Certification Process

Certification has two parts. Both must be complete before you apply.

Before you begin

You must hold a license, registration, or the equivalent authorization to practice a clinical mental health profession where you work. Certification does not provide this. Where your jurisdiction does not license the profession, you must be lawfully practicing under whatever qualification it requires.

You must hold IAPST Student Membership, and keep it current throughout. Hours completed while your membership has lapsed do not count.

Part One: Education

The educational component is completed through an IAPST-accredited program. No other course of education satisfies it.

Accreditation means the Association has examined the program against published standards in curriculum, structure, assessment, and faculty, and found that it meets them.

Some accredited programs also deliver Part Two. Where a program does not, you arrange that separately.

See the accredited programs.

Part Two: Clinical Supervision

You work with an IAPST Registered Supervisor, whom you find yourself unless your program provides one. You may check any supervisor's registration in the public Verification System.

At your first session you and your supervisor sign the official IAPST Supervision Agreement. Your supervisor files it with the Office of the Executive Officer, and the Executive Officer signs off on it.

What Part Two requires

Clinical work, supervision, observed sessions, and time limit required for Part Two
Psychosexual clinical work	300 hours
Supervision	50 hours
Of which individual	26 hours
Of which with one supervisor, continuously	15 hours
Group supervision, maximum	24 hours
Observed sessions	6, across at least 3 patients
Time limit from sign-off	2 years

Ratio

6:1

Six hours of clinical work to one hour of supervision

The ratio is 6:1. For every six hours of clinical work you complete, you get one hour of supervision. It applies as you go rather than at the end, and clinical hours run ahead of the ratio are not credited.

Only work after sign-off counts. One hour of your first supervision session counts toward the fifty. Everything after that counts only once the Executive Officer has signed off on your Agreement. Clinical work before sign-off does not count, however extensive.

At the ordinary pace, six clinical hours a week, Part Two takes about a year.

What it costs

These are the fees payable to the Association. Members whose primary country of professional practice is a Tier II country pay approximately half.

Association fees for student membership, the certification application, and certified membership
Fee	Standard	Tier II
Student Member dues, each year while you train	USD 50	USD 25
Certification application, once	USD 300	USD 150
Certified Member dues, each year once certified	USD 200	USD 100

Your supervisor sets their own fee, which you pay them directly. The Association does not set, review, cap, or take a share of it. Program tuition is set by the program and is likewise separate.

Downloads

The IAPST Certification Guide and the IAPST Supervision Standards are also listed on the Policies page.

IAPST Certification Guide
The Association's guide to certification: eligibility, the accredited educational component, supervised clinical work, and how the two parts fit together.
View or download PDF
IAPST Supervision Standards
The published standards that govern supervision toward IAPST certification.
View or download PDF