…

Slide 16 (12:04)

So, I just want to show you a little clip. It's kind of an older clip. It's just a piece of

another whole series.

Slide 17 (12:08)

So, what the guy's talking about at the very beginning doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

But I wanted to show you a clip of somebody with schizophrenia, which is one of the most

devastating mental health issues. To give you a picture because this might be one… Maybe you

do know somebody, but it's a little less common to be exposed to somebody with schizophrenia.

Like I said, it's a really debilitating disease. It's also a very commonly inherited disease. So, if

you have somebody in your family with schizophrenia it's a very serious thing because it does

tend to run in families. But I wanted to show this to you guys so that you have an idea of what

it's like to talk to somebody with schizophrenia, especially when they're in what's called a

"disorganized speech pattern." It's really interesting.

I actually… During my internship, which was outside of West Philadelphia, I talked to a

guy who talked like this. I had to have a therapy session with him for fifty minutes. I had maybe

about four or five of them until he got sent to the hospital. But, when they're talking like this…

This is not everyone with schizophrenia. This is just some people, maybe if they're not on

medications or whatever. So, it's not everyone. But, it's really hard to understand what they're

saying and you'll see what I'm talking about. But the point is I want you to keep in mind while

you're looking at this or watching this, what it would be like if you know what field you want to

go to or maybe you think you know. Maybe you want to be a PA or maybe you want to be a

physical therapist or you want to be a nurse. What it would be like to get the medical history

from this person? Or what it would be like to work with this person and have to understand what

they were talking about?

Slide 18 (13:55)

The third type of symptom that may be present is disorganization of thought and speech.

So that the thoughts are disconnected. When a person speaks there's either a great deal of

tangential circumstantial rambling kinds of lack of a connectedness to the other.

*Indistinguishable words*

Slide 19 (15:15)

Okay, so who knew what he was saying? Yeah, you're supposed to be confused. He

doesn't make any sense. Yeah, the wind blows. He was being completely serious. He was really

trying to explain something that was in his mind that was really important that was bothering

him, something he was experiencing. It's not something you’re going to be able to follow. So,

how would you get a history and physical from somebody like that? What kinds of medications

are they currently on? You hope that they brought somebody with them that is coherent enough

to explain, but that's not always the case. They could show up in the ER and you have to

somehow figure out what is this guy's deal. Right? So, it's just an example of how bad… That's

worse case kind of stuff. Okay? Now, when it comes to the things that I do… Again, I'll kind of

cover that a little bit too. But, I wanted to kind of give you guys an example of how this could be

relevant even if you're not going to be a counselor. Okay?

Alright, so let's talk about the different type of professionals in the mental health field

because a lot of these different professions sound really similar. They had the word psych in

them somewhere. Most people don't have a clue what the difference is. So now you're going to

be educated and know. So, the first thing… I'm going to talk about from the most education that

you need, down to the least amount just to kind of keep in some sort of organization.

PART 2

Slide 1 (00:00)

So, psychiatrists. That's the one you hear very commonly.

Slide 2 (00:06)

I'm not a psychiatrist. A psychiatrist is somebody who is a medical doctor who has gone

to medical school… So if you have someone that’s talked about medical school, that would be

one of the fields you could go into with medical school. Some people do because they love

mental health. But, the reason they're medical doctors is because they have to be able to prescribe

medication. Nowadays, they are not the people doing therapy. So if you want to do counseling, if

you want to do therapy, psychotherapy and talk to people and help them figure out what to do

with x, y or z problem, you probably don't want to be a psychiatrist. Back in the day, like

1900's/1920's, they did it all. They gave medications, they talked to people and did therapy.

That's not the case so much anymore. Medical doctors… You do see once in a while… It's

actually becoming pretty common. You will see nurse practitioners or ARNPs who also, because

they are nurse practitioners and could prescribe. They're nurses that have a higher education level

then bachelors-level nurse. They are able to prescribe. A lot of times they will work with

psychiatrists and prescribe medication, so that's why I kind of put it in parenthesis. But, they

usually… They always have to be working under a psychiatrist. But, some people that's who they

see – is they regularly see their nurse practitioner. So that's medical school, give people

medications, really very necessary because the best treatment for most mental health conditions

is medication and therapy. Not all, but most is to do both.

Most of the times we're not just going to write somebody a script, say, "Hey, take this

medicine. You'll be magically better. Your depression will be totally gone." It's not very likely.

Some people, okay, maybe. But especially with counseling it's going to be a lot more successful.

Questions about a psychiatrist? This is where I want to make sure you guys ask questions

because I'm going through what might be most relevant to you figuring out it might be

something you might be interested in. Does anybody have a question about the psychiatrist part

of it. Please feel free; I like questions. Okay.

Slide 3 (02:16)

Psychologist (sounds very similar) is somebody who had a PhD…

Slide 4 (02:22)

…Or it also could be a PsyD – a doctoral level degree (going to grad school for a

doctorate). They are people… They can do therapy… Someone with a PsyD is able to do therapy,

PhD as well. But typically, they're people who will do more assessments. They're the people that

would be doing page after page of assessment of questions, different settings (it might depend on

what they're assessing). They do lots of assessments. There's a lot of statistics involved perhaps.

