{"id":6331,"date":"2016-05-10T19:46:45","date_gmt":"2016-05-11T00:46:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/?p=6331"},"modified":"2025-05-15T12:21:56","modified_gmt":"2025-05-15T17:21:56","slug":"decriminalizing-mental-illness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/","title":{"rendered":"Access to mental health care critical for all"},"content":{"rendered":"<section class=\"clearfix\"><p>In response to the HB1840\/SB 1556 bill recently signed into law as part of legislation known as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), I sent a letter to the Governor of Tennessee on behalf of The Chicago School community to express my thoughts on the likely impact of this legislation on access to mental health care for members of his community and, additionally, on the dialogue now occurring within the professional community as a result of this action. The passage of this bill would prevent the American Counseling Association from disciplining applicants\/licensees in the state of Tennessee who violate section A.11.b of the Code and refuse to treat patients based upon their own belief systems.<\/p>\n<p>At The Chicago School we embrace and value inclusion and diversity in our education and training model. In our classrooms, we set the standard for our graduates who will ultimately serve our communities as providers or change agents. This legislative action provided us with the opportunity to dialogue about the impact of such legislation and the diversity of opinions surrounding such actions.<\/p>\n<\/section>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In response to the HB1840\/SB 1556 bill recently signed into law as part of legislation known as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), I sent a letter to the Governor of Tennessee on behalf of The Chicago School community to express my thoughts on the likely impact of this legislation on access to mental health care for members of his community and, additionally, on the dialogue now occurring within the professional community as a result of this action. The passage [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[198],"tags":[224,223,225,226,227],"coauthors":[1051],"class_list":["post-6331","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-hb1840sb-1556","tag-mental-health","tag-religion","tag-religious-freedom-restoration-act","tag-rfra"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Access to mental health care critical for all - Insight Digital Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Exploring policies and solutions to shift mental health treatment away from the criminal justice system.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Access to mental health care critical for all - 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Insight Digital Magazine","description":"Exploring policies and solutions to shift mental health treatment away from the criminal justice system.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Access to mental health care critical for all - Insight Digital Magazine","og_description":"Exploring policies and solutions to shift mental health treatment away from the criminal justice system.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/","og_site_name":"Insight Digital Magazine","article_published_time":"2016-05-11T00:46:45+00:00","article_modified_time":"2025-05-15T17:21:56+00:00","author":"The Chicago School","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"The Chicago School","Est. reading time":"1 minute"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/"},"author":{"name":"The Chicago School","@id":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/#\/schema\/person\/787367bbb0760a531451d62e2574ae37"},"headline":"Access to mental health care critical for all","datePublished":"2016-05-11T00:46:45+00:00","dateModified":"2025-05-15T17:21:56+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/"},"wordCount":187,"keywords":["HB1840\/SB 1556","mental health","religion","religious freedom restoration act","RFRA"],"articleSection":["News"],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/","url":"https:\/\/www.thechicagoschool.edu\/insight\/news\/decriminalizing-mental-illness\/","name":"Access to mental health care critical for all - 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