How to Become a Substance Abuse Counselor

Video Transcript

"Hi, my name is Stacie Royer, and I'm a career specialist from Austin, Texas. I'm going to talk to you today about becoming a substance abuse counselor. This is a very emotionally and stressful job, but it's also very rewarding, so you'll want to take up some positive activities such as yoga or running or something like that to stay positive in your own mind. What you'll want to do is study sociology or psychology while you're at your four-year university. From that point, you'll want to start by volunteering at other substance abuse centers or addiction treatment centers to gain the knowledge and experience that you'll need, and to also see how other counselors work with the -- excuse me -- work with the patients or clients at that point in time. Then you'll...then you'll want to start working or talking to the Certification Board of Addiction Professionals about becoming certified. Once you have received the necessary information and fulfilled the necessary requirements, then you can sit for the state exam and take that. And once you pass it, then you can start practicing."