Now again, seeing nowadays they put it all in the computer and it does it for them. But a lot of

times, you have to have taken a lot of mathematics and statistics classes to be a psychologist. It's

assessing to come up with a diagnosis. From this student a gifted student in a school, to do they

have autism, to do they have a personality disorder? It’s any number of different things. So it's

mostly assessments or on the flip side, it's also could be somebody who wants to teach mental

health at a university. So, if somebody wants to be a professor, they're going to end up being a

psychologist and having a PhD. So if you want to teach mental health, you want to teach in the

psychology-related field, you're going to want to get a doctoral level degree. You can teach with

a master's, but especially at a major university you usually want to have a PhD. Questions about

a psychologist? Okay.

Slide 5 (03:53)

Mental health professional. I starred the licensed mental health counselor, the LMHC

because that's what I am.

Slide 6 (03:58)

So, the rest… A lot more of my presentation will be specific to a licensed mental health

counselor. It's very similar to a licensed clinical social worker or a licensed marriage and family

therapist. But in many states, especially also in the state of Florida, it's a different license. Very

similar requirements, slightly different classes at the master's level but you need a master's

degree to be a licensed mental health professional – whether it be LMHC, clinical social worker,

marriage and family therapist. For me, I knew I didn't want to do marriage counseling. No desire

to be somebody's referee about whatever divorce issue. Not interested. I really wanted to do the

clinical stuff. I wanted to deal with people that had severe mental illness if I wanted to. I wanted

to deal with more diagnosing. Again, I'll go into what we do more.

Slide 7 (04:54)

But, they're all very similar. A licensed clinical social worker , somebody that gets that

degree a lot of times…

Slide 8 (05:01)

… they have a bachelor's in social work. Their master's degree would be in social work.

Social work focuses a little bit more on the community and community resources. That is a

whole… At the master's level they learn a.sl how to do therapy. Like I said, very similar to what I

do. Most of my co-workers in private practice are licensed social workers. They're a little bit

older degrees, so there's more of them. LMHC has only been around for maybe… I'm not sure in

Florida because I was trained in Pennsylvania but maybe twenty/thirty years or so, whereas

licensed social workers is much older than that. So, it's a more established program. But again I

was more interested in clinical, diagnosing, therapy, so that wasn't for me. I didn't really want to

do social work where I'm going and working in adoption agencies or doing therapy with that

kind of issues. So, it wasn't for me. Then the same thing… I said that, license marriage therapy is

out. Then there's also all kinds of other areas that people could work in mental health.

Slide 9 (06:02)

It could be school guidance counselors. Most guidance counselors may have the same

degree as me: licensed mental health counselor.

Slide 10 (06:06)

Some of them get a degree in school counseling. That's its own separate degree or can be.

Again, it depends on the state. If you know you want to live in Florida, it's going to be different

requirements then if you want to live in New Jersey depending on what the school requirements

are. The best way to find that out is if you think you know where you want to live, go to the state

licensing board. They have all those requirements typed up there. That's what I had to do. I was

trained, born and raised in Pennsylvania and moved down here, oh geez, four years ago now. So,

I got my license in Pennsylvania and I had to see, okay, can I bring my license down here for

Florida? What are the requirements? They were different. I had to take an extra class, pay more

money for graduate training and I had to do more supervised hours, which I'll explain in a

minute. But anyways, guidance counselors are also master’s-trained. School psychologists could

be a psychologist, like I mentioned, with a PhD or there's specific programs for school

psychology, which mostly deals with the assessments that would be relevant to school-age

children.

Slide 11 (07:24)

Then there's also career counselors. Most universities have career counselors…

Slide 12 (07:30)

… Help you with resumes, help you with figuring out what the heck you want to do with

the rest of your life. That's its own thing. She was telling me that you had taken kind of a

personality test, which is something that career counselors would specialize in. So, I have a little

bit of exposure because you have to take classes in a little bit of all of this stuff to do what I do.

But, they would be specialist in that area. Then there's tons of other stuff. If you know, you know

what? I'm done, bachelor's degree; I'm done.

Slide 13 (08:00)

That's fine. You could be a case worker. Case workers are so important.

Slide 14 (08:06)

I can't tell you how many times I refer to a case worker because there's some sort of

resource that one of my client's needs. Maybe they are having… I don't know. Let me think of

one that I had recently. So I work mostly with teenagers and young adults, especially teenage

girls/women/young adult women. I had a girl who she was thirteen and at a new school. She

didn't like any of the activities the school had. So, I referred her to a case manager who would

help her find activities in the community, things that she would like to do. She wasn't a sports

person. So, that wasn't really for her… Finding things in the community that she might like. Case

workers are also huge in hospitals. They help create discharge plans for patients. They help get

them connected to resources like rehab, places to live. If you had a homeless guy come into the

hospital that's got some real serious illness, gets admitted, he's got no place to go. They can't just

say, "Hey, good luck!" Right? So, the case workers have to figure out a plan for him: Send him

to a shelter, figure out what his medical plan is going to be. So, case workers are really

important. You could also have adoptions case workers, child safety case workers (so children

are getting removed from the home and their parents are having to be monitored, make sure that

they're being safe and treating their kids okay). Those case workers… There's a huge need for

those. So if you want to do that, more power to you. It's very exhausting. But, it's a really

wonderful field if you like kids. So, that's bachelor's level. You can be a case worker and work

with children and child safety, all kinds of different areas.

Slide 15 (09:55)

Also, there are people who are nurses. They have a degree in nursing and they work in

mental health.

