Advantages:

• Active certified instructors who wish to be, are included on the National Referral List for COUPLE COMMUNICATION on ICP's web page: www.couplecommunication.com
  The National Referral List is also available on paper for people who request it from the ICP office.
  
  
• Couples who do not know an instructor can place credibility in taking the program from a certified instructor. This can be a help to you in gaining the confidence of couples interested in the program who do not know you. Certification assures partners that they will receive quality teaching, as signified by your having completed the Instructor Certification Process. The certification helps guarantee that they will be taught the same structured COUPLE COMMUNICATION Program wherever it is taught across the country.
  
  
• Certification can be a plus for you in promoting your services to other professionals and for employment purposes.
  
  
• Certified instructors receive support from ICP. Once certified, you receive quantity discounts on Couple Communication materials ordered. Also, you may attend additional workshops for updating purposes, at a discounted rate.

Requirements

Instructors take several steps to complete the COUPLE COMMUNICATION certification process:

1. Attend an instructor training workshop. (The workshop described on this web site fulfills this step and is one very important part of ICP certification for the COUPLE COMMUNICATION program. By itself, however, the workshop is not sufficient for certification.)

2. Study the COUPLE COMMUNICATION Instructor Manual and the workbook, Talking and Listening Together. (We suggest you do some study before the instructor workshop, so you are familiar with the concepts, skills, and coaching process.)

3. Teach 20 couples (using Couple Packet materials) and be evaluated by self (twice during this process) and by the couples you teach. You may teach the couples one couple at a time or teach them in small groups of couples. Or, you may do a combination of working with couples individually as a couple, or in groups. (Along the way, you send your evaluations to ICP for review, to receive our comments and support.)

4. Pass a written exam. This exam is an open-book test based on the information in the COUPLE COMMUNICATION Instructor Manual and the couple workbook, Talking and Listening Together. The exam is designed to help you reflect on and integrate the following:
             Content of the program (skills and frameworks);
             Theoretical assumptions about the program;
             Teaching/learning guidelines for couples;
             Ways of "contracting" with couples.
You may take this exam at any point during your certification process, but we suggest that you request it by the time you have taught your 10th couple. Once you take the exam, you send it to ICP for scoring. ICP will notify you if you have passed the exam or need further study on certain parts.

5. Sign a set of ethical expectations. These include that you will do the following:

• Practice what you teach -- that you use the concepts and skills of COUPLE COMMUNICATION in your own life and relationships. We value congruence.
  
  
• Establish a couple agreement (a "contract") with each couple prior to their first session, so that couples know what they are taking as a course.
  
  
• Teach the program as it is designed and use the Couple-Packet materials with each couple you teach. (This is not a program for which you learn concepts and then integrate some or all of them by bits and pieces into another program. Rather, it is a structured course by itself.) It is permissible to use the entire program as one part of a larger course, as long as the part with COUPLE COMMUNICATION keeps the integrity of the program intact and couples use the Couple Packets.) Couple Packets are only available through ICP directly. For a description of the program and materials, click: www.couplecommunication.com
  
  
• Use the discounts on materials for which you qualify for programs you teach yourself, and agree not to transfer any such discounted materials to anyone else.
  
  
• Wait until you have received written notification before representing yourself as a certified instructor.

ICP supports participants in completing certification and teaching the program.