CANVAS

A semi-annual newsletter brought to you by the ACATE Council

VOL. 3, ISSUE 1

January 2023

The Accreditation Council for Art Therapy Education (ACATE) ) provides the semi-annual ACATE Canvas newsletter to inform its many stakeholders of the progress of art therapy program accreditation generally and the actions of the Council more specifically.

ACATE 2023-2025 Chair Elected

At its December 2022 monthly meeting, ACATE elected Eliza S. Homer, PhD, ATR-BC, LCPC-C, NCC as ACATE Chair for the July 2023-June 2025 term.

Eliza is a practitioner member of ACATE and practices art therapy in Maine. Eliza served as an adjunct faculty member at Universidad Latina de America in Michoacan, Mexico, and is currently working in a team that is developing the first master’s degree in art therapy in Mexico.

Eliza will serve as chair-elect until her term officially begins, mentoring with the current chair and meeting with leaders of AATA and CAAHEP.

Craig Balfany Receives ACATE Outstanding Site Evaluator Award

Craig Balfany, MPS, ATR_BC, LPC has received the 2022 Dana Elmendorf Outstanding Site Evaluator Award from ACATE. Craig is the Art Therapy Program Chair at the Adler Graduate School in Minnetonka, Minnesota. He has been an ACATE educator member since 2016, including a term as Vice-Chair and a term as Treasurer.

Craig was instrumental in establishing and revising the council’s policies and procedures for site visits. His nominator notes, “His work on-site visit reports is complete and thorough, and he maintains a friendly, relaxed demeanor that puts the people he is working with at ease, during the visit itself or during planning prior to the visit.” Craig has completed six site visits for ACATE and will complete another in April 2023.

Dana Elmendorf, ATR-BC, LPC was the founding chair of the ACATE Council and since 2017 has been the volunteer ACATE Coordinator. She also serves as a site evaluator. This award was named in honor of Dana’s work for ACATE as an officer, coordinator, and site evaluator.

Recent CAAHEP/ACATE Accreditation Actions

In the past six months, ACATE completed reviews of five art therapy degree programs, leading to accreditation approval for eight years by the Council on Accreditation of Allied Health Educations Programs (CAAHEP). CAAHEP is the parent accrediting body for ACATE and dozens of other accreditation councils and commissions. The newly accredited master’s degree programs include:

Lesley University, Cambridge, Massachusetts
School of Visual Arts - New York, New York City (Manhattan), New York
Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan
School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
Notre Dame of Maryland University, Baltimore, Maryland

Congratulations to these programs. They join 25 previously accredited art therapy programs already listed on the ACATE/CAAHEP website. Four additional programs are in various stages in their review for their initial accreditation. and have site visits scheduled in winter or spring 2023.

CAAHEP/ACATE Standards Revision Update

All accrediting bodies are required to conduct periodic reviews of their educational standards, seeking continuous improvement and increased relevancy. In the past year, five review committees carefully reviewed the existing standards for art therapy education programs. The ACATE council currently is considering the committee’s recommendations.

Many formatting changes are mandated by CAAHEP’s Standards Template, but ACATE has proposed some additional revisions to strengthen the standards. The single largest proposed change is the movement of Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) from the Curriculum Standard and Appendix B to the Outcomes Standard, where SLOs are a better fit and more easily understood.

When accepted by the council, the proposed revisions will be shared with stakeholders in the art therapy community, hopefully by March 2023. The Council will be seeking comments on the proposed revisions before sending the revised proposed revisions to the AATA Education Committee for its review and ultimately to the CAAHEP Standards Committee for further review and potential adoption.

ACATE Addresses Student Learning Outcomes

Current standards for art therapy education programs mandate the use of Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) as a required outcomes measure. ACATE has proposed moving SLOs from the curriculum standard, which has created confusion among program directors, to the outcomes standard, where it is a better fit.

To better inform colleagues of the use of SLOs as summative measures, ACATE Chair Ron Hunt provided a presentation on the use of SLOs at a CAAHEP Workshop in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in July 2022. In April 2023, he will provide another presentation on SLOs at a virtual conference for the Association of Specialized and Professional Accreditors.

In early 2023, Ron will be providing a webinar on the appropriate use of SLOs for art

therapy program directors and other interested individuals. An announcement of the date and time will be forthcoming.

ACATE Seeks Two New Council Members– July 2023

On June 30, 2023, two ACATE members will finish their six years of service on the Council, completing two three-year terms. ACATE seeks applications from art therapists who represent the education community (1 position) and the practitioner community (1 position) and are interested in promoting the art therapy profession through accreditation.

ACATE is the only organization authorized to recommend the accreditation of art therapy master’s degree programs. All 12 Council Members and one Coordinator are volunteers who strive to conduct uniformly applied, high-quality accreditation processes as they review art therapy programs for initial accreditation, reaccreditation, and annual monitoring of compliance with accreditation standards.

In March 2023, with the posting of the council openings on the ACATE website , applications for the two vacant positions will be accepted. Questions about the Council and its work can be addressed to Ron Hunt, ACATE Chair at acatecouncilchair@gmail.com.

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