Slide 16 (10:00)

When I worked in inpatient, I worked with a couple different nurses who were the floor

manager for the inpatient floor of the children's unit that I worked in. There were also some

nurses that worked in what's called "utilization review", where you are talking with the insurance

companies to get those kids permission or authorized to be able to be in the hospital for mental

health. You're arguing basically with the insurance companies, this is why this kid needs mental

health coverage, this is why he needs to be in the hospital. So, it's actually usually a nursing

degree but you could definitely work in mental health if you are interested in nursing.

Slide 17 (10:42)

Then there's mental health techs, which is usually a high school-related degree. Those are

the people…

Slide 18 (10:46)

… who are in hospitals that are the… for a lack of a better term, brute force. There’s kids

that… and adults, when they're hospitalized, if they go into a psychotic episode and they're

flipping out, pulling down curtains, flipping over the bed and trying to break the TV and

whatever else, you can't just let them do it. You have to make sure that they're not hurting

themselves, not trying to beat up the staff. The mental health techs are people that understand

mental health issues but are maybe going to have to physically restraint people or the people that

are helping people file in from lunch and go back to their rooms and make sure that they're

following the schedule of the day. So, mental health techs are actually really important. Those

are the people I totally relied on when I was working in inpatient because they were

implementing a lot of the things I was suggesting to them how to help those kids kind of move

forward with their treatment. Questions about any of those? Does that kind of help you

understand the differences? Because a lot of times people will say I'm going to see a

psychologist because I'm seeing someone for therapy. Uh-huh, you're not seeing a psychologist.

Yes. Psychiatrist. Yes. Yeah.

So, from a licensed mental health counselor to a licensed clinical social worker? Yeah, I

would have to take additional classes that have to do probably more specifically with the social

work part of it that I had not taken. So yeah, you can switch. It wouldn't actually that hard to

switch between those two. I don't know why you would to be honest though because most of the

stuff that you can do as a licensed mental health counselor you can do as a licensed clinical

social worker. They're almost interchangeable at this point. You can pretty much do the same

stuff. It didn't used to be the case. But, it's becoming more and more that they're almost exactly

the same thing. It's just a little bit more on what kind of training do you want. Like I said, I knew

I wanted to get more clinical training. But, some people know they want to know what's going in

the community and how it relates to people. So, you could switch. But yeah you would have to

take additional classes and maybe a different licensure exam, which again I'll get to what you

have to do to be a counselor. The biggest difficulty would be to try to switch from a licensed

mental health counselor and go up. If I wanted to be able to prescribe I would have to go back to

medical school. Four more years of school and then three or four years or whatever for

residency. Uh-huh, not happening. Psychologists… I have had some friends that have been

licensed mental health counselors and they go back to school to get their PhD because they

decided they did want to teach in addition to doing private practice stuff. So, that's not that

uncommon to go. But a lot of times, you can do that more of a supplement and do it online or

something like that to get your PhD. So, it's not that unheard of to kind of get more. I'm done. I'm

done with the research and that stuff.

Oh, research! Good point, Whitney. Psychologists are also people who do a lot of

research. So, the people who are doing all these studies on… You'll see sometimes in the news

you'll see these images of people's brain scans and these different areas that are all light up.

There's fascinating developments in the field of cognitive neuro science, which is something that

I took a number of classes in. They're doing… They're scanning people's brains using what's

called a FMRI machine. It's the same as an MRI, only it uses slightly different things. So, it’s got

the anatomy of an MRI but then it’ll shows it's functionally working depending on what you

want to measure. They can actually do… I wish I had pulled up some of those slides. They can do

scans of people's brain and tell the difference between somebody with schizophrenia and

somebody who doesn't. There's organic and anatomical differences. The ventricles, which is the

space in the brain… They're actually larger in people with schizophrenia then people that are

not/do not have it.

Yeah! Oh, good question. Her question was, "The only people that prescribe for

depression are psychiatrists?" Other people can prescribe and that would be primary

practitioners, so your family doctor. They can prescribe. They don't usually like to unless it's for

something very basic like depression or anxiety. So they will if you're just saying, "I'm having a

really hard time. I'm anxious a lot and I don't really know why." They may start you on one of

the more basic mental health meds. But, if it's something that is more specific… Psychiatrists are

really like a specialist in prescribing. So yeah, your family doctor could prescribe it. But as a

counselor I usually recommend if this is not just some mild depression or mild anxiety, go see a

specialist, go see the people that maybe if you need… Especially if you are on two or more

mental health medications, which some people need to be, see the specialist because then they

really know the ins and outs of it. Exactly. So, I constantly work with the other people on this

list. I'm constantly referring to psychiatrists because I know that that person needs meds.

Likewise to the case managers because I need community resources. So, it's really very much a

team thing in the world of mental health. Yeah! I don't know if we should. But part of the issue is

that… Well, there's a lot of… It's a very loaded question. Lots of people are over diagnosed and

overprescribed. Sometimes it's because there are doctors like family practitioners especially but

psychiatrists do it for sure also, that don't think it's a real serious issue and they think they can

just prescribe the medication and it'll get better, or maybe the way it's presented to them/the way

that the parents or the person is reporting the issues to them, they think, oh okay, this medication

will take care of it when really maybe that's not what's going on.

