Paul Carrola Interview: Bridging from Graduate to LPC Associate

It's easy to get lost bridging from graduate to LPC Associate. Dr. Paul Carrola, counselor education professor at UT El Paso talks to me about how to successfully graduate from a mental health program and become a LPC Associate.

TCCBB 0107 Paul Carrola Interview: Bridging from Graduate to LPC Associate

How do I become a LPC Associate in Texas?

Kate Walker: Hey, it’s Dr. Kate Walker. Welcome to my interview with Dr. Paul Carrola who is a faculty member and associate professor in the counseling department, the mental health program at the University of Texas, El Paso, and he knows all things LPC Associate. I’m just going to ask him tons of questions to make sure that we get down to the answer because he is the President of the Texas Association for Counselor Education and Supervision, or past president now. Anything you want to add to that intro? 

Paul Carrola: Great to be with you, Kate. I think there’s a gap between, I think, being a student and being licensed that I think is very confusing for a lot of students and we do our best to try to communicate to our students what they need to do. But I think across the state there’s still a lot of uncertainty with what they’re supposed to do. So I’m really happy to talk about this topic.

Kate Walker: And it changes every semester, right? I mean, it seems to, so it’s hard to even make these recordings and then carry them over to the next semester because something is going to be different. So I really appreciate you doing this.

Paul Carrola: No problem.

Kate Walker: Alright, I’m just going down the list. How do I become an LPC Associate in Texas?

Paul Carrola: Right. So what’s required for an LPC Associate license is having a master’s degree in counseling or a related field, an academic degree from an accredited institution. It can be counseling or a related field. It needs to be a 60-hour program. There’s academic requirements if you look on the LPC BHEC website, they have Texas Administrative Code that will actually list all of the specific things, and I can send that information out so people can look at it. It’ll say the academic content, the classes, everything, and that’s kind of tricky because it changes sometimes. The LPC board will change requirements at times, so we really want to make sure you’re up to date with what the current requirements are.

In addition to academic requirements, you need to pass the NCE, which is the licensure exam that Texas uses. Now, there’s some confusing things about that, the NCE, which I can talk about, because the state allows two exams to be used for licensure. One is the NCE, the National Counselor Exam, the other is one is the National Clinical Mental Health Counselor Exam, that acronym is a mouthful, so I don’t even say it. But really, it’s the NCE, and I say that because the only reason the other exam is there is usually people who come from other states where they took that exam, because some states require that exam instead of the NCE. It’s really difficult to take that National Clinical Mental Health Clinical Exam if you haven’t taken the NCE. The NCE is a more foundation exam. It’s multiple choice, similar to what a lot of preparation exams will give you in your academic program. The National Clinical Mental Health Exam is a more complicated exam; it’s based on scenarios, and you have to select the most correct answers. It’s a more complicated exam. And so really, we should preparing our students, and you should be prepared to take the NCE for licensure. 

There’s an application packet that has – now there’s fingerprinting and background check required. You need to have a supervisor agreement, so you need to find an LPC supervisor – it must be an LPC supervisor. That question gets asked a lot: who can supervise you? And there’s a lot I can talk about – I know you might have questions about the supervision part; there’s a lot I have to say about that. But as far as the application, you need the degree, you need the exam, you need a background check and a supervisory agreement, and you also need what’s called a jurisprudence exam, which is a no-fail exam, and that exam basically goes – well, no fail means that if you take it and you miss some questions, you take it again, or you keep doing it until you get it right. And so it’s basically highlighting issues that the LPC board has seen. Here are some violations we’ve seen, things that people have done wrong, or people have messed up. So whether it’s documentation, dual relationships, whatever it is, whatever they’re seeing the most problems in, they’re going to put that in the jurisprudence exam. So it changes, but it’s a no-fail exam. They’re trying to reinforce some information to you.

That’s pretty much – there’s different forms you need in the packet, but that’s basically the application packet.

