Biography and Vision Statement

Carol D. Goodheart has been in independent practice and involved in furthering the aims of independent practitioners, the profession, and the patients, since 1980. Originally trained as a nurse, she earned her doctorate in counseling psychology from Rutgers University and specializes in the treatment of people coping with physical diseases or disabilities. In addition to her practice in Princeton, NJ, she has served at Rutgers University’s Graduate School of Applied and Professional Psychology in a number of roles: clinical supervisor, contributing faculty, and committee on continuing education.

We asked her to share her vision for APA with our readers. Here’s what she said:

MY ROLE & VISION

My vision for APA is the result of years of serving our organization and learning about its strengths and its potential. It is the duty of every President to articulate the pressing challenges, to envision where APA needs to go, to implement concrete strategies to get there, and to pave the way for the next generation. I pledge effective leadership to fulfill these duties and move forward on initiatives important to members: economics, advocacy, partnerships, diversity, and responsiveness.

ECONOMICS

We must address our members’ economic pressures more directly. Career-building is a practice issue, a science issue, an education issue, a diversity issue, and an early-career issue. The public is deprived, and even harmed in some cases, when they do not have access to the fruits of psychology. This means we must create stronger projects for economic success in competitive funding environments.

We must ensure strong and diversified revenue streams for APA so that we can offer what our members need without raising dues beyond members’ means and without creating deficit budgets. As the current APA Treasurer, I know the financing of APA intimately and have worked transparently to make the best use of our resources.

As APA President-elect, I will propose a Practice Summit to take place as soon as possible. The goal is to develop a comprehensive set of recommendations for sharpening our strategies to ensure the future of psychology practice.

Advocacy

We must hold our seats at legislative and advocacy tables. Advocacy for psychological practice, science, and education is required for the public welfare. Success for practitioners requires a greater mobilization of members for the advocacy issues that affect psychologists and are in the public interest.

As APA President, I will encourage all members to support APA’s legislative and advocacy efforts. Staff and the leadership cannot carry the advocacy agenda of the discipline alone. Only through grassroots participation of members can we increase our influence on legislation and regulations. We have great messages, but we need more messengers.

Partnerships

We must increase our strategic collaboration and our coalition-building, both within our own house and with other organizations who share our agenda. There are many opportunities to work with others for the common good.

As APA President, I will propose the development of a new think tank, an Institute of Psychology, on a par with the Institute of Medicine. A think tank will provide a unified structure to advance psychology’s agenda and to enhance psychology’s influence. It involves a true partnership among psychology constituencies. It can change the landscape for psychology by addressing targeted social problems and influencing public policy.

Diversity

We must increase diversity at every level of the association. We want to be a more welcoming organization, one that is reflective of changes in our discipline and in our society.

As APA President, I will nourish allies for diversity and encourage diversity in psychology’s pipeline. I believe that we must put into action what we have learned from the Multicultural Guidelines, LGBT Guidelines, Guidelines for Women and Girls, Guidelines for Aging Adults, and the recommendations of the Task Force on Enhancing Diversity. We must move forward with the Diversity Implementation Plan and follow through on the recent Council Resolution to Enhance Ethnic Minority Recruitment, Retention, and Training.

Responsiveness

We must take practical steps to make APA a nimble and responsive organization — one that simultaneously serves the discipline and the membership.

I want us to serve as a resource when national crises arise, such as Hurricane Katrina and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. I want us to increase public awareness of who we are and what we do. Bit by bit, we are making psychology a household word with these kinds of efforts.

As APA President, I will support the development of more powerful infrastructures such as newer communication and technology systems. These are necessary for our web presence and for the delivery of information, products, and services

Conclusion

It is vital for our next President-elect to understand the coordinated agenda that drives APA and the APA Practice organization forward, to implement solutions for the challenges facing psychology, and to capitalize on the opportunities available to us. I want us to respond to members in all the ways outlined above: economic strides, strengthened advocacy, partnerships, increased diversity, and organizational responsiveness.

I promise to advance a broad shared agenda for psychology through collaboration and take us ever closer to meeting APA’s goals at the highest level.

