Post Master’s Program in Counseling for Licensure Readiness

This program is designed for individuals who have completed Masters degrees in Counseling and wish to pursue further systematic study to qualify to sit for the National Counselor’s Examination (NCE) or licensure in Pennsylvania (or other states with equivalent requirements). The NCE requires 48 semester hours of graduate credit with a course in nine specified areas. Pennsylvania requires completion of a planned program of 60 graduate semester credits in counseling from an accredited educational institution. This program prepares post-master’s students to meet these requirements. The specific courses that students take in this program vary according to their needs in meeting specific NCE and state licensure requirements.

The number of credits required will be determined after a transcript analysis has been completed. Specific courses will be selected through meeting with the student’s Program Director. However, a minimum of 12 credits are required for individuals with a 48-credit Master’s degree.

In this program, students could take any of the GPC’s core or elective courses recommended by the Program Director. Students could also take elective courses featured in our seven concentrations (Autism, Foundations in BCBA^® , Community Public Health, and Mediation and Conflict Transformation), pending approval from these graduate programs and completion of any necessary prerequisites. Other Master’s-level courses at Arcadia could be taken with the approval of the Program Director and with approval by the Office of Graduate Studies. To do this, students must complete a petition that includes a statement on course relevance to the student’s academic program and career goals. The petition form can be found at: 

In addition to the general admission procedures, a student also must hold a master’s or doctoral degree in a field closely related to the practice of professional counseling from an accredited college or university. Test scores are not required.