CACREP Addendum Into and Miscellaneous

In the initial review document received from CACREP, we were asked to “Please verify that the program titles, degrees, and locations are correct.”  The actual name of the CACREP Program we offer in Clinical Mental Health Counseling is called Mental Health Counseling so I have added a strikethrough of the word Community listed in the table included in the initial report.   Also in the report received from CACREP, it lists our School Counseling program as a Masters of Education (M.Ed.) when it is actually a Masters of Arts in Education (M.A.Ed.) degree and I have corrected the table below to show this. 

Miscellaneous

Reviewers noted that the program offers endorsement-only programs in elementary and secondary school counseling.  Please provide additional information on enrollment in these programs, impact of these programs on Eastern Kentucky University the resources for the accredited programs, and means by which program works to ensure that the quality of these programs is consistent with that of the accredited school counseling program.

Response:The endorsement only programs offered for school counseling is an artifact of both a change in our program and in the Kentucky State regulations for certified school counselors.  At one time we offered a 33 hour non-accredited program in school counseling to our students but this changed prior to our seeking initial accreditation from CACREP in 2002.  When we moved to a 48 hour M.A.Ed. program and, eventually, to a CACREP accredited program in School Counseling, we had many school counselors who had graduated from our old 33 hour M.A.Ed. and who had certification at only the elementary (grades K-8) or secondary (grades 5-12) school counseling level.  In September 2003, the Education Professions Standards Board sponsored changes to the Kentucky Revised Statute that dictates the qualifications needed to be a certified school counselor in the state of Kentucky (16 KAR 3:060) specifying that school counselors would now graduate from masters programs with all grades certification.  This new regulation also allowed those with only elementary or secondary certification to move to all grades certification by taking a minimum of an additional 3-6 graduate hours in counseling and by gaining the recommendation of an institution of higher education that offered an approved school counseling Master’s program.  We, however, grant that recommendation to endorse from their initial elementary or secondary certification to an all grades certification if they complete a specified additional 12 credit hours in school counseling.

These students are becoming very rare as those eligible to do this have mostly already done so.  Those who do follow this path take the classes with our other students causing little drain on existing resources.  Those that do seek to add this additional level of certification are almost all already practicing counselors and actually enhance the experience of other students in their classes by offering their insights into the practice of school counseling. In the last year, we have had only 12 students request this certification change through our program and in the last three years we have had a total of 32 receive this certification. (See table 1 below).  

Note:  Date ranges for each year are from September 1st to August 31st.

Policies

Accreditation Process Policy #6 - Multiple Sites Policy

Some of the documentation provided in the self-study (e.g., Practicum and Internship Data for Standards Q and R) reference "Richmond Campus course only and Campus Course"). Please provide clarification on whether or not the counseling programs are offered at multiple campuses/sites. If this is the case, additional information and documentation is needed in accord with the new Multiple Sites Policy (revised July 2011) available on the CACREP website.

Response:The statements noted have to do with some past practices associated with courses offered at our extended campus sites.  In the past, we have offered some courses at our extended campus sites that were part of the Richmond Campus programs in School and Mental Health Counseling.  We have never offered more than 12 hours of the total programs off the main campus and we have not offered any courses off the main campus in the last several years.  The notation about “Richmond Campus Course Only” mentioned above was used to indicate to students that those courses would never be offered on any campus except the Richmond campus. The term “Campus Course” is added by the registrar to distinguish between a course that is offered online, through interactive television, or at a regional campus site and one that is on the Richmond campus.  This is not applied consistently but does not reflect that courses without this designation are offered off the main Richmond campus.