Erica Wise Honored
as Recipient of the
Fifth Annual APA Ethics Committee Award for
Outstanding
Contributions to Ethics Education
The following is
adapted from the nomination to APA by the North Carolina
Psychological Association:
Erica Wise has been an ethics educator for the past 30
years. She served on the NCPA Ethics Committee
(1982-1988), was a member and chair of the APA Ethics
Committee (1990-1993), a member and chair of the North
Carolina Psychology Board for 10 years (1993-2003), and
co-chair of the NCPA Professional Affairs and Ethics
Committee.
In her role on
the NCPA Ethics Committee she has offered countless individual
consultations on ethical and legal questions and concerns to
NCPA members. This is a very valuable service that often
goes unsung due to the nature of the consultation. NCPA
has received several contributions in Erica’s honor and in
appreciation of her efforts – psychologists who are very
grateful for the service she has done for them.
Erica has made numerous ethics workshop and
continuing education presentations throughout the state over
the past 20+ years. Workshop topics have included ethics and
supervision, ethics and self-care and managing complex ethical
and legal dilemmas in clinical practice. She makes
regular presentations to psychologists at the Duke University
Medical Center for local internship programs at UNC, Duke, and
the Durham VA on a variety of ethical and legal topics.
Her integrative approach to conceptualizing and teaching
ethics has also resulted in several presentations on infusing
multicultural and ethical competencies into the education and
training of professional psychologists.
Social Justice Advocacy:
Erica’s commitment to the integration of ethics and social
justice issues at the local level is also exemplified by her
service as the liaison from Division 31 (SPTA’s) to the
Division 44 public policy committee and by her active
membership on the BEA Working Group on Legislative
Restrictions Affecting Diversity Training in Graduate
Education. In addition, last spring Erica played a key role in
developing the public position that NCPA took in opposition to
the discriminatory “defense of marriage” constitutional
amendment which codifies the discrimination of LGBT citizens
in our state. She was co-author of the influential NCPA
resolution opposing this amendment that was approved by the
NCPA Board and became the model for similar resolutions that
were endorsed by other professional associations throughout
North Carolina. She represented NCPA at a high profile press
conference in Raleigh to speak out about psychology’s
opposition to this amendment. In addition, she took a
leadership role in crafting a joint statement with the NC
Psychiatric Association that was published in newspapers and
promulgated on influential websites.