When do I take the Licensing Exam?

Kate Walker: So if I’m a grad student, how do I take the NCE? Do I take it before I graduate? Do I take it after I graduate? How does that work?

Paul Carrola: So that has changed recently. Before, you used to have graduated. You had to submit your transcripts and they would verify that you graduated from a program. Now, you can take the exam while you’re a student. Now, here’s the confusing part that students get caught in this little situation. So you can take the NCE for two reasons: licensure or credentialing. Now, the NCE allows you to be credentialed as a nationally certified counselor; the national exam is used for that credential. The state of Texas also chooses that as their licensure exam. Because there’s those two pathways to take it, when you go online, you need to make sure you’re selecting “taking exam for licensure.” Because they will let you take it as a student as well for credentialing, but it’s a much more complicated application process. You need permission from the faculty in your program to take it. And it’s something that the program organizes with NBCC so that students can get on track to get that credential, they can take it early. 

Now, because you can take the exam for licensure as a student now, there’s no need to go that route. If you’re a student, take the exam for licensure. You can always get the credential. Once you’ve taken the exam, you can get the NCC, Nationally Certified Counselor later. It’s a very simple process to take it for licensure when you’re a student. So you always have to make sure – there’s specific links. If you go to the website for examination, register to take examination for licensure. They are two different things. I know credentialing can mean licensing sometimes too but they’re talking about the Nationally Certified Counselor credential.

Kate Walker: In Texas, that doesn’t really mean anything, right?

Paul Carrola: Yeah, I mean, it’s something so you can have another credential on your name and maybe if you move to another state, you carry that credential with you. Maybe the licensing board over there will say, okay, you have the credential, maybe that will carry some weight over there. But yeah, the license is what you need – that’s what you need to practice, is a license.

Kate Walker: So taking the NCE then, I’m going to go, I’m going to go to the website, I’m going to click the link, make sure that I’m taking it for licensure. You mentioned only an LPC supervisor can supervise an LPC associate. So as a grad student, I’ve got to find an LPC supervisor to sign my paperwork, right?

How do I find a LPC Supervisor?

Paul Carrola: Yeah, you need to have that supervisor agreement. So what every student should be doing during practicum and internship, they should be networking. There’s going to be LPC supervisors at your practicum and internship. Maybe they’re not going to be the ones that are going to supervise you, but you need to talk to them. You need to talk to your site supervisor about supervision. Sometimes they’ll have an LPC supervision license, sometimes they won’t, but they’re going to know people who do. 

And so during that time, you’re networking, you need to – this is the process I recommend. You’re learning about supervision when you’re a student and so you have an idea in your mind what you want out of supervision. Different people will want different things, right? Sometimes you may want a specific skill that a supervisor has during assessment or some intervention, right? You may want someone who you have a lot of access to. Sometimes, honestly, people, they just want to have a supervisor that’s at their place of employment so it’s part of a package deal. So everyone has a different kind of priority list of what they want out of supervision, so you need to list what’s important for you out of supervision.

And then you need to look for supervisors and you need to interview them during your practicum and internship. Set up interviews, at least two-to-three LPC supervisors. And maybe initially, you’ll see some LPC supervisors. Just meet with them and ask them about supervision, how they do supervision. What do they look for in LPC associates? Obviously you want to be able to have good references from your faculty, your professors. But by the time you’re graduating, you don’t want to be in the situation of, oh, now what do I do? You already want to have a plan in place. By the time you’re finishing internship two your last semester, you should already have in mind – not already know who your supervisor is going to be, you should have an idea of a group of people, some people that you have in mind already. Know what that supervisor’s expectations are and they should know what your expectations of supervision are. 

So that time as a student is really a great time to learn about supervision. You don’t always have a choice when you’re a student of who is going to be your supervisor. You do have a choice for supervision for licensure. It’s a two-way street, right? When you interview them, they’re interviewing you and you’re interviewing them. You want to know, are they going to meet your expectations? And they want to know, are you going to meet their expectations. So you should feel a bit more empowered by the time you graduate to be a little bit more assertive with what you want out of supervision.

