How To Become A Certified Art Therapist: What It Is and Career Path

What is a certified art therapist and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted expert

Ron Precht

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a certified art therapist. For example, did you know that they make an average of $36.56 an hour? That's $76,046 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 4% and produce 600 job opportunities across the U.S.

What general advice would you give to a certified art therapist?

Ron Precht

Senior Manager, American Massage Therapy Association

Generally, metropolitan areas have had more openings for massage therapists. This is a report from the end of 2019 that has the most recent data we have available. Report

ScoreCertified Art TherapistUS Average

Salary

5.9

Avg. Salary $76,046

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

7.3

Growth rate 4%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

10.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.77%

Asian 3.27%

Black or African American 6.53%

Hispanic or Latino 10.21%

Unknown 4.49%

White 74.73%

Gender

female 71.88%

male 28.13%

Age - 43

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 43

Stress level

7.3

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

5.3

Complexity level is intermediate

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.0

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a certified art therapist

Explore certified art therapist education requirements

Most common certified art therapist degrees

Bachelor's

57.9 %

Master's

23.0 %

Associate

12.0 %

Start to develop specific certified art therapist skills

Skills	Percentages
Patients	30.05%
Patient Care	16.70%
Rehabilitation	15.71%
Physical Therapy	15.57%
Occupational Therapy	10.22%

Complete relevant certified art therapist training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 1-3 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New certified art therapists learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a certified art therapist based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real certified art therapist resumes.

Research certified art therapist duties and responsibilities

Demonstrate working knowledge of community mental health services identify in the Medicaid guidelines and attain contractual outcomes within designate time frames.
Improve patient outcomes by correctly evaluating and providing ongoing assessments of patients' rehabilitation needs relative to the upper extremity.
Provide individual short term and long term psychotherapy, and anger management for adolescents and adults.
Fabricate static and/or dynamic finger, hand, wrist and elbow splints as well as upper extremities casts.

Prepare your certified art therapist resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your certified art therapist resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a certified art therapist resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable certified art therapist resume templates

Build a professional certified art therapist resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your certified art therapist resume.