The NJ-AIMH is the sole provider of the NJ-AIMH Competencies and Endorsement® system in New Jersey. Grounded in the best practices developed by the Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health, the NJ-AIMH Endorsement represents nearly a decade of efforts to bring to the state a highly-regarded professional credential to Infant Mental Health multidisciplinary professionals in our field. Endorsement has been in effect in NJ since 2014.
What is the IMH-E®?
Endorsement is a process that supports and recognizes the development of professionals who work with or on behalf of infants, toddlers, and their families. This process uses a nationally recognized set of competencies that help define best practice and guides professional growth.
NJ-AIMH Endorsement recognizes and documents the development of infant and family professionals within an organized system of culturally sensitive, relationship-based, infant mental health learning and work experiences. Endorsement by NJ-AIMH verifies that an applicant has attained a level of education as specified, participated in specialized in-service trainings, engaged in professional work related to infants and toddlers, obtained reflective supervision/consultation from mentors or supervisors, and acquired knowledge to promote the delivery of high quality, culturally sensitive, relationship-based services to infants, toddlers, parents, other caregivers and families.
Recognition of NJ-AIMH Endorsement tells employers, parents, health and legal practitioners, and insurance providers that the person endorsed has expertise related to the social and emotional development of infants and young children in families. Of additional importance, the NJ-AIMH Endorsement offers individuals in the infant and family field a professional development plan that focuses on cultural sensitivity, early emotional development, and relationships.
Categories of Endorsement and Requirements
NJ-AIMH endorses professionals from many disciplines at the following four Categories: Infant Family Associate, Infant Family Specialist, Infant Mental Health Specialist, and Infant Mental Health Mentor. Each Category recognizes knowledge, training, and conformance with best practice standards.
Registering & Applying on the EASy System
Register to Apply
- The first step in Endorsement is to register to apply. Go to njaimh.myeasy.org and click on “Register.”
- Registration requires you to provide brief information about your specialized education, work, and reflective supervision/consultation experiences.
- It is strongly recommended that you register using a personal email address (e.g., gmail, yahoo, hotmail, etc). Employer email servers often block messages sent by the EASy system. You will be asked to pay a registration fee of $20.00 via PayPal using a credit card or by check.
- At the time of registration, applicants must have a current membership with NJ-AIMH or another IMH association.
- After you register to apply, you will receive an email from the EASy system within 48 hours with log-in information to begin your application.
Complete Application
- You may then log in, as often as necessary and from any computer with an internet connection, to build your portfolio online.
- If questions come up while using EASy, there is a “Help” button on the top right. Applicants can indicate whether the issue is technical or related to the endorsement process. There are also comment sections on most pages where applicants can ask questions or leave remarks
Submit Application
- Once the application is complete (all sections completed, reference ratings complete, transcripts uploaded by NJ-AIMH), the applicant may hit the Submit button that appears on his/her EASy dashboard. The Endorsement Processing Fee will be paid via PayPal.
Endorsement Exam
For applicants at Category IV, there is the requirement of the Endorsement Exam. The exam consists of two parts – a 60 question multiple-choice test and an essay portion. Category IV-Clinical applicants respond to clinical vignettes, Category IV-Policy applicants respond to a vignette related to policy/advocacy in IMH, and Category IV-Research/Faculty applicants write about presentations or research in IMH.
Broad Topics Covered on the Exam
- Pregnancy, childbirth, and the newborn period.
- Attachment theory and early relationship development.
- Caregiving practices and caregiving behaviors.
- Family, parenting and child care issues.
- Infant and toddler development in all domains: social, emotional, cognitive, language, and physical.
- Temperament and individual differences in infancy and early childhood.
- Indicators of risk, identified disturbance or disorder, as well as capacity, in infancy, early childhood, and early parenthood.
- Infant mental health practice.
- Best practice infant mental health assessment, diagnoses, and treatment approaches.
- Cultural competence.
- Familiarity with standardized screening & assessment tools
- Familiarity with service delivery systems that cater to infants, toddlers, and their families
- Reflective supervisory practice (Category IV – Clinical)
Exam Preparation
For suggestions on resources to read as you prepare for the exam, please see the resource list document below.
Read through the suggested articles, and schedule a time to visit IMH resource centers, including the library at the Center for Autism and Early Childhood Mental Health at Montclair State University.