How Therapy Became a Re-Education Camp - CACREP Dispositions Part - 4

Future therapists are being groomed to see their clients as ideological projects.

Would you trust a therapist or school counselor who was forced to pass an ideological loyalty test before being allowed to graduate? Does it help to know that this ideology includes concepts such as white privilege, anti-racism, allyship, decolonization, racial awakening, microaggressions and gender-affirming care?

Looking at counselor training programs from the outside, it’s not obvious that they are ideological training camps. That’s certainly not listed on the glowing webpages they present to prospective students, nor are they leading with how they enforce this because if they did, no one would waste their precious time and money paying to be indoctrinated.

The Hidden Agenda in Counselor Training

Wise shoppers, both for counselor training and therapy, should look into the details. As I wrote in part 1, part 2, and part 3, by CACREP demand, counselor trainees must have the correct ‘disposition’ to graduate, regardless of their grades. To be 110% clear on what CACREP means by ‘disposition,’ the word is defined in their standard as: 

The commitments, characteristics, values, beliefs, and behaviors that influence the counselor’s professional growth and interactions with clients, faculty, supervisors, and peers, including working in a diverse, multicultural, and global society with marginalized populations.

That’s right, students are evaluated on their values, beliefs, commitments, and behaviors, and if they don’t have the right beliefs and values, they will be blocked from graduation or sent to re-education. In my program, this was called having a Support Plan

You are unlikely to find this information on a training program’s home page, and if you don’t know what to look for, you may never see it. Much of it is discussed in the fine print, under nice-sounding terms like Support Plan.

How Training Programs Enforce Ideological Conformity

Where prospective students and curious observers can see these details is in program student handbooks. Many universities, to their credit, have these easily available on their website. You can find them if you think to look. Before you go spending three years and $40,000, or take your 12-year-old to a newly graduated therapist from your local university, do yourself a favor and get yourself a copy of one.

Let’s examine handbooks from two different schools of higher education in Washington, D.C., so everyone knows what to look for.

First, we will explore George Washington University, (GWU) and The Chicago School in Washington DC, which has two, an old general program handbook from 2017-2018 and the practicum and internship Training Manual from 2023-2024.

Take note, these handbooks are considered legal documents and are viewed as contracts in court. So if you are a student, should you ever need to sue, make sure that you have a thorough understanding of what you are signing up for. If you are a parent taking yourself or your child to an indoctrinated therapist, sadly you can’t sue the school your therapist trained at. The best you can do is push for reform legislatively right now.

What Handbooks Reveal About ‘Wrong’ Dispositions

In part 2 of this series, I wrote about how the dispositions show up in two handbooks. Today I’m going to write about what happens when your beliefs are deemed unacceptable.

CACREP requires that all programs have a plan in place to retain students. If you don’t know better, this would sound like a great safety net if your life spiraled out of control while you were trying to finish your degree.

That’s not how it works. I know from personal experience. 

In the GWU training handbook, after a long paragraph expounding on how the program is making special efforts to recruit from diverse marginalized groups even extending their efforts to satisfy a global agenda. They go on to site how they evaluate students in alignment with ethical standards, set by the same professional agencies (ACA, CACREP, etc) that condone gatekeeping the profession unconstitutionally on the grounds of values and beliefs.

In discussing what happens when a student isn’t meeting the standard, they bring up their Professional Development Plan (PDP). You might wonder what failing dispositions look like. 

At GWU you can get a PDP for many reasons including the following: 

6. Poor and unprofessional interactions with instructors, faculty, supervisors, staff, and colleagues

7. Not accepting and integrating professional feedback from an instructor, program faculty, advisor, or supervisor

8. Not taking appropriate initiative while at field placement sites

9. Poor professional dispositions

10. Inability to meet and uphold professional or accreditation training standards, professional code of ethics, and professional competencies,

11. Inability to uphold the CHD program’s as well as the profession’s multicultural, social justice, anti-oppression, and anti-racist values and practices

While some of these, could be interpreted benignly, as number 11 reminds us that students are being evaluated on social justice values at all times. Misgendering a faculty member or a classmate could be considered a ‘poor and unprofessional interaction’.

Likewise, a student who didn’t accept the ‘feedback’ that they were a white oppressor would, by these guidelines, also be grounds for a PDP.

If we check in at The Chicago School in Washington DC, their program handbook is spare. While dispositions are still mentioned 15 times, the concept is left vague. The primary indicator of an underlying agenda is in the program objectives which iterate that students will demonstrate culturally appropriate diagnosis, evaluation, assessment, treatment, and referral while advocating for clients and influencing policy.

It gets more dicey when detailing ethical conduct, where trainees are expected to maintain personal control and have self-awareness.