How do I know if my Supervisor is a good fit?

Kate Walker: So one of the questions dovetailing off of that is this idea of what is a direct hour? So if I know I’m going to be a school counselor, it’s important that I get a supervisor who understands what a direct hour is in a school setting versus if they have no idea what a school counselor does. What do you teach students is a direct hour?

Paul Carrola: For when they’re students, we have specific categories of what direct client contact means. However, the short answer I give students when they say, “What counts as direct when I’m getting my licenses?” You know what counts as direct? Whatever your supervisor says counts as direct. Your supervisor decides what is direct; they sign off on your hours. So it’s their discretion. Some may say, you know what? You’re co-facilitating a group, I’m going to count that. Another may say, no, that doesn’t count. Or, if you’re shadowing, there may be a supervisor that says oh, that counts; another will say, no, it doesn’t count. So obviously there’s going to be some gray area. I’m doing client contact, I’m calling clients, or I’m doing consultation with a parent about their child who is a client. Does that count? So there’s some gray area and every supervisor has different ideas about that. So you need to discuss that when you’re looking at who the site supervisor is going to be. So it 100% depends on your site supervisor on what counts as a direct or a non-direct hour.

Kate Walker: I’m going to ask the next one about accreditation but I think this is important to dovetail off of that because of the idea of being self-employed because you are allowed to accrue direct hours in a self-employed setting, but it’s back to this if your supervisor says it’s okay. If your supervisor is not comfortable supervising self-employed hours, you won’t be able to work or create or do anything in that setting. It’s ultimately up to the supervisor.

Paul Carrola: Yeah, and supervisors are responsible for their supervisees. So a supervisor is going to want to supervise someone doing something they have confidence in. So if you’re going to be in a private practice off the bat, it’s probably a good idea to look for a supervisor who has a lot of private practice experience so they can kind of guide you with that. I know sometimes people will think, well, I just want someone who is going to sign off on my hours. No, that’s not what you want. You want someone with expertise in what you’re going to be doing. So, yes, any LPC supervisor could hypothetically supervise you if you’re in private practice and some may even agree to do it if they don’t have any experience in private practice. 

But I would not recommend – if you’re that student who is going to graduate and you’re wanting to go into private practice right away, I would not recommend having a site supervisor that doesn’t have experience in private practice. I would really seek out a supervisor that has that experience because you want that support. You want to be able to go to your supervisor and say, I have this issue that’s specific about private practice and they can be able to actually respond to it. And if they’re maybe working in a school and they’ve never done private practice, they’re going to be like, well, I don’t know. You don’t want to be in that situation where you have an urgent situation and your supervisor doesn’t know.

Kate Walker: Yeah, I think that’s a huge point. Alright, I’m going to back up because you said earlier when students are applying you have to have a Master’s degree from an accredited institution and I want to make sure that we understand that that doesn’t necessarily mean CACREP accredited, it’s just an accredited university. So talk a little about that.

CACREP Graduate to LPC Associate

Paul Carrola: So CACREP accreditation is a national accreditation. It’s really good because it standardizes a lot of things that we do and prepares students. But being licensed in Texas does not require that you graduate from a CACREP accredited program. There’s some obvious differences in what Texas requires and CACREP requires. There’s a lot of similarities but there’s some differences, too. And at some point – as we were saying before, things change. Who knows, in the future, it could change. But at this point, it’s not required. What it means by accredited institution is the regional institutional accreditation. Programs are accredited by CACREP, whether it’s nursing, whatever kind of program it is, there’s accreditation for that specific purpose. But universities or institutions have regional accreditation. Like the one we have is SACS in Texas, usually: Southern Association of Accreditors, which means our institution meets certain standards and it just basically has to do with different metrics, graduation rates and certain outcome data that they collect, but it’s for the whole university. So the whole university covers that accreditation. And if your university has that accreditation, it meets that requirement for licensure that says you need to be an accredited institution.

