No qualifications? No problem!:
To be a manicurist in the state of Washington, you must take 600 hours of training and pass both a written exam and a skills demonstration. To cut hair, you need 1,000 hours of training and the two tests.
But to be a registered counselor, someone who will help guide troubled clients through some of their most difficult life challenges, you need take only a four-hour AIDS-awareness class. That's it — that and a $40 registration fee. You don't even need a high-school diploma. That sounds like an invitation for trouble — and it is.
... Washington legislators had good intentions when they created the registered-counselor credential nearly 20 years ago. Reports of sexual abuse and brainwashing by a fringe counseling group in Seattle spurred lawmakers to try to corral the burgeoning, unregulated practice of counseling. But instead, they flung open the gates.
The Legislature enacted exacting standards for mental-health counselors and for marriage and family therapists, requiring each to have a master's degree and thousands of hours of clinical training. But fearing they would put less-educated counselors out of work, lawmakers created a classification called "registered counselor," with minimal requirements.
... Joanne Brekke, the former state representative who spearheaded the registered-counselor law in 1987, said she envisioned the credential as a way to regulate already-practicing counselors. She never expected her bill would instead create a licensing expressway, welcoming thousands with unproven skills and unknown motives. "Our goal was to protect counseling clients from abuse," Brekke said. "What has happened since, now that may be a different story."
... "Counseling was the perfect setting for him," she said. "He was a predator and the prey just walked through the door."
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