This winter, the membership of the American Psychoanalytic Association is being asked to consider and vote on a bylaw amendment, often misleadingly described as the “local option” amendment, which would forbid the Board on Professional Standards (BOPS) from requiring any form of certification for service as training and supervising psychoanalyst (TA/SA). Altering our bylaws to explicitly prohibit BOPS from nationally requiring certification for TA/SA service attacks a core mission of our national organization, the educational mission, and is neither “local” nor merely an “option.”
Why is the “local option” bylaw dangerous to our national educational mission? BOPS currently already effectively utilizes its existing option of waiving certain requirements in individual circumstances. This proposed bylaw would permit individual institutes, but not our national organization, to either require certification or waive it, so that non-certified analysts could become TAs. This argument and its corollary, that analysands of such non-certified analysts might become candidates, is attractive but extremely misleading. In actuality, under the guise of providing needed flexibility, the bylaw would impose a new rigidity. Far from being merely an “option,” to be exercised locally, the bylaw would remove an option nationally. APsaA would no longer retain the option of employing its only national evaluation tool, the certification examination, as part of its national evaluation of potential TAs through its BOPS.
As a national organization with a major educational mission, APsaA has an obligation to perform due diligence in evaluating local educational programs on the national level. Candidates are required to be analyzed as part of their psychoanalytic education. Therefore, APsaA has an obligation to assess potential TAs nationally, just as curricula and other aspects of candidate education are nationally reviewed. These tasks are assigned to a body—BOPS—consisting of institute representatives, each institute autonomously selecting two representatives, called fellows. The decisions of BOPS are our institutes' group decisions, arrived at and voted on democratically. Institutes, collectively, want certification as a national standard for TA appointment.
BOPS is presently actively studying and improving both the TA system and certification examination, including the possibility of recommending periodic re-certification.
Beth J. Seelig, M.D., is professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and director of the Psychoanalytic Institute, Emory University. She is secretary of the Board on Professional Standards and councilor-at-large of the Executive Council of APsaA.
The reliability of the certification procedure is being researched. Substantial and extremely well received changes have recently been made in both certification and the national standards for TA appointment. Work continues to increase flexibility while maintaining reasonable assurance of TA experience and qualifications. Although there has been ongoing controversy regarding certification, when polled, the majority of our members support national certification with improvements. This proposed amendment opposes this expressed wish of our membership by attempting to preemptively prevent our BOPS from employing any form of national certification. Taking this step is also contrary to the accepted practice of other healing professions, which recognize the need for national standards and a national certification for their individual practitioners that has meaning for the profession and which should be expectably required for those entrusted with educating future colleagues.
There is another quite different but also essential problem with the “local option” amendment. APsaA is in the middle of a major reorganization. The bylaws of our organization are being reviewed and rewritten. All administrative structures within the organization are subject to revision. The proposed new administrative structure and bylaws will be voted on by our membership. This bylaw would have the effect of making a radical (and realistically irrevocable) change in the nature of our organization at a time when the big picture is being re-considered in a holistic way. Please consider carefully before casting your vote. The nature of our organization is at stake.