BHEC Public Comments for Aug 23, 2022
Preparing my public 3-minute comments for next week's BHEC Council meeting and thought I'd share them with you a few days early. I urge each of you to attend the meeting virtually and let your own voices be heard during the public comment section of the meeting. And you may read my written submission here if you missed it.
Ok, here we go!
Scroll down and share your thoughts with me in the Comment section below.
Plan Smart. Be Safe. Serve Others.
Kathleen Mills, LPC-S, CEAP
Got An Opinion?
These posts are my beliefs based on my a) 32 years of practice as a mental health provider and b) my own research. Whether you agree or disagree, please feel free to leave your civil, constructive comments below. I try very hard to back up my liberty-based statements with my own experience and/or verifiable facts and I would ask you to do the same. You do not need to be logged in to leave a comment.
The Counseling Landscape Workshop Series
The Counseling Landscape Workshop Series Everything we teach is based around The Counseling Landscape. That’s the body of information you need to know in order to run a successful practice, a lot of which is required by BHEC. Completing this series of workshops will put you in the top 5% of all mental health counselors trying to run a practice today and it will put you on a firm, safe foundation. Oh, and each…
I am strongly against changes to the CEU requirements and regulations.
First, I have not attended a cultural diversity training which generated further unity. Instead, each training I have attended fostered more diversity and more separation. It leaves most people feeling horrible as ‘everyone has been oppressed’ at some point in life. Equally, now, we are having to face diversity training normalizing mental illness to appease a minority audience who have hijacked nearly every company and organization in this country. This is disgusting and unethical. If this training is demanded we attend, then we are contributing to the rise in mental illness/mental health issues not a part of healing. If this is demanded, then the Council, the Board has succumbed to political activism and political correctness run amuck.
Be better than this and stand up for what is right and good based on logic, objectivity, and science. Diversity training can be summed up in two things: respect and love for whoever enters our office. I am asking you to remove this proposed requirement of diversity training.
Second, if you curtail who can provide CEU’s to a few chosen entities, you cut the legs off of independent and qualified providers who RELY on that income to make a living in this profession. You stifle the wide variety of talented, knowledgeable, and wise independent providers who are needed in this field to train in their respective niche of experience and expertise. These practitioners are not associated with academia, government, or organized associations. There are hundreds of established providers that DO NOT wish to belong to these entities and they should not be forced to do so in order to provide CEU’s.
Again, be better. Look out for the strong leaders in our profession who serve. I am requesting you add a 7th category to your approved provider list for ‘independents’ which will be defined as ‘fully-licensed counselor CE providers’ not belonging to any of the organized groups listed on your current list.
Well said.
Well said, Kathleen! I had to listen twice to take it all in—I hope they get a written draft also so they can process your content more carefully. One of your strongest points that might get lost is that counselors should be able to choose their CEUs (including ones related to diversity) based on the focus and direction of their practice. Time, money, and education that doesn’t contribute to that actually diminishes our capacity to pursue what does contribute to our effectiveness in our chosen areas of expertise and growing a robust practice. I will state this in my own comments that I submit, but I wish it stood out more in yours as well. I am grateful for your dedication and attention to what is going on with the Board and BHEC, and wisening up the rest of us!
Thank you kindly, Carol, you just made my day. They do, indeed, have a written draft that goes into much, much more detail. Let’s hope they read it.
As to your point about wishing I’d focused more on our need to select our own CE topics, my original draft had much to say about that but my preliminary practice runs ran to 7 minutes long so, given the 3-minute time limit, I had to do some trimming, knowing that the points that were a victim of the editor’s pen have been made elsewhere. (Numerous times! LOL) Let’s hope these folk do their homework.
Kathleen you did an excellent job of making those three points. Very succinct clear and concise. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Fran! We gotta speak up or we’re going to be handed a monster to deal with for the next who-knows-how-many-years. Comment appreciated.