Delaware Continuing Education Requirements for Mental Health Professionals

Delaware licenses counselors and marriage and family therapists through one board, social workers through a separate board, and psychologists through their own board — all on a biennial cycle, but with genuinely different hour totals and provider rules. If you’re searching for Delaware continuing education requirements, one detail stands out immediately: Delaware’s counseling board takes an unusually hands-off approach to course approval, accepting CE from any recognized national organization regardless of specific content. This guide breaks down Delaware CE requirements for LPCMHs, LCSWs, LMFTs, and psychologists, along with renewal logistics, approved providers, and state-specific details worth knowing before your next renewal.

Delaware Continuing Education Requirements

Delaware licenses counselors and marriage and family therapists through one board, social workers through a separate board, and psychologists through their own board, all on a biennial cycle (Delaware Division of Professional Regulation, n.d.).

License Type	CE Requirements	Renewal / Special Requirements	Official Licensing Board
Licensed Professional Counselor of Mental Health (LPCMH)	40 CE hours every 2 years	Minimum 3 hours ethics, 3 hours cultural inclusion/equity/diversity. Renewal cycle runs October 1 – September 30 of even-numbered years. Associate-level licenses (LACMH) are not required to complete CE.	Delaware Board of Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Professionals
Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW)	40 CE hours every 2 years	Minimum 1 hour mandatory reporting. LBSW requires 20 hours and LMSW requires 30 hours on the same biennial cycle.	Delaware Board of Social Work Examiners
Licensed Marriage & Family Therapist (LMFT)	40 CE hours every 2 years	Minimum 3 hours ethics. Same board and cycle as LPCMH.	Delaware Board of Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Professionals
Licensed Psychologist (PhD / PsyD)	40 CE hours every 2 years	Minimum 3 hours ethics, 3 hours equity/diversity/inclusion. At least 10 hours must be face-to-face or live webinar. Biennial cycle runs August 1 of odd-numbered years.	Delaware Board of Examiners of Psychologists

Clinical Note: Delaware’s social work board sets a different total for each social work license level (20/30/40 hours for LBSW/LMSW/LCSW) even though they share a biennial cycle — don’t assume your CE total matches a colleague’s just because your renewal dates line up. Delaware’s counseling board also takes a distinctive hands-off approach to course approval, discussed further below — a structure that puts real weight on clinicians choosing genuinely relevant CE rather than defaulting to whatever’s easiest to complete (Brockett & Bauer, 1998).

Delaware License Renewal Requirements

Renewal fees, deadlines, and documentation rules differ across Delaware’s three boards, though all are processed through the state’s DELPROS online portal.

LPCMH License Renewal

Administered by the Delaware Board of Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Professionals. LPCMH licenses expire September 30 of even-numbered years, with a renewal fee of $172. A late fee applies if renewal is missed — the Board’s published late-fee policy is 50% of the standard renewal fee. CE documentation doesn’t need to be submitted with your renewal application, but must be kept on file for at least 5 years.

LCSW License Renewal

Administered by the separate Delaware Board of Social Work Examiners. Social work licenses expire January 31 of odd-numbered years — a different deadline than LPCMH/LMFT’s September 30 even-year cycle. Late renewal is possible within one year of expiration with an added late fee; after one year, the license terminates and you must reapply as a new applicant.

LMFT License Renewal

Administered by the same Delaware Board of Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Professionals as LPCMH, with the same $172 renewal fee, September 30 even-year expiration, and 5-year CE documentation retention requirement.

Psychologist License Renewal

Administered by the separate Delaware Board of Examiners of Psychologists. Licenses expire July 31 of odd-numbered years. As of December 11, 2024, inactive status for psychologist licenses is no longer renewable.

Delaware Approved CE Providers

Whether you’re looking for Delaware online continuing education or in-person Delaware continuing education courses, Delaware’s counseling board takes a notably broad approach to what counts:

Accreditor / Association	Who It’s For	Recognized For
National Board for Certified Counselors (NBCC)	LPCMHs	Pre-approved by name in Delaware’s counseling board regulations
Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) / NASW	LCSWs, LMSWs, LBSWs	Accepted for social work CE at every license level
American Psychological Association (APA)	Licensed Psychologists	Pre-approved by name for both counseling board licensees and psychologists
American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT)	LMFTs	Pre-approved by name in Delaware’s counseling board regulations
Delaware Psychological Association	Licensed Psychologists	State-level CE and advocacy for Delaware psychologists
NASW Delaware Chapter	LCSWs, LMSWs, LBSWs	State-level CE and professional development for Delaware social workers

Here’s the detail that sets Delaware apart: the Board of Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Professionals’ own regulations state that CE hours approved by a recognized national mental health or substance abuse organization — including NBCC, AAMFT, IFTA, NAADAC, the Delaware Certification Board, NASW, the Art Therapy Credentials Board, or APA — are acceptable regardless of specific course content, and do not require separate Board review or approval. This is meaningfully more permissive than most states, which typically require content to align with specific mandated categories even when the provider is nationally recognized. For a broader look at how CE approval works across all license types and states, see our full guide to continuing education for mental health professionals.

