When our background education and training are standardized it will really
help make the case that IBCLCs are health care professionals .  As I have
written many times, it is one's professional training that confers the
privilege of calling oneself a professional.  Professionals invest time and
money in education, they support and join professional organization, and
they stay current with the research in their fields.  I am primarily
self-trained because that was the only avenue open to me when I began, but I
look forward to the day when LCs are educated in a consistent manner, with
an agreed-upon curriculum that prepares everyone to minimum standards.  The
IBLCE exam would then become the equivalent of Boards, and we'd be able to
assure consumers that certain standards were in place.  There will always be
individuals who, even with training and education, are average in their
skills, and others who will see it as a calling and will go the extra mile
in every way.  But it is going to continue to be difficult to convince the
other professions that we are one until we have standardized education.

This gives me an opportunity to say something to people who are not members
of our professional organization (ILCA):  By withholding that support, you
slow down the movement towards these reforms that will benefit us all.

By the way, I am not an ILCA officer, just a member.

Barbara Wilson-Clay BSEd, IBCLC
Austin Lactation Associates
http://www.lactnews.com

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