Program for working professionals

[Barefootone]

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I work full time in professional capacity, in a field unrelated to psychology, medicine, etc.

I'd like to begin preparing for a second career in the psychology field.

At this stage of my life, I am not motivated much by money or building a fascinating and successful career in the field.

I am simply interested in learning a new field that interests me and perhaps I can get work as a counselor when I retire from the current job.

This will be part time work for me....that said, I need to begin planning and so I don't necessarily need a rigorous program, I simply need one that is flexible to fit my current working schedule and preferably has distance learning options.
I am still looking into all of this - but maybe all I would need is a graduate degree in counseling. I have a masters degree already in business and an undergraduate degree in Social Work. I do not wish to undertake Social Work on the grad level...I am not interested in building another career.

I just need something that will qualify me to do basic work, but obviously the program and school would need to be legitimate and not just a diploma mill.

Would love to hear any recommendations.

Thank you, BF

 

[psychology24]

Barefootone,

This might be a little hard, but still do-able. As you can see, be careful about the diploma mills and online/DL programs. I support distance learning programs for some areas and courses, but not everything. I believe there are maybe 2 or 3 CACREP-accred. counseling programs that offer distance learning. Check out http://www.cacrep.org/template/index.cfm for more information.

Here is one example of a integrated program with DL components: http://www.messiah.edu/academics/graduate_studies/Counseling/index.html

One option could be taking the foundation courses online, and then setting up practicum and internships with local agencies. You may need to cross-register classes in order to get the supervision.

Also, if you do complete a graduate degree (let's say all online) in psychology or counseling, you could enroll in a local Counseling program's "Post-Graduate Certification in Counseling." These are only CACREP-Accred programs though and can tailor your education to the remaining courses you need (e.g. internship).

Hopefully others can weight in with more details. I did not go to a counseling or CACREP accred. program, and not pursuing licensure. I just remember some of these details from when I was previously looking into this route as an option.