PART 3

Slide 1 (00:00)

So, for example… I'll stick with parents because I work with teenagers a lot. If I have a

parent who's telling me their kid is not focusing at school, they're failing, they can't sit still, they

move around a lot, they're kind of hyper… Why's my kid doing this? Some psychiatrists…

Psychiatrists usually only have ten/fifteen minutes for check-ups, whereas a counselor I have

forty-five or fifty minutes with them. So, I have a little bit more time to really figure out what's

going on. I feel like a lot of times we're the ones that can really get to the root of what's

happening, but a lot of times they'll say oh: trouble paying attention, moving around a lot, hyper

= ADHD. Put them on some Ritalin! When really it’s maybe that mom and dad are yelling each

other at home a lot. Kid's really nervous and scared. When he's at school he can't focus because

he's thinking about all the stuff going on at home, so he's not able to pay attention. He's moving

around a lot because he's on edge and anxiety. Well, Ritalin isn't going to do anything but make

that worse. So, there's a lot of talk about things being overprescribed. So that's why it's so

important, I think, to get multiple people involved. Especially if it's a… Well, if it's kids I would

say specialists and counselors. But, it's definitely an issue.

Especially in this country, for some reason we want a quick fix. I tell my patients all the

time, “I do not have a magic wand. I cannot fix it for you and make it go away. I can help it. I

can help you figure out what to do about it. I can help you cope.” But so many people are

looking for that quick fix or that quick solution that they think, “Hey, I'll just take a pill in the

morning with my vitamin. That'll be easy! I don't have depression anymore” For some people

that might work if it's mild. But, a lot of times people are asking for medication as to the solution

of the problem and it might not be the best solution. So a lot of times doctors, if they're being

asked for it, “Hey, I want this medication. I'm feeling down/depressed or I'm feeling anxious or

whatever”, they'll prescribe it when really maybe it doesn't need to be. So, it depends. Any other

questions before I keep going? Okay. Sure. Yes.

Guidance counselors don't do that much counseling. Maybe they used or depending on

what school you're in, some of them get to do more than others if they don't have as many kids to

cover. Yeah, they're doing a lot more of the guidance stuff which would be more of schedules –

what classes you’re going to take to make sure you have enough to graduate. They're doing a lot

more of that. Then sometimes if there's a crisis in the classroom and a teacher says, "Hey, I saw

this kid cutting themselves," maybe they'll go to the guidance counselor because they're also

equipped to assess for that stuff. But yeah, they don't get to do as much counseling. If you want

to do counseling, guidance counselor is not so much the place to be lately. It's definitely to be

more of licensed mental health professional of some sort in a clinical setting versus in a school

setting. School setting you're going to be doing some, but that's not all you'll be doing. Yup. No.

Sometimes they get to run groups about bullying or something like that, but it's not nearly as

much clinical stuff. Again, part of the reason I picked the LMHC stuff is because I wanted to do

counseling. I wanted to do one-on-one talking with somebody doing psychotherapy.

Slide 2 (04:06)

So, what do counselors do? Great question! What do you guys think counselors do?

Slide 3 (04:12)

Because I'm getting away from all the different fields and I'm going to talk specifically

about the counseling field for a little bit. Anybody want to take a guess? What do counselors do?

What do you think I do every day? Well, not every day. But what do you think I do when I'm

working? Listen to people's issues – good. What else? Help them cope? Yup. Anything else?

Yup, cognitive ways; new ways of thinking about situations. It's called "reframing" (considering

alternative viewpoints). Yeah. Give them assignments to kind of follow-up after therapy: try new

things, do stuff different. Sometimes you give them worksheets on actually writing things down.

Good, well I'm glad you guys said those things. Some people say that you just sit there and

listen. It's a little bit more active than that, but you do have to be a good listener. Yeah, I'm sorry.

Before I keep going, go ahead. Do therapists go crazy? I don't know; do I seem crazy? After

listening to other people's stuff do you go kind of crazy? It affects you. I was going to talk about

it in a little bit. But, when you have really serious things being talked about you… Unless you

don't have a soul or whatever you want to call it…. It's really hard to not be affected by some of

that stuff. So, one of the things…. I'm going to talk about also what kind of qualities that you do

need to have to be a counselor, but it's really hard to balance it and not come home and think

about it. Sometimes you hear really great stuff. If you have a client who's doing great, made all

the changes, life is awesome – it's really rewarding. That’s really great. But when you have

clients come in and talk about how they want to die, it's pretty tough.

For example, one of the most difficult cases of my career so far was a… Let's see, I

started seeing her when she was about sixteen. She came in… She's a really interesting girl.

Psychiatrist was saying she was hearing voices. Her dad was schizophrenic, so she was hearing

voices. Well, in my opinion she wasn't hearing voices. I was kind of on the opinion that she had

that multiple personality, which is no longer called that. But she had been traumatized so

severely that her personality kind of… She kind of shut out the world and when things became

too stressful, a different part of her would sort of take over and she wouldn't remember what was

going on. She had been sexually abused by her father for sixteen years. Started when she was

two; so I saw her from age sixteen to nineteen. Without going into all the details, yeah it affects

you when part of the therapy is to talk about somebody's father raping them and you have to hear

all those gory details. It's hard not to go throw up in the bathroom afterwards. Do I go crazy? No,

because it also restores your faith in the good of people as well because so many people do so

many amazing things. This girl, all the odds were against her being successful. She graduated

high school. Not quite on time, but she graduated high school after she started coming to therapy.

She discovered that she loved kids. So, she decided to become a nanny and now she's a

professional nanny and works with kids. It's pretty darn impressive considering she was failing

school in ninth grade.