Kate Walker:  I see threads sometimes on social media where they say, gosh, I didn’t come from a CACREP, going back to this idea of CACREP and the program accreditation. I didn’t come from a CACREP accreditation, how do I make sure that my application goes through smoothly? And I know UTEP is CACREP accredited so it’s hard to speak to that, but for your students, they know when they put their application in it’s going to be pretty quick because staff knows what to look for. Non-CACREP accredited, they may have to get real specific and make sure that they have a syllabus ready if they’re asked for it, or they have some other information about a course if staff comes back and it might delay their application a bit.

Paul Carrola: Yeah, so you want to do your due diligence and look at the academic content requirements that state all of the different areas that are required. For example, CACRAP has the eight core areas, the Texas Board, it’s a little bit different. A lot of overlap but it’s not the exact same eight core areas. There’s things like addiction and things that are a little bit different. So you want to look at the course content area, the course content requirement, and look at your transcripts. Does it easily match up? Does the name of a class – like say addictions is one of the content areas. Do you a class that says addictions or maybe substance abuse or something similar? If it says something that’s not quite that, then you may need to be ready with the syllabus. 

There’s some classes, the names are like abnormal human behavior and then there’s psychopathology. Well, those are kind of the same but you want to make sure that if the name of the class is a little bit different, then you have that syllabus ready and you make sure it meets what that content area is. So having the syllabus. But reviewing your transcripts ahead of time, because sometimes you may find out that you know what, I’m missing this. And if you’re missing something – oh, I need to take a marriage and family class, oh my gosh. Because that’s part of the requirement and I didn’t take it in my program. Those are the two I’m thinking of, addictions and marriage and family, that is not a CACREP core standard but it’s required for LPC course content for the application. So you want to look to make sure if anything is missing. If anything is missing, you need to find a way to take that class.

Can I sit for the LMFT Exam too?

Kate Walker: So that’s my follow-up and I know we’re running out of time, but I get asked a lot by graduate students on the LPC track, well, can I go sit for the LMFT exam? How does that work?

Paul Carrola: So some programs will offer the LMFT content, so it’s going to be what’s on your transcripts. You need to look at the LMFT licensure code; it has specific course content. And I think off the top of my head you have to take about I think four or five classes specific to marriage and family. And in your practicum and internship, it has to show you did some marriage and family.

Kate Walker: Right, there’s extra practicum, there’s extra ethics.

Paul Carrola: So you need to make sure to look at those requirements and see what your program is missing. So maybe you took three classes in your master’s program and it didn’t meet the requirement and you say alright, I need to take two more classes, or I need to do a practicum or I need to find out how that’s going to work. So you can still meet those requirements afterwards, but you really need to look at what those requirements are and see where the gaps are.

Kate Walker: That’s what I did, I graduated the 36-hour program back in the day, so I had to go back and pick up a lot of hours so that I could sit for my exams and get my license. Anything else you want to throw out there that students need to know as they’re on their journey to become an associate?

Paul Carrola: I would say that now because of the technology and virtual spaces that are available now in such a high prevalence that distance supervision is something that is possible now. So think about that but don’t automatically jump on, oh, I’m going to do this in supervision. It has to be a good fit for you. Ask yourself, do I really want someone who is local here who knowledge about the agencies here and the professionals here and what’s going on in my community? Or maybe there’s someone who has a specific skill that’s not locally where I’m at, then that may be an option for you. So it’s a new option but be thoughtful about it before you decide, oh yeah, I’m going to do distance supervision.

Kate Walker: Awesome. Well, thank you, Dr. Carrola from the University of Texas El Paso Mental Health Program and counseling expert and TACES past president who knows all things supervision. This was great information. Thanks everyone for watching.

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