The two greatest challenges for practitioners are the Economic Viability of Practice and the Increased Demands for Accountability:

We must focus on expanded practice roles, creative practice models, increased resources, and economic advocacy, in light of: downward reimbursement trends and other significant problems with health systems and insurers; rising debt loads of early career members; the accelerating accountability movement that began with disruptive utilization review and is now transitioning into outcomes review; disparate outcomes measurements and methods that make practice management burdensome; and Pay-for-Performance plans and consumer driven health plan reports on professionals that are being rolled out now with unclear effects.

As APA President, I will propose a Practice Summit, at which the APA/APAPO, CAPP, practice Divisions, SPTAs, trainers of practitioners, business and marketing experts, and interested others will develop a comprehensive set of recommendations for sharper strategies to ensure the future of psychology practice. I will call upon Division 42 for help with this initiative.

Further, I will continue to support sustained Legislative Advocacy efforts. The laws and regulations that affect practice are forged in both the States and at the Federal level; members count on Division 42, the APAPO, and their State Psychological Associations, which need resources to push forward successfully and help coordinate strategies to address the rapid-fire changes in the practice climate. I will support Membership Recruitment and Retention efforts. APA, its Divisions, and the SPTAs are working harder than ever and delivering more services, but membership is not growing sufficiently to keep pace. We must connect with all licensed psychologists in ways that allow them to see the benefit of working together toward the economic viability of practice and the development of resources to address the accountability movement, so that they can serve their patients and clients successfully

The pace of change in society is quickening in ways that affect us in Division 42 directly: demographics, globalization, non-sustainable health care costs in a fragmented system. Nevertheless, I am firmly convinced that the need for psychology services will continue to grow. Exciting opportunities for professional psychology lie in 1) prevention (e.g. health promotion in schools, workplaces, communities, and public health projects), 2) partnerships for improved services and visibility both within and beyond healthcare (e.g. science-practice networks, interdisciplinary collaboration), practice expansion (e.g. prescriptive authority, business consultation, interdisciplinary teams, diversification, full inclusion in evolving health systems).

Approaches to capture these kinds of opportunities include: first and foremost my proposed national Practice Summit, but also on-going advocacy and coalition-building, flexible forms of life-long education, and a new think tank to showcase major projects and change the landscape for applied psychology.

Service to Division 42 Carol was our President in 1999. She filled other roles in continuous service from 1992 to 2004: Secretary, Member-at-Large, Publications Chair, and Finance Committee member. She was the series editor for our book series, initiated the niche guides as a part of her Presidential Initiative PICK 42, reconstituted a focus on Diversity, and supported the multi-year Divisional efforts to address managed care issues. In 2002, she received the Division 42 Distinguished Psychologist of the Year Award.

Leadership

Carol currently serves as APA Treasurer and as a member of the Board of Directors. She has chaired the Finance Committee, Policy and Planning Board, the Task Force on Evidence Based Practice, and co-chaired the Task Force on Health and the Congressional Initiative on Serious Illness. She served on the Council of Representatives from both a Division and a State. Her service also includes such diverse leadership activities as: co-chair of the CEO search committee that culminated in the hiring of Norman Anderson, senior advisor to the Advisory Council on Genetics, Trustee of the APA Insurance Trust, and a board member of Women in Psychology for Legislative Action. In 2005, she received a Presidential Citation, in recognition of contributions as Chair of the APA Presidential Task Force on Evidence-Based Practice in Psychology. Carol is a widely respected practitioner who has become known as someone who works effectively across constituencies and achieves consensus on difficult issues.

Scholarship

As an author and editor, Carol has published extensively on health, women, and the practice of psychology. Her books include Evidence-Based Psychotherapy: Where Practice and Research Meet, Treating People with Chronic Disease: A Psychological Guide, Handbook of Girls’ and Women’s Psychological Health, and Living with Childhood Cancer: A Practical Guide to Help Families Cope. She served as a consulting editor or editorial board member for Professional Psychology, Journal of Clinical Psychology, and Pragmatic Case Studies in Psychotherapy.

Honors Representative awards are: Fellow of APA, distinguished practitioner in the National Academy of Psychology, APA Presidential citation, the Division of Psychotherapy Distinguished Psychologist Award for lifetime contributions, the Society of Counseling Psychology Best Practice Award; and Distinguished Psychologist of the Year awards from the Division of Psychologists in Independent Practice and the New Jersey Psychological Association.