Delaware-Specific Considerations

A few details worth knowing beyond the base CE requirements:

Interstate Compact Status

Delaware has enacted the Counseling Compact for LPCMHs and is a PSYPACT member state for psychologists — clinicians holding PSYPACT authority can practice telepsychology with Delaware clients without a separate Delaware license. Delaware is not currently part of the Social Work Licensure Compact; social workers relying on an out-of-state or ASWB-based credential cannot use it to treat Delaware clients and need a direct Delaware license. There is no compact yet for LMFTs nationally.

Broad National-Provider Acceptance for Counseling CE

Delaware’s approach of accepting any content from a recognized national organization — without requiring the Board to separately review course content — gives LPCMHs and LMFTs real flexibility, but it also means the responsibility for choosing genuinely relevant, practice-improving CE falls more heavily on the individual clinician than in states with stricter content mandates.

Psychologist Inactive Status Was Recently Eliminated

As of December 11, 2024, Delaware psychologists can no longer renew a license on inactive status — a real change from prior practice. If you were planning to use inactive status as a way to pause CE obligations temporarily, confirm your options directly with the Board of Examiners of Psychologists, since that path may no longer be available.

New Licensee vs. Renewing Licensee

A few distinctions worth knowing depending on where you are in your Delaware licensure timeline:

• Associate Licensed Counselors of Mental Health (LACMH) have no CE requirement at all, and can only renew their associate license twice — meaning the LACMH phase of a Delaware counseling career spans a maximum of six years before a clinician must transition to full LPCMH licensure.
• New licensees completing an initial licensure period of less than 2 years follow a separate, prorated CE structure under Delaware’s regulations (12.2.1.1 through 12.2.1.4) rather than owing the full 40-hour total.
• Supervisors overseeing LACMH or Associate MFT candidates take on real responsibility during that supervised period, and having a clear clinical supervision agreement in place from the outset helps define expectations for both parties, including separate general and direct supervision plans as Delaware’s application process requires.

CE Tracker Templates for Mental Health Professionals

Even with a clear picture of your state’s requirements, actually staying on top of continuing education across a full renewal cycle is a different challenge — tracking which hours you’ve completed, which mandated categories still need attention, where you’ve saved your certificates, and when your actual deadline hits. A CE tracker template solves this by giving you one place to log activities as you complete them, monitor progress against your specific requirements, and pull everything together when it’s time to submit your renewal — rather than reconstructing two years of CE history in a panic the week before your license expires.

Get started with the free CE Tracker Template to organize your current renewal cycle, or manage your complete CE renewal process from planning through submission with this comprehensive CE Tracker Template (pictured above).

Final Thoughts on Delaware CE Requirements

Delaware’s structure is genuinely more permissive than most states in one specific way — the broad, content-agnostic acceptance of CE from recognized national organizations for LPCMHs and LMFTs — while still holding firm on specific mandated categories like ethics and cultural inclusion. That combination rewards clinicians who take real ownership of their professional development rather than simply hitting a required hour count.

The recent elimination of inactive status for psychologists is also a good reminder that even well-established administrative options can change — confirming your specific board’s current policies periodically, rather than relying on what was true a renewal cycle or two ago, is worth the few minutes it takes. Clinicians who treat their continuing education and licensure landscape as an ongoing practice, rather than a once-every-two-years scramble, tend to navigate changes like this with far less disruption (Neimeyer & Taylor, 2010).

References

• Delaware Division of Professional Regulation. (n.d.). Board of Mental Health and Chemical Dependency Professionals. Resource
• Delaware Division of Professional Regulation. (n.d.). Fee schedule. Resource
• Delaware Division of Professional Regulation. (n.d.). Board of Social Work Examiners. Resource
• Delaware Division of Professional Regulation. (n.d.). Psychology license renewal. Resource
• Delaware Division of Professional Regulation. (n.d.). Mental health & chemical dependency service requests. Resource
• Brockett, M., & Bauer, M. (1998). Continuing professional education: Responsibilities and possibilities. Journal of Continuing Education in the Health Professions, 18(4), 235–243. Resource
• Neimeyer, G. J., & Taylor, J. M. (2010). Continuing education in psychology. In J. C. Norcross, G. R. VandenBos, & D. K. Freedheim (Eds.), History of psychotherapy: Continuity and change (2nd ed., pp. 663–671). American Psychological Association.