Alaska's new counselor license ends the unlicensed wait for graduates

For years, Alaska's counseling graduates have had to practice their way to a license without holding one — logging 3,000 supervised hours, at least two years of work, as unlicensed practitioners before the state would license them. On Aug. 21, that changes: a new associate counselor license gives graduates a credential to carry while they build toward full licensure.

Alaska has been one of the few states without a working entry-level counseling license — a barrier at the front of an already long pipeline, in a state with real behavioral-health workforce shortages and hard rural access problems.

The Legislature created the license under House Bill 126, but the rules stalled for a year under a statewide freeze on new regulations. The Board of Professional Counselors adopted them in July.