Dr. S. Kent Butler Begins Term as 70th President of the American Counseling Association

S. Kent Butler is a Professor of Counselor Education and the Interim Chief Equity, Inclusion and Diversity Officer at the University of Central Florida. A licensed professional counselor (LPC), Nationally Certified Counselor (NCC), and Nationally Certified School Counselor (NCSC), Dr. Butler will begin serving as the American Counseling Association’s 70th president on July 1, 2021, after serving as ACA President-Elect for the last year.

An ACA member and fellow, Dr. Butler was selected as a 2020 Chief Diversity Officer Fellow within the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education (NADOHE). Throughout his academic career, his research has focused on how to effectively enrich the lives of all people through the preparation of highly qualified, culturally competent helping professionals.

On the national level, Dr. Butler has served as the 2011 – 2012 President of the Association for Multicultural Counseling and Development (AMCD) and was honored to be a member of AMCD’s Multicultural Counseling Competencies Revisions Committee (2014 – 2015), which produced the ACAAMCD endorsed Multicultural Social Justice Counseling Competencies (MSJCC).

In April of 2016, Dr. Butler was bestowed with the prestigious ACA Fellow Award and served as an ACA Governing Council representative from 2015 to 2018. His research and academic interests lie in the areas of multicultural and international counseling, social justice, mentoring, group counseling, school counseling, multicultural supervision, and counseling work with African American males.

Dr. Butler is a member of several national and regional organizations including the Association for Multicultural Counseling and Development (AMCD), Multicultural and Social Justice Counseling Competencies (MSJCC) Committee, the Association for Counselor Education and Supervision (ACES), the Association for Spiritual, Ethical and Religious Values in Counseling (ASERVIC), and Counselors for Social Justice (CSJ). He is also founder and co-chairperson of the AMCD Writer’s Consortium.

He holds a doctorate in Educational Psychology with a concentration in Counseling Psychology from the University of Connecticut and has worked as an educator at the University of Central Florida, the College of William & Mary, and the University of Missouri – St. Louis.