C7 - Breaking Down Barriers to Licensure: Insights from the Mental Health Career Accelerator

Monday, April 27, 2026

4:00 PM - 5:00 PM MDT

Location: Bluebird 2G

Nearly 60 million people in the U.S. experience mental illness, yet workforce shortages leave over 122 million people in areas without adequate access to care. Many individuals who earn a master's degree in mental health face financial, informational and regulatory barriers to clinical licensure that force them to walk away from the field.

To address this challenge, the National Council for Mental Wellbeing partnered with Kaiser Permanente to develop and fund the Kaiser Permanente Mental Health Career Accelerator program. The Accelerator was designed to reduce barriers to licensure and expand the pipeline of licensed clinicians serving communities in need.

Join us to explore the program’s strengths, implementation strategies and key lessons learned from launching and scaling the Accelerator. We will highlight practical approaches to program design, partnership development and funding that participants can adapt to strengthen the behavioral health workforce in their own communities.

Learning Objectives:

Identify key barriers preventing master’s-level graduates from obtaining clinical licensure and entering the behavioral health workforce.
Examine strengths, implementation strategies and lessons learned from the Mental Health Career Accelerator program.
Apply and discuss actionable strategies to replicate or adapt the Accelerator’s efforts within session attendees’ local networks.

Disclosure(s):

Yoon H. Choi, PhD: No financial relationships to disclose

Amy Conway: No financial relationships to disclose

Aimee Chung: No financial relationships to disclose

Sam Slater: No financial relationships to disclose

Breakout Presenter(s)

Yoon H. Choi, PhD

Project Director
National Council for Mental Wellbeing
Herndon, Virginia

Disclosure(s): No financial relationships to disclose

Slides
AC

Amy Conway

Disclosure(s): No financial relationships to disclose
Aimee B. Chung, MSW, LSW

Faculty/State Advisor
University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Thompson School of Social Work & Public Health
Honolulu, Hawaii

Disclosure(s): No financial relationships to disclose
Sam Slater

VP Growth
Triad
Orlando, Florida

Disclosure(s): No financial relationships to disclose
Kristina Silva-Pedrero, MSW, LSW

Associate Psychotherapist
University of Hawaii
Wailuku, Hawaii

Disclosure information not submitted.