Interested in serving the profession? Enjoy thinking broadly about rules and processes and how to make things work effectively? Willing to make difficult, high-stakes decisions in order to ensure that the public is protected from incompetent or unethical behavior from psychologists? Tolerant of paperwork and meetings? Interested in connecting with colleagues you might not otherwise meet? You should consider applying to serve on the Iowa Board of Psychology! (It occurs to me that I’ve made Board service sound really dry – it’s actually not, it feels more like a group of passionate people getting together to talk about how to ensure that Iowans have access to high-quality, effective care from psychologists.)

My favorite part of serving on the Iowa Board of Psychology has been the opportunity to develop a broader understanding of how the profession functions. The Board is charged with regulating the practice of psychology in the state, which includes establishing rules around licensure and granting licenses, establishing rules that govern the practice of psychology and expectations around standard of care, and reviewing complaints filed against psychologists. The central guiding principle of the board is the protection of the public by promoting ethical, competent practice by psychologists.

In July 2020, a movie debuted on Netflix (originally scheduled for a theatrical release, but COVID required changes to be made to the plan) to generally positive reviews. The Outpost is a somewhat classic war movie: gritty American Soldiers fight against all odds to defeat the enemy. Based on a true story, what made this movie different for me is that it was a story with which I was intimately familiar.

In June of 2009, I was deployed to Afghanistan in support of an Army infantry brigade, the 4^th Brigade Combat Team of the 4^th Infantry Division. I had been licensed for 5 months, 6 months post-internship, and was responsible for the mental health of 3,600+ Soldiers who were spread out over 15 locations in four provinces of Afghanistan. From the beginning, it was a challenging rotation. Our area of operations was extremely active with troops in contact (engaged by the enemy) daily. I had a home forward operating base (FOB), but spent nearly every day moving between all of the various FOBs and outposts that our brigade occupied either by helicopter or convoy. In the first months of the deployment, we had suffered many losses, including Soldiers killed in action (KIA) or catastrophically wounded. A big part of my job was to meet with groups of Soldiers following traumatic events to initiate a protocol for Traumatic Event Management (the Army’s spin on critical incident stress debriefing).