Multiple Roles Policy | 2026-27 Academic Catalog

A culture of conviviality embraces and encourages multiple roles within relationships. In our relationships, an awareness of difference in the spheres of power and vulnerability is essential to sustaining conviviality. Meridian strives for a culture of conviviality that is contingent on conducting ourselves non-exploitatively in our relationships with one another.Multiple role issues arising from our overlapping social engagements are an ongoing aspect of the Meridian community (such as knowing one another - or friends of others - from contexts other than Meridian). However, certain multiple role situations can engender complications that require necessary boundaries on some activities.While transformative learning is not psychotherapy, like therapy, transformative learning - in all of Meridian’s programs - depends on the careful and protected relation between students and their student colleagues, and between students, staff, and faculty. In consideration of this, Meridian seeks to maintain optimal conditions for transformative learning by specifying limitations to potential social and financial engagements between students, and between students and faculty, as follows:

Between Students

Students may not become psychotherapy clients, supervisors, supervisees, employers, and/or employees of current Meridian students.
Students may not solicit, charge, or accept a fee to or from other students for any services or products (e .g ., coaching, bodywork, editing papers, selling greeting cards, technology support, business coaching, etc .).

Between Students and Faculty

Faculty and/or their psychotherapy interns may not accept current students as their private practice or agency clients. Note however, that faculty and doctoral students' engagement in research projects together with the aim of joint publication and presentations at conferences is an important area for collaboration between student and faculty.
While faculty may be employed by the same agency or business as a student and at times may even serve as the student’s direct supervisor (such as in a counseling agency for the Psychology program or a business for the MBA program), faculty may not directly employ students for their own business (including employment of Psychology students as psychological assistants.
Conversely, faculty may not be employed by students, including employment as an independent contractor.
Faculty may not make personal or professional solicitations of their clinical work, their business or organizational consulting services (or any other professional work), nor advertise their non-school activities, to students.
Faculty are asked to exercise their best judgment as to the appropriateness of attending specific social occasions with students, each of which is context-specific. Faculty make these discernments, as appropriate. However, conducting a social friendship and/or romantic relationship with a student is prohibited.

In summary, Meridian policy prohibits faculty and staff from entering into sexual, client-therapist, employment, financial, friendship, and private supervisory relationships withstudents. The term students includes both coursework and continuation students. (Note that staff are only minimally mentioned in the above but must follow the same requirements as faculty; staff also have additional required boundaries that are specified in Meridian staff publications).It is important to note a way in which faculty and doctoral students are indeed encouraged to develop collaboration through engagement in research projects, with the aim of joint publication and presentations at conferences.

Sale of Goods and/or Services

Students may not sell goods and/or services to other students either online or at in-personWeekends/Weeks, and are not permitted to use other students’ names, addresses, and/or email addresses for solicitation purposes. In certain instances, however, students may promote their products and/or services on a limited basis. In order to do this, the student must first receive approval for this promotion from the Student Development Committee. (Please also see Meridian’s Multiple Role policy, directly prior).