Social Work Licensure in Tennessee: LCSW Requirements, Hours and Exams

The board issues four licenses, and the initials matter: L.B.S.W., L.M.S.W., L.A.P.S.W. (advanced practice social worker) and L.C.S.W.

The LMSW is a full license in its own right, but it is also the rung the statute routes clinical applicants through — the LCSW experience clock runs while you hold it.

The LAPSW sits at the same graduate level but its experience requirement is explicitly nonclinical, so it is not a stepping stone to clinical work.

Alongside the four licenses, rule .04(6) provides a temporary license for applicants from programs that had applied for, but not yet received, CSWE accreditation.

Every license above the baccalaureate level rests on graduate social work education, and the rule fixes the accreditation checkpoint at the moment you graduated: the institution must have been accredited by the Council on Social Work Education at the time the degree was granted.

For an LCSW applicant the statute repeats the requirement as a master's degree from a CSWE-approved program or a doctorate or Ph.D. in social work.

If you graduated from a program that was still a candidate for accreditation, rule .04(6)'s temporary license is the only route the rules read provide — and it carries its own deadlines.

For the examination route, rule .04(4)(a)7 requires proof that the applicant has practiced for not less than two years after the date of application as a licensed master's social worker, or a temporarily licensed master's social worker, under the supervision of a licensed clinical social worker.

That two-year minimum and the 3,000 hours of clinical experience both run inside a single window of not less than two and not more than eight years from the date the application is received.

The license itself comes before the clock starts: rule .04(4)(a)7(i) requires the master's license to be obtained prior to filing and maintained in active status until the LCSW is issued, and rule .08(1)(d) requires a supervisor to be secured before any hours accumulate.

Each of the four licenses names its own ASWB examination in rule .04: the bachelor's licensing examination for the LBSW, the master's licensing examination for the LMSW, the advanced generalist licensing examination for the LAPSW, and the clinical licensing examination for the LCSW, which the statute restates as its own requirement.

The choice of exam is therefore not free — you take the one attached to the license you are seeking.

Reciprocity applicants should note rule .04(5) also requires proof that the person has not previously failed the examination required by the board.

The 100 supervisor contact hours sit on top of the 3,000, at approximately one supervision hour to every thirty clinical experience hours, spread throughout the experience.

At least 60 of the 100 must be individual supervision; no more than 40 may be group supervision with no more than four supervisees; and no more than 75 percent of individual supervision may come through teleconferencing or video conferencing.

Supervision may never take place via email, instant messaging, texting or any format without visual contact.

The supervisor must be an L.C.S.W. continuously licensed for no less than three years before supervision begins, documented with the supervisee's application, and from January 1, 2023 supervisors must document twelve cumulative CE hours in supervision, three of them on Tennessee licensing rules.

An LAPSW supervisor mirrors this: an active LAPSW of three years' standing.

Tennessee separates the two graduate practice lines by the kind of experience each requires.

The LAPSW's 3,000 hours are nonclinical advanced practice experience, supervised by either an LCSW or an LAPSW, and the license does not carry the clinical scope the LCSW does.

The LCSW's 3,000 hours are clinical experience under an LCSW.

The two hour-skeletons are otherwise identical — the same 3,000 hours, the same two-to-eight-year window, the same 100 contact hours — so the difference is what the hours consist of, not how many they are.

Rule .04(5), Licensure by Reciprocity, is open at all four levels, and its checklist is specific: a letter of good standing from the other state's board showing the license is active or when it became inactive, proof that the person has not previously failed the examination required by the board, copies of the original license and current renewal certificate, and the residency or employment condition quoted above.

An applicant who does not qualify for reciprocity must apply for licensure by examination instead.

For out-of-state LCSW applicants the statute has a second bridge, and it is the exception to the examination route's timing: their two years under someone whose qualifications meet or exceed Tennessee's LCSW requirements are worked prior to the date of application.

Rule .08(7) adds a condition on that supervisor: they must have passed the ASWB clinical examination or advanced generalist examination, and if the supervisor is not licensed, or the state has no provision for licensure, the prerequisite supervision must come from an L.C.S.W. or L.A.P.S.W. licensed in Tennessee.

Tennessee enacted the Social Work Licensure Compact in 2024; the Justia copy of the code records its history as Acts 2024, ch. 1041, § 1.

Enactment is not operation.

The commission's home page, read on 2026-09-24, states that multistate licenses are not yet being issued, and it lists Tennessee among its member jurisdictions.

The commission estimates its data system will be complete in spring 2027, so an LCSW licensed in Tennessee cannot yet practice in another member state on compact privilege and must use endorsement instead.

Renewal is biennial and falls in your birth month.

The CE loads are tiered in rule .09: eighteen hours per two calendar years for the LBSW, twenty-four for the LMSW, and thirty for the LAPSW and LCSW.

Each tier must include at least six hours in social work ethics and one hour specific to T.C.A. §§63-23-101 et seq. and the board's rules.

A licensee holding more than one category must satisfy each separately, though ethics and rules hours may count across categories.

Since January 1, 2020, every active licensee must also complete a minimum two-hour board-approved suicide-prevention training at least once every four years under the Kenneth and Madge Tullis, MD, Suicide Prevention Training Act.

Two dated changes sit inside the last few years.

From January 1, 2023, supervisors must document twelve cumulative hours of continuing education in the provision of supervision, three of them covering Tennessee licensing rules, before or during their first year supervising.

In 2024 the General Assembly enacted the Social Work Licensure Compact.

One caveat governs the rest: the rule text read for this page is Cornell LII's copy of chapter 1365-01 as amended effective March 2, 2022, so any 2023–2026 amendments to those rules are not reflected here — the research section lists this among what it does not establish.

Rule .04(6) writes a narrow lane for graduates of programs that had applied for CSWE accreditation but not yet received it: a temporary licensed baccalaureate social worker or temporary licensed master's social worker license, available only after passing the ASWB bachelor's or master's examination.

The temporary license ends if accreditation is denied or withdrawn, and a temporary licensee must submit a regular application within sixty days after the educational institution receives accreditation.

The clause quoted above has real consequences for clinical applicants: hours toward the LCSW or LAPSW cannot begin until the temporary license is in hand.