As the President of the Council of Specialties in Professional Psychology (CoS) it is with real pleasure that I announce the CoS Taxonomy Initiative for 2021. The Taxonomy Initiative is a full year plan to improve upon our specialty taxonomies and promulgate them across our affiliated specialty councils and other organizations. The 2021 Taxonomy Initiative was developed in collaboration with the Commission for the Recognition of Specialties and Subspecialties in Professional Psychology (CRSSPP), and a Workgroup from the Interorganizational Summit 4 on Specialty, Specialization, and Board Certification.
Each of the CoS Member Specialties has agreed to conduct a thorough and systematic review of their own Specialty Taxonomy for needed edits. The goal of this review is for each CoS Specialty to have an E & T Taxonomy Grid which will guide programs across all stages of training in that Specialty to use uniform and consistent language to describe the levels and intensity of education and training opportunities offered by their program within that Specialty. This task will be accomplished by each Specialty aided by guidance provided in multiple recently authored documents which have been prepared for this purpose. These documents are accessible in the 2021 CoS Taxonomy Initiative section of the website and consist of the following: Policy and Procedure for E & T Specialty Taxonomy Submission, Approval and Dissemination; CoS Taxonomy Grid; CoS Guidance for Preparing Specialty Education and Training Taxonomies; and the Strategic Plan for CoS role in Specialty E & T Taxonomy Submission, Approval and Dissemination.
The process developed to do this work is as follows. First each current CoS Specialty Member Specialty will review their Taxonomy within their own Specialty Councils. Second, the CoS Executive Council will act as a formal consultative body to assist with this task by providing guidance and recommendations to the Specialties who are current members of CoS, as well as for new specialties working toward CRSSPP approval and membership on CoS.
The timeline to accomplish the 2021 CoS Taxonomy Initiative is as follows:
• Quarter 1—Approve CoS E & T Taxonomy P & P; engage each Specialty Council about the importance of uniform and consistent descriptors in their Specialty Taxonomy.
• Quarter 2-- Each Specialty Council will choose a champion(s) to review and begin the process of revision of their Taxonomy.
• Quarter 3—CoS EC will evaluate each revised Specialty Taxonomy and make recommendations where needed to assure that each Specialty Taxonomy can be recommended for approval by the CoS Board of Directors.
• Quarter 4—Each Specialty Council should achieve approval of their Specialty Taxonomy and it should be posted on CoS Website by late Fall.
Each CoS Specialty has agreed that we need Specialty Taxonomies that conform to the APA E & T Taxonomy Guidelines. The Taxonomy Grid of a particular Specialty guides training programs in that Specialty to use clear and consistent language to describe the content and levels of education and training opportunity in a training program. In turn, students and other stakeholders will benefit from use of the consistent language and descriptors by Specialty Programs.
Many individuals and organizations have worked long and hard toward the goals put forward in this 2021 CoS Taxonomy Initiative. Thank you to Ron Rozensky, Ph.D., ABPP, Rick Seime, Ph.D., ABPP, Victor Molinari, Ph.D., ABPP; CRSSPP and Toni Minniti, Ph.D.; the Summit 4 Outreach & Communications Workgroup and David Cox., Ph.D., ABPP, Scott Sperling, Psy.D.; and many others too numerous to recognize here.
Sincerely,
Karen E. Farrell, Psy.D., ABPP
President, Council of Specialties in Professional Psychology