The International Certification & Reciprocity Consortium (IC&RC), the world’s leading addiction and prevention credentialing organization (http://internationalcredentialing.org), seeks American Indian and Alaskan Native substance abuse prevention specialists to review updates to IC & RC test material through an online survey.
Worldwide, substance abuse is gaining attention for the damage it does to families and communities, and the need for trained, ethical addiction and prevention professionals is growing. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, substance abuse counseling is one of the fastest growing professions, projected to grow 20 percent by 2016.
Recent political developments in the U.S. also mean that it is a critical time for the field. Both the Affordable Health Care for America Act of 2010 and President Obama’s National Drug Control Strategy have the potential to transform how the profession is practiced in North America. Setting the international standards for competency-based certification programs through testing and credentialing of addiction professionals since 1981, IC&RC is the largest credentialing organization in the field
IC&RC is in the midst of updating their Prevention Specialist (PS) credential. Phase I was reviewing the PS Job Task Analysis (JTA) which took place August 9 and 10. The JTA lists domains/competencies, tasks, knowledge and skills necessary for an entry level prevention specialist.
The next phase of the process will be an online survey that will be created. The survey, sent via email, is distributed to thousands of prevention specialists who will rate the importance of the updated JTA tasks to determine if they adequately describe entry level prevention practice among various work settings.
Literally thousands of prevention specialists are needed to complete this online survey. If you are a Native American substance abuse prevention specialist and would like to participate in this survey, please send your email address no later than October 30, 2012 to either:
AJ Ernst, Ph.D. at SAMHSA’s Native American Center for Excellence (NACE)
Email: aernst@avarconsulting.com
Website: www.nace.samhsa.gov
Or
Mary Jo Mather at International Certification & Reciprocity Consortium (IC&RC)
Email: maryjo@internationalcertification.org
Website: www.internationalcredentialing.org
Your email address will be protected and not used for any other purpose other than the one stated above. Your participation in this important survey is voluntary and vital to updating the prevention specialist credential. The survey will automatically be sent to your email address when it is ready for distribution in a few short months.