So that kind of stuff… There's some terrible things you will hear, stuff that you never

want to hear, stuff you won't forget. But I was the only person that she could talk to because her

family didn't believe her, friends didn't care. She didn't have any friends really. She was a weird

kid in the corner. But now she's helping kids. She's being a nanny and being a support person to

them while their parents are off at work. So, it definitely affects you. But, it's part of the balance

that you also learn. It's part of why you have so much training, is to learn the balance between

being there for someone and listening, helping them while you're at work and then having your

own healthy life because that's really important.

Slide 4 (08:46)

So, what do counselors do? We assess and diagnose.

Slide 5 (08:52)

I could tell you if I sat with each of you for an hour, which I'm not going to do because I

don't really have that time… I could asses one of you and give you a diagnosis if you had one. I

could also baker act somebody. So, I can send you to the hospital against your will. It's kind of a

cool power to have I guess. Hopefully I don't have to use that. It's one of the ones you'd like to

use. But doctors can do that, policemen can do that, I can do that because I can assess when it's

really a risk. I have had kids that have come in with cuts all the way up their arm. Bad cuts and

I've not sent them to the hospital. Why? Because it happened last week. They're not currently

going to hurt themselves right there. They've agreed to let's create a plan, send them home. It'll

be okay, parents will keep an eye on them. So, I didn't send them to the hospital because I

assessed that there wasn't the risk that they needed to go right then and there. Does everybody

know what a baker act is? For those of you who don't, that's when you go to the hospital when

you're a danger to yourself or others. Okay. So, I assess for risk, we diagnose, figure out what's

going on with somebody. Again, talking about the difference between does a kid have anxiety,

does he had ADHD, does he have learning disorder that keeps him from paying attention in math

class? All those kinds of things. Do they have anxiety? Do they have PTSD? Do they have

depression? A lot of them overlap and are really similar. So, you really have to be a specialist in

figuring out what it is because it's different treatments. You're going to work on one set of things

with somebody if it's depression and another set of stuff if somebody's been traumatized.

Slide 6 (10:29)

So once you figure out what you're doing…

Slide 7 (10:34)

… once you figure out what the diagnosis is you treat via psychotherapy, which involves

talking with someone, listening to them, figuring out new ideas of what they could do differently,

encouraging them to discuss their emotions. Maybe they grew up in a family where you didn't

talk about feelings. Helping them to be more comfortable with their feelings. Helping them

adjust to changes in their life. Maybe learning new skills, developing new patterns of behavior,

etc.

Slide 8 (11:04)

Coordinate with other treatment professionals. So like I was saying, I refer to

psychiatrists all the time or case workers/social workers all the time.

Slide 9 (11:11)

Depends on what it is. So, a lot of times being a good counselor's also knowing how to

connect your clients to stuff that they need. And likewise, like I said, referring. Okay.

Slide 10 (11:22)

Where can you work? Where can you do this? We already talked about some of these

areas. Hospitals for sure.

Slide 11 (11:26)

There's counselors at hospitals because if you come in with a baker act you got to have a

therapist there, psychiatrist also. You can work in schools depending on if you want to do more

therapy or not. Depends. There are social workers that can do some therapy. Usually there's one

for every couple of schools. Guidance counselors… Case workers also work with schools.

Prisons! I don't have that statistic with me. I wish I had brought that too. But, it's a ridiculous

percentage of the prison population has a mental health illness. I think it's one in two or

something. Depends on if you're talking about drug and alcohol stuff, including that or not. So,

you can work in prisons. My uncle’s actually a psychologist. I never talked to him about it for

some reason. But, he works in a prison and does therapy with inmates.

Slide 12 (12:16)

Outpatient agencies. If you want to do therapy that's one of the biggest areas…

Slide 13 (12:20)

… is to be at an outpatient agency, meaning people come in for weekly counseling.

They're not coming every day, they're not living there. They could have a residential treatment

facility where they live. But that would be for more serious stuff. Substance abuse treatment, a

lot of times that's outpatient or it could also be inpatient, meaning they live there/stay there

overnight. Private practice, where you don't have a boss, which is I'm doing and I love it because

I'm my own boss. But that's where you run your own business. So, you have to be really savvy

with the business stuff, finances, all that kind of stuff.

Slide 14 (13:00)

You could work at a college or university. There's college counseling centers. You could

be a professor. Like I said, you could do research.

Slide 15 (13:04)

If you're more interested in the science of the psychology world you could be doing more

research. In corporate or business settings, there's also a whole section of psychology called

“industrial organizational psychology”, which has to do with making sure people are efficient

and effective in the workplace. It bored me to tears. But, some people love it. It has to do with if

somebody is chronically late to work, what's the obstacle? What's keeping them from coming to

work all the time? Or maybe they're showing up drunk – how do we treat that? Or what do we

do? What's the action plan with human resources to make sure that they're being an effective

employee? Or maybe they're the CEO of the company and they're having a crisis and a major

breakdown. What does that person do? A lot of the times they are not doing the counseling but

they would refer out for the counseling if they needed to. But sometimes they'll be doing group

things, depends on what the setting is. There's all kinds. This is just to give you an idea. It's all

kinds of different settings. The traditional one is in your some sort of office doing one-on-one

therapy, but that's not always the case. It could be any of these settings.

Slide 16 (14:08)

Important qualities to have as a counselor… These are just some of them but they're kind

of the bigger ones.

