Mental Health & Social Work Careers

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?