Emotional Stability and Self-control – Student exhibits emotional stability (i.e. congruence between mood, affect, and behavior) and self-control in relationships with instructors, supervisors, peers, and clients

General Self-Awareness and Understanding – Student demonstrates an awareness of his or her own belief system, values, needs and limitations, and the effect of these dynamics on his or her general interactions with others

Instructor/Supervisor Feedback – Student responds non-defensively and incorporates supervisory feedback to alter skills, behavior, and/or counselor dispositions

What does it mean to be self-aware in this context? How is that judged? Are students required to incorporate all supervisory feedback, even if it is telling them to give up essential parts of themselves? That these questions aren’t addressed is a red flag big enough to cover China.

In the additional handbook covering practicum and internship, listed under situations that would lead to a trainee being withheld from practicum or internship you find: 

There is a significant concern about their professional behavior, including but not limited to,

▪ Professional behavior toward faculty, peers, supervisors, and/or clients

▪ Emotional stability

▪ Adherence to program and university policies and procedures

Both GWU and the Chicago School use the textbook Counseling the Culturally Diverse by Derald Wing Sue in the CACREP required Multicultural Counseling class. I have written about this book several times, for gaslighting, promoting sadism and stereo-typing.

In the context of a Social Justice curriculum with training in micro-aggressions, it is unclear what inappropriate ‘professional behavior’ would look like. There are also no indicators of the rates of emotional instability for their average class. In an environment serving up the textbook, Counseling the Culturally Diverse 9th Edition, a book that in its introduction admits this course inspires shouting matches among students and sadism, rates of emotional instability would be an important metric to know before signing up as a student, or as a client to one of their graduates.

What Happens When You Don’t Comply

In my case, at my program in Eastern Tennessee, we were told that it was important to monitor our behavior at all times. This specifically included our body language to ensure we were not giving off any messages of exclusion in how we moved.

My Buddhist practice was called out as a schema that needed to be corrected because it was deemed invalidating to other identities and therefore harmful.

From my own experience having a support plan, I can share that it was a biweekly affair where I was pressured to change my values, told my thinking was wrong. I was bullied, and verbally abused by my professors who also attempted to gaslight me into agreeing I was suicidal.

If that sounds like it is wildly illegal and I must have been able to sue, you should check out Jennifer Keeton’s story. Her Christian faith was ruled unacceptable and when she went to court, the ACLU backed up the school and the courts decided against her. She was ordered to undergo a re-education program or abandon her degree. This happened in Georgia.

Why This Matters for Clients

While there are no formal studies into how much this affects clients, the rise in transgender identification, affirming care, and the resulting sterilization of children should be setting off alarm bells.

What Can Be Done?

The bottom line is that reform is necessary. While a lot is happening under the new administration, Americans should not get too comfortable that this will be fixed with an Executive Order. While an EO may help to curb the worst offenses, without legislative action, it’s uncertain if change will be lasting.

It’s laudable that the Trump administration is addressing these areas where Academia has been flouting the Constitution. It’s also important that reform follow appropriate legal channels as this transpires. As much as people may welcome the end of such egregious institutional actions, if reform is enacted on legally shaky ground, it creates precedent that would allow for future tyranny.

Only legislation that disempowers or radically restructures accreditation will put the potential for nationwide ideological takeover of universities to bed.

In the interim, people in need of mental healthcare they can trust, new networks of practitioners who hold to past evidence based standards have already begun to pop up. 

The sooner students and clients hear about that the better.

Jump to - When Straight A’s Aren’t Enough: The ‘Disposition’ Scam in Universities - Part 1

Trained to Obey: Required Grading of Counseling Students on ‘Dispositions’ Part 2.

Trained to Betray: How Ideologically Captured Counselor Training Hurts Vulnerable Kids Part 3

The Psychological Takeover: How Therapy is Becoming a Tool of Oppression, Dispositions - Part 5

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About

Diogenes in Exile began after I returned to grad school to pursue a Clinical Mental Health Counseling master’s degree at the University of Tennessee. What I encountered, however, was a program deeply entrenched in Critical Theories ideology. During my time there, I experienced significant resistance, particularly for my Buddhist practice, which was labeled as invalidating to other identities. After careful reflection, I chose to leave the program, believing the curriculum being taught would ultimately harm clients and lead to unethical practices in the field.

Since then, I’ve dedicated myself to investigating, writing, and speaking out about the troubling direction of psychology, higher education, and other institutions that seem to have lost their way. When I’m not working on these issues, you’ll find me in the garden, creating art, walking my dog, or guiding my kids toward adulthood.

You can also find my work at Minding the Campus