Slide 17 (14:15)

Compassion and empathy. What's the difference between compassion and empathy

because they're not the same? What's the difference? What's compassion? Very good. Yeah. So,

compassion is more that you care, it's important to you. Whereas empathy is being able to

understand what it's actually like to be in what they're going through. So, that's the part that's

really hard to do. Some people don't have that skill. There's a bunch of studies out that have to do

with the different types of intelligences. Some people don't have a lot of social, emotional

intelligence. My guess is a lot of you do being in this class because you care about other people.

It's hard to be in a health-related field and not care about people, but it happens. So if you don't

really care about people and you're just worried about your own thing, you might not want to be

a counselor. But, you have to understand what it's like to be going through what they're going

through and show that you actually not just care but that you understand. So many people come

to counseling and just want to know that somebody gets it. That's most of what I do with the

teenagers I see. Getting bullied at school, they got nobody to talk to. They just want to know that

somebody gets it. They're talking to everybody on Tumbler but nobody in person. Okay? Yeah,

it happens. I know what Tumbler is, I'm still cool. Okay.

Interpersonal skills. Obviously you need to be able to relate with people, you have to be

able to work with different types of people. If you are somebody that doesn't like people different

from you, not going to work. You got to be able to relate with other people. What if you had a

dad in your office who's screaming at you? You still have to care about him. It's hard. She's

going no way. You have to be able to work with all different types of people, people who have

different beliefs than you. People that have no idea where you're coming from and they're angry

or they don't care. Some people are forced to therapy because they're court ordered. It's really

hard to make a seventeen-year-old kid care when they don't want to be there. But you still have

to care and you have to be able to communicate that you care.

Slide 18 (16:32)

Listening skills… Well, I said earlier, it's hard for me to talk in front of the class…

Slide 19 (16:36)

… because I'm not usually the one doing all the talking; I'm listening. So, listening skills

are obviously really important. You do actually talk. It's a conversation. I give lots of ideas and

feedback. But listening skills are extremely important. Actually not just listen and not to hear

what they said, but actually… Again, use those interpersonal skills and communicate that you

understand it and that you really heard what they were trying to explain because sometimes they

don't do a very good job of explaining what they're talking about. You have to figure it out.

Organizational skills, it’s just important in general. It’s probably important in just about every

career. But, especially if you wanted to do your own practice. Something like that is very

important.

PART 4

Slide 1 (00:00)

Speaking of communication skills again, you have to explain what you're trying to talk to

people about.

Slide 2 (00:05)

If you're trying to teach them something new, teach them a new skill, help a parent

understand why their kid is acting this way, it's important for you to be able to communicate with

them in a way that they understand. Everybody has a different pattern of communicating. So,

being able to adapt to what that style and that family or that person is in that way that they

communicate is really important. And stress tolerance… You have to be able to handle stress. If

you freak out at something minor, maybe think of a related field. You hear really serious stuff

and you have to not be able to flip out. Or likewise when I was working at the hospital. The kids

were flipping out and it wouldn't have really been productive if I flipped out with them.

There was a kid in the hospital that was so mad he would go to the quiet room, which was

a ironic name because they were always freaking out… The quiet room was where we would put

them when we didn't want them to do anything else. There's nothing else in the room. It's kind of

like a padded room only there was no padding and they weren't locked in there. But, he got so

mad he decided to pee on the door just to show us I don't care what you think. There he's spitting

at the door… This is a nine-year-old about this big acting real scary. The mental health techs

were staying away from him, "I don't want to go, that's gross." I flung open the door and I went

in and sat in the middle of the room. They're like, "Oh my gosh, you're going to get hurt!" You

know what the kid did? Well, after a few minutes… I avoided the urine on the floor. I went to the

other side. Eventually he came down and sat down next to me, put his head on my shoulder and

started to cry because nobody cared about him. All I did was open the door, avoid the pee… But

he would flip out just to see how people would react, to see if they would stick by him when he

was having a bad time.

So, you have to be able to handle stress. I loved it! But, it can be very stressful especially

when you're hearing about such awful things going on in people's lives. You will hear awful

stuff. There's nothing that shocks me anymore. There's no story out there that would surprise me.

But like I said it also is great because you hear the good. It's really great to get a card in the mail

from a family who says that you literally saved their child's life. It's pretty cool. Alright.

Educational requirements. So, this is specific for counseling. So, if we're talking about any of the

other fields, it’s not relevant.

Slide 3 (02:44)

LMHC – To be a licensed mental health counselor you need an undergraduate degree in a

related field. It does not specifically…

Slide 4 (02:50)

There is no bachelor's degree in counseling that I'm aware of. Maybe there is now. But

most people take psychology, but it could be health science. It could be biology. It could be

education. It has to be related. Most master's degree programs to get into… Because that's really

the main requirement to be a licensed counselor, is you have to have a master's degree with sixty

course hours and most of them just require that it be related so that they know that you are

interested in this field. But there's not usually… Dependent on the program there might be

specific requirements but in general there's not, as long as it's related. You probably wouldn’t

want to be… I don't know… You can pretty much use anything. But, you probably wouldn't want

to be a music/arts person and then go into psychology. You could be because then you're going

to catch up in the master's program, but… It's pretty flexible, which is nice because as long as it's

related you can go into a master's program in counseling. You have to take the GRE, which is

required for most – not just counseling – graduate level programs. Some graduate programs have

a specific test you have to take but the GRE is usually the general one. It's kind of like the SAT

of grad school.

