Pacifica Graduate Institute

Pacifica Graduate Institute is a private for-profit graduate school with two campuses near Santa Barbara, California. The institute offers masters and doctoral degrees in the fields of clinical psychology, counseling, mythological studies, depth psychology, and the humanities. The institute is accredited by the WASC Senior College and University Commission. History Pacifica Graduate Institute dates its life as an educational institution from the 1976 inauguration of a nine-month para-professional Counseling Skills Certificate program offered by the Human Relations Center. The institute's original name was the Human Relations Institute. The M.A. in Counseling Psychology was initiated in 1982. In 1984 the institute announced a new M.A. Counseling Psychology program with an emphasis in depth psychology. The program was launched in 1984 by Stan Passy, who drew on his doctoral work in archetypal psychology with James Hillman at the University of Dallas. Faculty and visiting lecturers have included Marion Woodman, Thomas Moore, Robert A. Johnson, and Marija Gimbutas. In 1996, Dr. Stephen Aizenstat was named Founding President and Gary Linker was the Vice President when the Santa Barbara Graduate School Inc. was formed as a private corporation. The name of the school was changed to the Pacifica Graduate Institute in 1989.