By Gretchen Kell, Greater Good Magazine, February 17, 2023
There’s a resurgence in psychedelics, banned in the U.S. since 1970 by the federal Controlled Substances Act. That law, signed by then-President Richard Nixon, halted what had been promising research into the drugs’ therapeutic and medicinal potential. Today, psychedelics have been shown in recent, approved clinical trials to alleviate mental distress, even addiction. As a result, efforts to legalize their use also are on the rise.
Last fall, 24 people in a first-of-its-kind training program at the year-old UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics began learning to safely guide patients’ psychedelic experiences in therapeutic and research settings. The group of advanced professionals chosen for the nine-month, 175-hour program includes doctors, nurses, social workers, psychologists, chaplains, and others.
Tina Trujillo, an associate professor in the Berkeley Graduate School of Education, helped launch and serves as faculty director of the Certificate Program in Psychedelic Facilitation. She said cohort members “want to be ready to do this work safely and ethically in legal spaces” in states where voters or legislatures are working to enact measures—like Oregon’s Measure 109, approved in 2020—to allow the supervised administration of psilocybin, the “magic” in magic mushrooms, at licensed centers, or where opportunities exist in research studies and ketamine-assisted therapy clinics.
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