Slide 5 (04:09)

Then you have to complete the master's degree. It's usually six course hours. I put up

there that I recommend a CACREP program.

Slide 6 (04:14)

That's kind of becoming the standard. It's an accreditation that schools have to apply for.

They have to meet certain course requirements and standards. I did not go to a CACREP

program and I'm doing just fine, so it doesn't have to be. But, more and more… Like, I know that

the Tricare insurance, which is the insurance for most military members actually requires now

that new counselors have gone to a CACREP program. So it's just becoming something that I

would recommend. But, you definitely don't have to. Then part of your master's program, while

you're in the master's program, you'll do a practicum and usually also an internship. It's a certain

number of hours where you're actually doing counseling. In addition to taking traditional classes

you also have to do a practicum and an internship. This is where I did outside of Philly.

Fascinating people. Really people that are really not well off in any shape or form in life, but

made it that much more educational and interesting. So I suggest if you do an internship, do it

somewhere really… Maybe you don't want to work there long-term, but somewhere where it's a

really challenging population because you'll learn a lot.

Slide7 (05:24)

Then state licensure requirements. Licensing for counseling is different in every single

state.

Slide 8 (05:29)

There's lot of push nationally to try and make it one across the board. For doctors, across

the board. If you're a doctor in one state you just have to apply for a license in another state as far

as I'm aware. For counselors, there's different requirements. Some of them require additional

classes. Some of them require additional training, which would be the supervised internship in

addition to… The way to get your license is you have to do a supervised internship. This is while

you're working you are being supervised by someone who has an additional qualification called a

"qualified supervisor." They are checking in with you and meeting with you about your clients to

make sure that you're doing the right thing. To make sure you're doing good counseling. In

Florida, it's two years with fifteen-hundred supervised hours. But, it's different by state. In

Pennsylvania it was something ridiculous. It was like three-thousand supervised hours, no less

than two years or something like that. So, it's different in each state. So, you just want to check.

Again if you know you're not going to be living in Florida, you want to check with other stuff.

Florida's actually one of the tougher states to get licensed in because they have a whole bunch of

requirements or a certain course. You have to a class in HIV/AIDS awareness and you have to

take a class in human sexuality. You have to take a couple classes that aren't always required in

other states. So, you just want to check with that state licensing board to make sure that's right.

Then you have the license exam that you also have to take. In Florida it stands for

National Clinical Mental Health something Education… I don’t know what it stands for. It's not

important. But another one's is called the NCE, which is the one I took in Pennsylvania. So

again, it's different by state. Those are the two for mental health counseling. So, I had to take

both. In Florida you just have to take that one and then you can become a counselor. No big deal!

This, start to finish, if you count undergraduate…

Slide 9 (07:25)

… is four years, then two years for master's degree, then no less than two years of

internship before you get your license.

Slide 10 (07:35)

So four and two and two… Eight years until you can be a licensed counselor. That's a lot

of training. Questions on that? Yes. Sometimes, yeah. Yeah, sure. Depends on what they are. So

if let's say another state, Nebraska, wants you to have fifteen-hundred hours of supervised time

and you have fifteen-hundred hours from Florida, done! It's fine. You don't have to do it in

Nebraska. Is that what you're asking? Yeah. It just depends on if there's different courses. If

they're different you might have to do something additional. If it's maybe more time… In Florida

I actually had to do more time for supervised internship. So, I had already done it in

Pennsylvania. I was already licensed in Pennsylvania. But then I had to still have someone

supervise me for a certain additional amount of time to meet Florida's requirements. So, it's kind

of complicated. Yeah, it'll transfer over. Some states have reciprocity where it matches exactly if

you're already licensed in one state. It just depends on what states you're talking about and where

you want to go from where to where. So, yeah. Most of it transfers. It's not like I had to go back

to school and get a new degree. You'll maybe just take like one course or maybe more time with

a supervisor, which is just kind of frustrating because you can't just go work on your own and get

your license. So, it's just paying your dues a little bit more maybe.

Yeah. Oh, wait. In the back! I don't have to take a test, but I have to renew my license.

That test I don't have to take again unless they change the rules. I have to stay up on continuing

education requirements. That's good, I’m going to add that for next time. You have to have a

certain amount of continuing education requirements once you're licensed. You have to attend

seminars or do online CE credits. You have to get a certain amount of those and again it's

different by state. I don't know offhand what Florida's are. As long as you do those you get to

keep renewing your license. So, they just want to make sure that you're staying on top of what's

going on in the field, staying up-to-date and you get to keep renewing your license. So no you do

not have to take another exam. I think you can choose to take the exam instead of doing the

continuing education stuff, but I don't know why you would want to do that. That's really

stressful rather than just going to a class and sitting and learning about it. So, I think that's an

option. But, you do not have to.

Then we had a question over here. Sorry. Yeah. Like, kind of specialize? Absolutely.

There's no formal… If you want to specialize in a certain population or different area, there's just

no formal training to give you that specialty. Now, there's some that are. There's a certain… If

you want more letters after your name, you could get more certifications in drug and alcohol

counseling or if you wanted to do employee assistance counseling you can get some additional

training and get credentials for that, but you don't necessarily have to. So if your interested is

PTSD at the VA, you would just want to take some classes maybe more than others on trauma or

do a lot of continuing education credits on trauma so that you have more knowledge about that

area then others. That makes sense? Okay. Yeah. Yes, you're working. Normal job but you're just

not going to get paid. Once you get a license you get paid a lot more and then you don't have

anybody over you. So yeah, when I first moved to Florida I was getting paid. Yay! Not a lot.

