Overview
COAMFTE Accreditation
The Marriage and Family Therapy Program at La Salle University is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education (COAMFTE) of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, 112 South Alfred Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22314, Tel. No. 703.838. 9808. This accreditation is a measure of the program’s excellence. With it comes national recognition as one of the nation’s premium MFT training programs. AAMFT’s Commission on Accreditation for Marriage and Family Therapy Education (COAMFTE) is the nationally recognized accrediting agency that accredits master’s degree, doctoral degree, and post-graduate degree clinical training programs in marriage and family therapy throughout the United States and Canada.
What is Marriage and Family Therapy?
Marriage and Family Therapy is an approach to mental health care, which seeks to help people within the context of their families and their relationships, using family systems theories and interventions. Its practitioners hold a common assumption that if the individual is to change, the context must change. Therefore, the unit of treatment is no longer the person, even if only a single person is in treatment. It is the overall context of the client’s life and the set of relationships in which the person is embedded that is addressed as part of the treatment.
Who are Marriage and Family Therapists and what do they do?
Marriage and Family Therapists (MFTs) are mental health professionals trained in psychotherapy, family systems, and relationship issues. They are licensed to treat mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders within the context of individuals, couples, and marriage and family systems. Some of the problems that Marriage and Family Therapist help people with are as follows:
- Communication between family members, intimate partners, friends, coworkers, or others.
- Parental concerns such as learning effective approaches to discipline and how to effectively deal with children and/or adolescent’s psychological, behavioral and emotional difficulties.
- Marital or couple discord
- Sexual difficulties and concerns
- Feelings of depression, anxiety, or loneliness
- Unmanageable anger, hostility, or violence
Marriage and Family Therapists are widely employed as clinicians and consultants in mental health clinics, hospitals, schools, drug and alcohol centers, and a variety of other settings. Marriage and family therapists with additional training in research method and design also conduct or direct research.
What is La Salle’s Program?
The Marriage and Family Therapy program is a 60-credit hour degree. Refer to the Schedule Options for more information about how long it takes to complete the program.
The required courses (57 credits) fulfill the educational requirements for licensure in the state of Pennsylvania (and most other states) as well as for clinical membership in the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. Students complete the additional 3 credits for the 60-credit degree by choosing one elective course. Electives can be within the MFT Program or can be courses within our Professional Clinical Counseling program. Refer to the Curriculum for more information.
The MFT program progresses from a knowledge base of core courses in systems theory to a sequence of skills courses in assessment and intervention, to actual clinical practice, completed in a 12-month clinical placement (i.e., Internship) in the final year.
La Salle’s MFT degree prepares students for licensure as marriage and family therapists (LMFT) in Pennsylvania and most other states and for employment in many professional settings. Upon graduation from the program, students meet the education eligibility requirement the national exam for licensure. The MFT degree also is excellent preparation for those students planning to pursue doctoral studies in marriage and family therapy or a related field. For more information about La Salle’s MFT Program, view the Mission Statement and Educational Outcomes and FAQs.
Why study Marriage and Family Therapy at La Salle?
- The Lasallian Mission – La Salle University believes in a personal, practical, and professional graduate education that occurs in the context of the Lasallian tradition focusing on excellence in teaching, social justice, community, and concern for both ultimate values and for the individual values of its students.
- Long history of training students and large alumni network – La Salle’s Counseling and Family Therapy Master’s Programs have been training counselors and therapists since 1979.
- Designed around the working professional – Our courses are offered in the evening, which is helpful for students who have full-time or part-time jobs.
- Field Placement Training – Affiliations with regionally-recognized field placement sites in the greater Philadelphia area, which is especially rich in its mental health resources, and a dedicated Field Placement Coordinator for MFT Students.
- Inter-disciplinary – While training students in MFT professional identity, students take courses with mental health counseling and social work students, akin to working relationships seen in the field.
- Diverse faculty – Our faculty possess a wide range of disciplinary expertise dedicated to teaching, scholarship, and service, bringing their clinical and research experience into the classroom.
- Tevera – Students are able to build an e-portfolio that they can take with them after graduation and can use Tevera to log and track post-master’s hours for licensure.
The thoroughness of La Salle’s training is widely recognized in the Philadelphia area and sets its graduates apart. View the Admission Requirements for eligibility criteria and application deadlines.
