Substance Abuse Counselor Requirements in Indiana: Credentials, Hours and Exams

Indiana licenses addiction counselors at four rungs, two bachelor's-level and two master's-level, and protects practice for compensation, not just the title; a knowing violation after July 1, 2010 is a Class A misdemeanor.

The ban does not apply to a person who does not use a title specified in this article and is one of the following: students, interns and trainees; licensed or certified health care professionals acting within scope with addiction-counseling training; nonresidents within the five-day-a-month and fifteen-day-a-year limits; clergy, who may practise for compensation as pastoral addiction counselors; charitable, religious or educational organization employees and volunteers; school counselors; governmental employees in the same job classification; court alcohol and drug program employees; and probation officers.

A settings carve-out lets unlicensed people counsel in DMHA-certified agencies, licensed hospitals and health facilities, home health agencies, community health centers, Department of Correction institutions and community mental health centers if they meet a DMHA-approved credentialing agency's requirements and do not profess to be a licensed addiction therapist or a licensed addiction counselor.

ICAADA is the separate private IC&RC member board.

The LAC track starts with a baccalaureate or higher degree in addiction counseling or a related area as determined by the board, plus course work across the statute's content areas — addictions theory, psychoactive drugs, addictions counseling skills, ethics and others, which may be combined into a single college-level course — and a supervised practicum in an addiction counseling setting.

The LCAC track requires a master's or doctor's degree, graduate course work such as psychopharmacology and psychopathology, and a supervised clinical practicum of seven hundred (700) hours including 280 face-to-face client contact hours and 35 hours of supervision from a qualified supervisor.

An applicant who already completed a clinical practicum for another licence under this article does not repeat those hours, and a master's-level applicant whose degree did not emphasize addiction counseling may take the course work from an institution accredited by CACREP, COAMFTE, the American Psychological Association's Commission on Accreditation, CSWE or NASAC, recognized by NAADAC or IC&RC, or approved by the board as substantially equivalent (10.5-4(b)).

Both full licences ask for at least two (2) years of experience, and the statute defines what counts as experience: time during which at least fifty percent (50%) of your time consists of providing addiction counseling services directly to clients diagnosed with a substance use disorder.

The LAC needs 150 supervision hours inside those two years — 100 individual, 50 group; the LCAC needs 200 — 100 individual and up to 100 group.

If the experience is earned in Indiana, it must be earned while licensed as an associate or while the one-year associate temporary permit is unexpired, so plan an associate licence or the temporary permit before your first counted day; hours accumulated after associate licensure do not expire, and hours accumulated under the temporary permit count until it expires.

Up to one hundred percent (100%) of the supervision may be virtual.

A doctoral internship or a supervised master's-level practicum, internship or field experience may be applied toward the LAC requirement; for the LCAC, only a doctoral internship qualifies.

Each of the four licences requires the applicant to pass an examination established by the board; the statute does not name the exam, and the board's exam pages were not among the sources read.

Students do not have to wait for the degree: someone enrolled in the last term of the last year of a qualifying program may take the associate-level exam after providing a director's letter of good standing.

The one-year associate temporary permit expires without regard to the number of times the holder passes or fails the required examination, so failed attempts do not extend it.

The board may also waive the exam: an LAC applicant needs an out-of-state addiction counselor licence or certificate with a substantially equivalent exam, practice in at least three (3) of the previous five (5) years, an Indiana law-and-rules exam, no violation or pending investigation, and otherwise qualification under sections 1, 3, 5 and 7 of the chapter; the LCAC version (11(b)) drops the three-of-five-years condition, tests on the addiction-therapy laws instead, and requires qualification under sections 2, 4, 6 and 8.

For both licences the supervision must come from a qualified supervisor as determined by the board — the statute defers the criteria to board rules that were not among the sources read, so verify a proposed supervisor's qualification with the board before counting hours under them.

Virtual supervision qualifies only if it runs on an electronic platform with synchronous visual and audio interaction in real time and is HIPAA-compliant.

The experience itself may be performed at or away from the supervisor's premises, but except as provided in the virtual-supervision subsection the work may not be performed away from the qualified supervisor's premises when it is the independent private practice of addiction counseling at a place without qualified supervision — the up-to-100-percent virtual allowance is the carve-out that keeps properly supervised virtual work countable.

The tier split runs straight through diagnosis.

The LCAC's practice definition includes providing a mental health diagnosis and using counseling and psychotherapeutic techniques in settings that include private practice.

The LAC's does not, and private practice is recognized only for licensees who obtained the LAC through the pre-July 1, 2010 grandfather route, in consultation with other licensed professionals as required by the client's individualized treatment plan.

Chapter 11 adds a second gate even for the LCAC: an individual licensed under the article may not make a mental health diagnosis without at least sixty (60) clock hours of graduate study in mental health diagnosis, DSM and ICD training, at least 1,000 hours of supervised practice by an appropriately licensed supervisor, as determined by the board, and the licence itself.

Every licensee may provide factual testimony but may not provide expert testimony.

The board shall issue a licence not more than thirty (30) days after a completed application to a counselor who holds a valid licence or certificate in another state or jurisdiction, passed an examination substantially equivalent to the level requested, has no pending discipline elsewhere and pays the fee.

The board may also issue a temporary permit to out-of-state licensees who have applied, counselors practising in a state that does not license addiction counselors or therapists, certified by a national association the board approves, and who have also applied, and exam-approved graduates who have completed any experience requirement; it expires at the earliest of licence issuance, board disapproval or one hundred eighty (180) days, renewable only for a scheduled holder who misses the next exam with good cause.

Nonresidents authorized in their home state may practise up to five days in any one month or fifteen days in any one calendar year.

IC&RC reciprocity runs between member boards, and Indiana's member is ICAADA, not the licensing board, so an IC&RC transfer yields an ICAADA credential, not the state licence.

An associate licence may be renewed two (2) times, on payment of the renewal fee and completion of at least twenty (20) hours of continuing education each licensure year, and the board may renew it for additional periods based on circumstances it determines.

For the full LAC and LCAC the statute ties validity to the renewal period in effect on the date the licence was issued, subject to IC 25-1-2-6(e), but it states no CE figure: that sits in board rules (839 IAC) that were not among the sources read, so the CE hours for a full licence are not stated in the sources read, and the length of the IC 25-1-2-6 renewal period was not read either — confirm both with the board before planning a renewal-year budget.

The code's history lines show IC 25-23.6-10.5-7 and 10.5-8, the two supervised-experience sections, amended by P.L.83-2024 and P.L.130-2025, and the exam section 10.5-9 amended by P.L.83-2024.

The research records the amendments without describing what changed, and guides written before 2024 may quote superseded text, so check the current sections before relying on an older summary.

The current text carries the provisions this page cites: the 100 percent virtual-supervision allowance, the no-expiry rule for associate-earned hours, and the good-standing letter contents for last-term exam takers.