Some News of Note:

 

  • NCE remains available for applicants for licensure!

The National Board for Certified Counselors (NBCC) owns and administers the National Counselor Examination (NCE). A passing score on the NCE is required both to qualify for licensure in many states and to attain the National Certified Counselor (NCC) credential. Individual states have the sole authority to stipulate license requirements in their state. No outside body, such as NBCC or AASCB can mandate changes in any state. When organizations such as these attempt to influence states to restrict licensure, APC protests vigorously, and asks individuals and affiliated organizations to do the same.NBCC has restricted eligibility for the NCC to graduates of programs accredited by CACREP beginning 2024. That also means that Graduate Administration of the NCE will be restricted to programs accredited by CACREP since the technical purpose of that “early” administration is to qualify for the NCC.

  • Graduates of other programs will continue to be eligible to take the NCE and/or other state-required examinations through their licensing board/committee.
  • APC endorses the American Counseling Association’s (ACA) Portability Plan

“A counselor who is licensed at the independent practice level in their home state and who has no disciplinary record shall be eligible for licensure at the independent practice level in any state or U.S. jurisdiction in which they are seeking residence. The state to which the licensed counselor is moving may require a jurisprudence examination based on the rules and procedures of that state.”

—Approved by the ACA Governing Council, June 2016

  • The American Mental Health Counselors Association (AMHCA) and the American School Counselor Association (ASCA) recently disaffiliated from ACA. They are now operating as independent organizations.
  • The formerly independent American Association of State Counseling Boards (AASCB) is now managed by the Center for Credentialing & Education, an affiliate of NBCC (Counseling Today interview with Simone Lambert, past-president of the American Counseling Association, August 2019).