UVU Master of Clinical Mental Health Counseling Program Addresses Crucial Need | News @ UVU | News @ UVU

With a worldwide pandemic, troublesome financial circumstances, and rising political tensions
worldwide, the necessity for psychological well being care has by no means been larger. Yet, according to national reports, it’s by no means been tougher to discover a therapist.

A brand new program at Utah Valley University (UVU) helps to handle that want. Twenty-one
college students within the preliminary cohort of UVU’s Master of Clinical Mental Health Counseling
(CMHC) program are offering 1000’s of hours of take care of the UVU group and
past.

“The need is there,” says Kiera Davis, affiliate director of the CMHC program. “People
simply are recognizing their very own wants, and there is not as a lot of a stigma as there
was centered round psychological well being.”

The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) studies that in 2021, greater than 11% of adults within the United States reported
common emotions of fear, nervousness, or nervousness. A 2018 survey reported that extra
than 55% of all visits to doctor workplaces within the U.S. have been for psychological well being causes.

“Mental well being is vital in at present’s world as a result of it is vital to understand when
you’ve got reached your limits,” says CMHC scholar Linda Good. “Today’s world is tough
— individuals want to have the ability to take a break.”

Davis says UVU’s CMHC program was designed with non-traditional college students in thoughts.
Courses for the two-year program are all held within the night, and the bulk of
the 21 college students on this first cohort are non-traditional.

“This program was designed to be inclusive of totally different schedules, inclusive of totally different
backgrounds of all types,” Davis says.

Davis says whereas a level in medical psychological well being counseling is much like one in
marriage and household remedy or social work, CMHC focuses on the prognosis and therapy
of people. In addition to rigorous coaching in Western psychological well being practices,
this system features a course on Eastern counseling strategies. “It’s a extremely good
eye-opening expertise that there are different methods of approaching remedy and counseling,”
she says.

Each scholar will present 5-15 hours of counseling per week to the UVU group,
working with entities comparable to Discovery Day Treatment, Alliance Behavioral Health,
Circle of Life Counseling Center, The Center for Couples and Families, and Cedar Psychiatry.

CMHC scholar Rory Hileman says his classroom work ready him for making diagnoses
and planning therapies, however his hands-on work with shoppers taught him issues he couldn’t
have discovered in any other case.

“I needed to study concerning the disgrace and destructive feelings that the shoppers have round
having a dysfunction,” Hileman says. “Basically, it isn’t simply the shopper’s presenting
challenge, but in addition how they really feel about their struggles that impacts counseling.”

Many of the shoppers UVU college students see come from underprivileged or marginalized communities,
together with LGBTQ+ individuals. It’s estimated that by commencement from the CMHC program,
UVU college students may have labored with greater than 7,000 people and households.

“I love helping people, and this subject was the best way to do it,” Good says.

Upon finishing the CMHC program, UVU graduates will probably be eligible for licensure as
medical psychological well being counselors and in a position to apply within the state of Utah, both
on their very own or as half of a apply or clinic.

“Mental health counseling isn’t just diagnosing and ‘fixing’ disorders,” Hileman says.
“It’s successfully processing the world round you. Mental well being counseling is extra
and extra vital because the world turns into extra divided. And when division has lastly
settled down a bit, psychological well being will nonetheless be obligatory, as a result of individuals will want
to course of find out how to go about forgiving.”

For extra info on UVU’s Master of Clinical Mental Health program, visit the program’s website.