John A. Mince, Ph.D.

Adjunct Professor of Marriage and Family Therapy

Marriage and Family Therapy

Dr. Mince received his bachelors degree from the S.U.N.Y. at Stony Brook in 1967 in Music; completed his Masters Degree in Counselor Education from Long Island University in 1970; he then took a number of ongoing training courses in New York City under the aegis of Group Relations Ongoing Workshops. There he trained in: Psychodrama with Hanah Weiner and Phillip Walls; Gestalt therapy with Lenore Hecht; Family Reconstruction in Group Process and Family Sculpting with Ruth Ann Pippinger; and Race Relations with Muhammed Sahaludeen.

In the early 1970's Dr. Mince co-chaired the first Long Island Conference on Group Counseling under the aegis of Western Suffolk Counselor’s Association. During this same period he presented sensitivitiy training and group counseling workshops at the New York State Counselors Conference. In 1971 he became a consultant to the Brookhaven Town Narcotics Guidance Council and became Director of the Moriches Substance Abuse Counseling Center. In 1973 while continuing his work in the schools and undertaking his doctoral studies, he became a consultant for the Y.M.C.A. Outreach Family Services in Coram, NY.

In 1980 Dr. Mince was awarded his Ph.D. in Counselor Education from St. John’s University School of Education and Human Services. He completed a year-long, post doctoral Externship in Structural/Strategic Family Therapy at Family Studies Center, Inc. where he studied with Stanley Siegel, then Director of Education and Training at the Ackerman Institute. Following training he was hired by Family Studies Center as a family therapist and trainer. During this period from 1983-1990 he participated in workshops and trainings by the following: Peggy Papp, Bradford Keeney, Carlos Sluzki, Janine Roberts, and Luigi Boscolo. The training with Dr. Boscolo ran intermittently over four years and was very influential.

As a trainer at Family Studies Center, Dr. Mince ran numerous ongoing training groups and workshops of special interests. He also participated for years in an ongoing staff training utilizing one-way mirror, video taping, and creative team strategies. The team experimented with straight strategic, paradoxical, complex division, and reflecting team work throughout this period. In 1984 Dr. Mince presented this work with Winifred Jolly at the University of Massachusetts Annual Family Therapy Conference.

Dr. Mince was trained in 1985 by Dr. John Haynes, then President of the Academy of Family Mediators. He was hired by Dr. Haynes and became a consultant of Haynes Mediation Associates. He completed many divorce mediations throughout the next several years, writing up numerous Memoranda of Understanding. He was also trained in the Utilization Approach to Hypnosis by Philip Hill, M.D. of Cambridge, MA., taking several extended trainings with Dr. Hill.

In the latter 1990's Dr. Mince became a consultant for the New York State Teacher Mentor Program through which he ran workshops in school districts throughout Long Island. Presently he is a trainer for MESTRAC where he runs various teacher training workshops throughout Suffolk County.

Dr. Mince’s most recent interests involve corporate consulting and training. He is currently collaborating on a series of trainings designed for corporations using the methods and concepts of family therapy. Former Hofstra student, Maria Seddio, M.A. is the developer of Corp Talk, an extremely effective and creative way to help corporations change and renew themselves. This exciting work currently involves a year-long association with a multi-national, Fortune 500 company in New York City. Dr. Mince has also begun collaborating with Maria Seddio on a project for producing a play involving the oral history of women over a thousand years, entitled, “Wash.” Both the corporate work and the play are co-influential in that they are based in language and creativity.

Since 1969 Dr. Mince worked full-time as a Pupil Personnel Specialist with the Three Village School District in Stony Brook, NY., where he has run counseling groups, parent training groups, gestalt awareness training groups, psychodrama groups and has done teacher training under a number of grants to the district. He has been an intern supervisor for many counseling interns over the years.

Dr. Mince is an active practitioner of marriage and family therapy. He currently runs a four-therapist office in Setauket, NY. He is a Clinical Member of the AAMFT as well as an Approved Supervisor, A National Certified Counselor (NCC), and a Certified Mental Health Counselor (CMHC).

COURSES:

MFT 267-268 Diagnosis, Assessment, and Intervention in Marriage and Family Therapy

MFT 205 A Sociological History of Marriage and the Family

MFT 236 Ethnicity in Marriage and Family Therapy

MFT 281J Family Scripts of Abuse and Addiction

MFT281L Crisis Counseling in Families for Educators Beyond this he developed MFT Psychosomatic Families

Publications: In the latter 1980's Dr. Mince published a number of articles in The Western Suffolk Counselor’s Association Newsletter as well as one for the New York State Counselor’s Association Newsletter. In the early 1990's he published chapters in several of Dr. Atwood’s books, and his “Ten Linguistic Transforms” were quoted in Boscolo and Bertrando’s The Times of Time.

“Discovering Meaning with Families” in Dr. Atwood’s Family Therapy: A Systemic-Behavioral Approach. Chicago: Nelson-Hall. 1992.

“Integration of the Family Counseling Specialist into the Public School Pupil Personnel Services.” in the Journal of Community Intervention and Prevention. Publication date: 2000.

“Scripts as Life Forms: Parasitism and Perpetual Novelty” in Dr. Atwood’s Family Scripts. Taylor and Francis, 1995.

His current research interests include use of drama, language, and creative moments in family therapy and corporate systems; as well as his ongoing work with cellular automata, fractal geometry, and attractor basins in discursive therapy.