Until you have your license a lot of times you get paid what somebody with a bachelor's degree

would be getting, but you have a master's degree. So, it's a slightly… It's a more clinical position

but you're not yet licensed. So, it's usually somewhere in between.

Okay, local programs. USF has these programs; yay!

Slide 11 (12:08)

So, I just listed the master's ones and then they have all kinds of doctoral programs.

There's lots of psychology programs and all kinds of stuff. They got basically everything you

could think of. The University of Florida has some of these programs.

Slide 12 (12:16)

Central Florida has them. There's all kinds of programs in Florida and they have them.

There’s also online programs. Personally, I wouldn't recommend the online ones unless it's a

supplement because this is a people field and to practice counseling… I have some friends that

did their degree online and I don't think they're the best therapist because it's something that you

really want to practice and have somebody be able to work with you and see how you're doing

counseling and work in class and practice on each other and all that kind of stuff. In my opinion

it would be a little bit harder to be really great at it. But, you could definitely do it. So, they’re all

over the place. Yeah. It's pretty much the same as it would be in any other medical field. It’s the

same with a doctor. I am not allowed to tell anybody what we talked about unless I have a

subpoena from a judge. Not even from a district attorney, that won't cut it. I have to have it from

the judge. Tricky in Florida with kids. Until they turn eighteen, technically I have to disclose

certain things to parents. I don't like it. In Pennsylvania it was fourteen they could consent for

their own treatment. I don't have to include the parents if I don't want to. So especially it gets

really tricky when you have a seventeen-year-old smoking pot. Do I have to tell the parents or do

I not? Okay. Sixteen actually you don't have to.

So, it starts to get really tricky. That's one of my gray areas that I really don't really care

for. But, when you're doing family stuff or the parents are bringing in these kids you do want to

include them. You want let them know generally but I always ask. I just ask the kids, "Hey, do

mind if we bring your parents in and talk about this?" As long as they say okay then it's not

breaking confidentiality. But, I'm a pretty upfront genuine person. That's what's great about this.

I don't have to put on some facade to pretend to be somebody else. So, I just kind of tell them,

“Hey, this is something your parents should probably know.” But with adults, same thing. If I

don't have a release I can't talk to anybody about it. That answer your question? Yeah.

Psychiatrists? No, no counseling. They listen, they figure out what's going on, they do their own

assessment and then they prescribe medication. Now, maybe like 1% of them are still old-school

and try to do both. But usually they're older and have been in practice for a really long time.

Job outlook! This is the not fun part!

Slide 13 (14:55)

Lots of mental health jobs are going to exist. There's going to be a huge… Because

everyone's getting insurance that has mental health coverage, there's going to be a lot of

therapists that are needed for people.

Slide 14 (15:05)

It just doesn't pay that great sometimes. So, psychiatrists get paid pretty decent because

they're medical doctors. They've gone to school even longer. They have the debt to go with it

too. Psychologists, same thing. More school, a little bit higher salary I guess. Mental health

professionals… Now, this is a national average. So, this isn't necessarily what somebody’s going

to be making in this area. This is the national average… Yeah, I just eliminated so many people

from this class from doing counseling. Right? Yeah; okay. But, same thing. It depends on what

field you're working in. This is an average and the national. So, somebody working in the middle

of Idaho is not going to be making what somebody in NYC is making. There are therapists in

NYC that make over one-hundred thousand dollars easy because they charge two-hundred an

hour and they don't take insurance. So, this is really dependent on where you work. This is really

kind of skewed because these are the only numbers I could really come up with. If somebody has

specific questions about a salary for this area or whatever else… I'm not going to share with you

what I make, but I can give you a better idea about this area. That's actually not that far off for

people just entering the field with a master's degree. It’s not that far off for somebody just

starting out.

Slide 15 (16:22)

So the case workers would be the bachelor's level people and then the techs, etc. But like

I said, there's going to be a lot of jobs out there.

Slide 16 (16:30)

A lot of people need this service, especially at the VA, etc. Yeah. No, but a lot of times

it's recommended. The question was, to be a case worker, usually psychology/sociology/a people

related field. But it's easier to get a job if you are a social work major or something mostly

related. Okay, so now that I just alienated the whole class because nobody wants to make that

kind of money, why should you care?

Slide 17 (17:08)

If you're not going into this, if you're not going to do this, why should you care?

Slide 18 (17:14)

Because if you're going to be in any of the other health science fields, you're going to

need to know when to refer to a counselor, you're going to need to know who the good

counselors are. Just like with any field there's some not so good ones out there. For example, if

you are a physical therapist, why would you need to refer to a counselor? What's that? Yeah. If

you find bruises, especially if you're working with a kid, you're going to need to file an abuse

report and may need counseling. Yeah. If they're traumatized from whatever. If they lost a limb,

that's a big life adjustment! They don't just need physical therapy, they need to figure out a way

to adjust. Right? Alright, any other major… I'll be around, so if you have any specific questions

please let me know. Point being, it's a really important field. Go into whatever you want to go

into but keep aware of the mental health stuff because it's really important and you're going to

come across it. Okay?