Section for Independent Practice – December 2016

The Section on Independent Practice is really moving!

Our Leadership Team is filled with enthusiastic members, including ECPs and students.

We are proposing a name change to the SECTION ON PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE. The goal of such a change is to expand our focus to include all practitioners, regardless of setting. Of course, our work as practitioners is primarily focused on our work with clients rather than on the setting. So, we will keep you posted!

Welcome to our Student Representatives, Mallory B. Garza from Louisiana Tech University and Lindsey Meyer from the University of North Dakota. Mallory and Lindsey will be reaching out to students and Training Directors to let them know about the leadership opportunities available to students within our Section. If you are a student interested in practice and would like to get involved, please email Mallory Garza at [email protected]. More information on leadership opportunities are listed below.

We have a new (excellent) website. Check us out at www.div17indprac.org. Our Membership Chair, Christopher Stults (a student at New York University and an LPC in independent practice) has designed an online membership system. MEMBERSHIP IN OUR SECTION IS FREE. We welcome all members who are interested in practice! Chris is in the process of connecting with members who indicated in our recent survey that they would like to become more engaged in the work of the Section. 

Our Section Research Team, led by Jeritt Tucker, who recently began as Assistant Professor in Behavioral Medicine & Juvenile Court Forensic Evidence at Des Moines University, is going to be sending out a link to our survey on the experiences of practitioners and practice-oriented students. WATCH FOR THE LINK TO PARTICIPATE IN THE SURVEY! Kudos to Jeritt and his team, including Brian TaeHyuk Keum (University of Maryland), Andrew Choi (student at University of California at Santa Barbara) and Teresa Huff (student at University of North Dakota). We are looking forward to their findings and the implications for practitioners in Counseling Psychology.

Welcome to Valene Whittaker and James Donaldson to our Leadership Team. Valene works as a Staff Psychologist at the Edith Nourse Rogers Memorial VA Medical Center in Bedford, Massachusetts, who served as Chair of SCP’s Early Career Professional Committee for several years. James is a student at Texas Tech University. We are so very pleased that both have joined our work to increase the visibility and engagement of practitioners in SCP!

Marcy Rowland (Independent Practice in Hollidaysburg, PA) and Valene Whitaker will be serving as Program Co-chairs for APA 2017. Marcy will coordinate one of our Roundtables focused on the design of office space and ways to have our psychotherapy offices reflect the values of our practice. Chris Stults will be working as our lead for a Roundtable with the International Section, and Valene will develop programs for the Hospitality Suite focusing on practice.

Mili Thomas Metz has agreed to serve as our Section Awards Chair. We will be developing proposals for two additional awards: Outstanding Practitioner and Leadership Award, in addition to our Travel Award. Watch for our announcements for nominations and please consider applying. 

We will be working together with Sherry Benton, the SCP VP for Practice, to sponsor a series of webinars this spring on CULTURAL COMPETENCY: LEARNING THE LINGO. Erica Wiley Whiteman (student at Cleveland State University) will serve as our lead person on this project, which will be a series of five webinars. More information to come soon.

Would you like to join us in representing the voice of practitioners to SCP, and the voice of Counseling Psychology to the practitioner community? First, join the Section at www.div17indprac.org. Second, email me at [email protected]. I look forward to hearing from you!

We welcome volunteers for the following initiatives:

• Webinar development
• Member engagement
• Webmaster
• Directory chair
• Multicultural practice

Mary O’Leary Wiley, PhD, ABPP
Chair, SCP Section on Independent Practice