MA School Counselor Conceals Gender Identity Sessions from Parents | The Role of Professional Licensing Requirements in Enabling Covert Counseling in Schools
Like Arizona, Massachusetts' separate certification pathway for "school counselors" enables unregulated mental health professionals to keep secrets from parents
In this Stack:
Parents in MA sue school district and school counselor for concealing gender identity sessions from parents
Like AZ, separate “certification pathway” for school counselors means they bypass the normal professional standards of conduct imposed on board licensed counselors
In any other context, what school counselors do would be grounds for license suspension or revocation
Jane Coleman at Legal Insurrection reports on a Massachusetts case of parents suing a school district and counselor - individually - for concealing the gender transitioning plan the school covertly adopted for their 11-year-old daughter. The parents discovered the transition plan only after a whistleblower teacher with a conscience discreetly reached out to them - and was subsequently fired by the district for disclosing the secret without the minor child’s consent.
The counselor met weekly with the child for months, encouraging her to socially transition, to formally demand the school use her new name and pronouns, and worked to undermine the advice she was receiving from an outside, licensed counselor whom the parents had already hired to work with the child.
Whether these “conversations” occurred casually during school lunch, in the hallways, or after school - they were, in essence, counseling sessions. And the prescriptions that counselor made to the child - to socially transition to a new gender identity - are in substance, mental health treatment plans.
All of this - despite the fact that the parents informed the school they had retained outside professional help and to not engage in any further private conversations with the child about the matter. But the school ignored them.
In her article at Legal Insurrection, Jane Coleman pulls out this portion of the court transcript where the parents’ lawyer asks the court to consider the psychological effect of these covert counseling sessions:
While the case does not hinge on the issue of whether the counselor was acting within the scope of a professional license in implementing a social transitioning treatment plan for the child, the case does highlight a point I’ve been banging away at for the last few months:
School counselors are almost always wholly unregulated by a professional licensing board and are not subject to the same professional standards of conduct as counselors actually licensed by a state board of mental health providers.
All of this secret, covert counseling in schools would go away the instant these counselors were brought under the regulation of a state board of licensing.
Here’s why.
Massachusetts, similar to AZ, has a separate certification path for school counselors (called "professional support personnel licenses"), and does not require them to have a professional license from a licensing board - in MA, that would be the Board of Allied Mental Health Professionals (BAMPH), responsible for regulating mental health services according to statute and regulations. From the Code of Massachusetts Regulations (CMR):
MA school counselors start out with an "Initial license" that simply certifies their educational background. What’s the rationale for this? Quite frankly, I suspect the reason for this watered down “initial license” category is that it allows school districts to hire more of them, early in their career, at lower cost to the district.
Unlike AZ, however, MA has another, higher level of school counseling “license” - but it, too, does not involve a professional licensing board:
After 3 years at the Initial License-level, they can seek a "Professional License" by completing either (a) 60 credits of graduate work in a master's program, or (b) 'certification or licensure' from the National Board of Certified Counselors or National Board of School Counsels. Both of those "boards" are professional associations with no power to discipline or regulate members in accordance with state law in a manner that the state BAMHP has. The BAMHP has actual (and detailed) ethical codes and regulations, together with the power to investigate violations and impose discipline.
Neither the “Initial License” nor the “Professional License” school counselors, however, are regulated by BAMHP. They are “licensed” through the Office of Educator Licensure at the state’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. If the were actually board licensed, they’d be subject to these ethical codes and standards of conduct set by BAMPH.
Here's the significance:
If a school counselor is subject to the licensing requirements of the BAMPH, to treat a minor, the regulations require, among other things: (1) written informed consent, w/a treatment plan, that is (2) signed by the parents.
There are customary, commonsense but limited exceptions where disclosure is not required, but those none of those include a blanket right to exclude parents if the matter involves gender identity - which is exactly what school districts are doing around the country now. Without legal authority whatsoever.
This case illustrates perfectly why we need to re-think the wisdom of using school counselors wholly unregulated by professional licensing boards - in schools. With minors. Out of parents' view.
Licensing boards know very well how to stop this nonsense about hiding counseling sessions and communications from parents - they suspend and revoke licenses all year long for that kind of breach of professional standards of conduct.
You can read about my coverage of Arizona’s Board of Behavioral Health enforcement actions against licensed counselors who fail to get parent’s informed consent and signed treatment plans on Twitter here.
For whatever reason, I’ve had trouble getting even close allies to understand the significance of these separate “certification” pathways. In part, I suspect, its because most people who are not themselves subject to professional licensing (like doctors, lawyers, and others) and don’t really ever think about strict licensing requirements around their professions - because there aren’t any. When they hear “certified school counselor” they mistakenly believe that it has some significance. Like they’ve been vetted in some way. As if it means something. And they assume there must be some kind of public protections implied by the title.
They are also likely misled by school counselors and teachers who are less-than-forthright about what “certified” actually means. Typical of many in the credentialed class, they use the term with an air of significance, and assume a veneer of professionalism they don’t truly deserve.
But in fact “certified” really only means, in most cases, that the Department of Education has simply verified they took some college level courses.
That’s not enough. Not today. Not when school districts around the country are engaged, quite literally, in covert counseling sessions with children behind closed doors. And they want more of them. Yesterday.
But these are not the “guidance counselors” you had growing up who helped map out career and college admissions plans. Much has changed. It’s time to consider changing back.
End.