The Counseling Psychology program’s mission is to train counseling psychology leaders who will transform local, national, and international communities by reducing social inequities through scholarship, practice, and advocacy. Rooted in a scientist-practitioner model, students develop these competencies within a culturally diverse learning community supported by strong, individualized mentorship with faculty. The program aims to prepare counseling psychologists to work in academic and applied settings (a) to think critically and to apply scientific-based practices, (b) to promote social justice, (c) who are ethical and culturally competent, and (d) to consistently strive for deeper self-awareness, and (e) to be mindful of personal power and privilege.

The Counseling Psychology training program is strongly committed to providing an environment that promotes, affirms, and supports cultural and individual diversity among students, faculty and staff.  A systematic as well as coherent and long-term program has been in effect to attract and retain students and faculty of diverse backgrounds, to integrate multicultural and cross-cultural training across the curriculum, and to provide on-going training that reflects this commitment. The Coalition for Cultural Competence bolsters our multicultural and cross-cultural training.

MU’s counseling psychology program strives for excellence in the integration of practice, science and diversity. Our training program has a strong scientist-practitioner training model which fosters student growth through professional identification. We are committed to multicultural and cross-cultural competence and social justice and maintaining our values of mentoring and apprenticeship. We expect that students and faculty will work to create a climate of safety and trust for all concerns and to abide by the counseling psychology training program’s values statement.

The Counseling Psychology Program was one of the first counseling psychology programs to receive American Psychological Association (APA) accreditation and has been continuously accredited since 1953. Our doctoral program has achieved national and international recognition as a top ranked program. It has been consistently ranked as one of the best in the nation because of its exceptional research productivity, exemplary professional leadership, numerous journal editorships, rigorous and innovative pedagogy, the ability to recruit top graduate students from around the world and provide them with exceptional training and mentoring, and the production of doctorates who become faculty at other APA approved academic programs. Our cross cultural and multicultural emphasis has been a particular strength over the past three decades, and in recent years, our faculty have been highly successful in securing external grants from the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Education, and National Science Foundation.

Degrees & Certificates

We offer Ph.D. and M.Ed. degrees in counseling psychology. See below for emphasis areas within the program. Inquiries for the master’s program can be directed to Christy Hutton at huttoncc@missouri.edu.  Inquiries for the doctoral program can be directed to Patrick Rottinghaus at rottinghausp@missouri.edu or Christy Hutton at huttoncc@missouri.edu.

Doctorate (PhD)

• Counseling Psychology
  • Doctoral Program Handbook
  • Doctoral Program Planner
    • Student admissions, outcomes and other data

Master of Education (M Ed)

• Counseling Psychology
  • MEd in Counseling Psychology Planner
  • Master’s Program Handbook
• School Counseling (Elementary, Certification; Secondary Certification; Elementary and Secondary Certification)
  • MEd in School Counseling Planner
  • Master’s Program Handbook
• Sports Psychology (This program is not currently accepting students.)
• Career Counseling
• Dual Degree
  • National Taiwan Normal University and Bejing Normal University

Graduate Minors

• Multicultural Psychology

Faculty

The Counseling Psychology program is lead by highly productive, nationally recognized faculty. They hold leadership roles in key professional organizations and premier publication outlets in our field, and engage in cutting edge research. Our program’s core faculty have expertise in a variety of areas including vocational psychology (career assessment, career decision-making), school mental health, belonging, academic achievement, health disparities, gender, sexuality, intersectionality, social justice, trauma, and qualitative methods. Faculty members who will be accepting new doctoral advisees for the 2024-2025 school year are noted below with an asterisk (*).

• Loren Bauerband*
• Keith Herman
• Christy Hutton (Program Clinical Training Director)
• Matthew Martens
• Joshua Parmenter*
• Patrick Rottinghaus* (Program Training Director)
• Christopher Slaten (Department Chair)

Accreditation & Credentialing

The doctoral program in Counseling Psychology is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of the American Psychological Association (APA). Questions related to the program’s APA accredited status should be directed to the APA Commission on Accreditation.

APA Contact Information
Office of Program Consultation and Accreditation
American Psychological Association
750 First St. NE
Washington, DC  20002-4242
Telephone:  202-336-5979
TDD/TTY: 202-336-6123
Fax: 202-336-5978
apaaccred@apa.org
apa.org/ed/accreditation

As an APA-accredited program, we require all of our students to abide by APA’s Ethical Principles of Psychologists and Code of Conduct and by the Guidelines for Practitioners, some of which are listed below:

• Guidelines for Psychological Practice with Lesbian, Gay, and Bisexual Clients
• Guidelines for Psychological Practice with Transgender and Gender Nonconforming People
• Guidelines for Assessment of and Intervention with Persons with Disabilities
• Guidelines on Multicultural Education, Training, Research, Practice and Organizational Change for Psychologists
• Guidelines for Psychological Practice with Older Adults
• Guidelines for Psychological Practice with Girls and Women