Holmes Training Academy™ · Professional Educational Certification
Relationship Strategy
Certified Relationship Strategist Level 1
Foundations of Relational Assessment, Intervention & Recovery
A 16-week professional certification in relationship assessment, ethical practice, relational models, Couples Therapy for One™, and Marriage Recovery ER™.
- Credential
- Certified Relationship Strategist Level 1
- Duration
- 16 instructional weeks. One two-hour live session each week, with scheduled academic recesses.
- Delivery
- Live cohort
- Weekly commitment
- Approximately 4–6 hours per week, including live instruction, assigned reading or lesson review, case analysis, skills practice, and required coursework.
- Investment · Pay in Full
- $997.00
01
Program Overview
Certified Relationship Strategist Level 1 is a sixteen-week professional certification program designed to develop the foundational knowledge, ethical discipline, relational-assessment skills, and intervention reasoning required to serve individuals, couples, and families responsibly.
The program moves beyond informal advice, motivational language, and technique-driven helping. Students learn how to observe relational patterns, develop structured case formulations, distinguish presenting complaints from deeper relational processes, and determine what level of response is appropriate.
Training begins with professional identity, ethics, confidentiality, boundaries, cultural humility, documentation, and the distinctions among counseling, coaching, pastoral care, and therapy. Students then study major relational approaches, including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Emotionally Focused Therapy, Dialectical Behavior Therapy, Bowen Family Systems, Gottman-informed work, Structural Family Therapy, and Narrative Therapy.
The final half of the program introduces two distinguishing Holmes Training Academy frameworks: Couples Therapy for One™ and the Marriage Recovery ER System™. Students learn how to work strategically when only one spouse is willing to participate, recognize relational emergencies, interrupt continuing damage, assess relationship acuity, stabilize acute distress, and determine the appropriate next level of care.
The goal is not to produce helpers who rely upon instinct, advice, or isolated techniques. The program develops thoughtful, ethical, and disciplined relationship strategists who can understand what is happening beneath relational behavior and respond within the limits of their professional role.
02
What You Will Learn
What a graduate of this program is prepared to do.
- Assess relational distress systematically rather than relying only on the couple's presenting complaint.
- Differentiate relational symptoms from underlying patterns, including attachment dynamics, cognitive distortions, emotional dysregulation, systemic interaction patterns, and maladaptive behavioral cycles.
- Determine the immediate level and type of intervention required, including when stabilization must precede reconciliation or deeper therapeutic work.
- Develop a defensible case conceptualization using information gathered from both partners or, when necessary, from one participating partner.
- Select interventions intentionally from multiple evidence-informed relational models rather than applying one model indiscriminately.
- Apply foundational principles of Couples Therapy for One™ when only one partner is willing or available to engage in the change process.
- Recognize high-risk relational conditions that require containment, referral, additional assessment, or a change in intervention strategy.
- Use structured language and intervention strategies to reduce escalation, increase clarity, and interrupt destructive relationship patterns.
- Distinguish relational shift, repair, reconciliation, and restoration and avoid promising outcomes that require the participation of another person.
- Document and explain the clinical or strategic rationale for an intervention, including what was observed, why the intervention was selected, and what outcome should be monitored.
03
Delivery & Format
Certified Relationship Strategist Level 1 is delivered through Holmes Digital Campus with live online faculty instruction.
The sixteen-week program includes:
- One two-hour live class each week
- Assigned textbook reading
- Faculty teaching and demonstration
- Relational case studies
- Guided case formulation
- Applied exercises
- Weekly assignments
- Professional discussion and reflection
- Faculty feedback
- Competency-based assessment
- Digital access to approved course materials
Students select one live section and remain in that section throughout the program. All class times are scheduled in Eastern Time under the America/New_York time zone.
Live classes are not recorded.
Students should plan for approximately five to seven hours of weekly participation, including live instruction, reading, assignments, case analysis, and review of faculty feedback.
04
Curriculum
Module 1
Professional Foundations, Ethics, and the Self of the Strategist
Weeks 1–4. Professional role clarity, ethics and boundaries, practitioner self-awareness, documentation, cultural humility, and ethical decision-making.
Module 2
Foundational Models and Relational Case Conceptualization
Weeks 5–8. Theoretical literacy and application across systemic, cognitive-behavioral, attachment-based, structural, narrative, and strategic lenses. The aim is competent conceptual selection, not mastery of every therapeutic modality.
Module 3
Couples Therapy for One™
Weeks 9–12. Conceptual foundations, case selection and risk screening, goals and pacing with the attending partner, and intervention toward relational shift. Couples Therapy for One™ is never presented as a guarantee that one partner can restore a marriage.
Module 4
Marriage Recovery ER System™
Weeks 13–16. Operational instruction in the Marriage Recovery ER™ phase, with ICU, Recovery, and Outpatient Care introduced only for continuum and transfer-readiness understanding, followed by full-system case integration.
05
Live Class Schedule
Select one live section and remain in that section throughout the program.
Wednesday Evening
Wednesday
7:00 PM–9:00 PM ET
September 16, 2026 – January 20, 2027
Thursday Evening
Thursday
7:00 PM–9:00 PM ET
September 17, 2026 – January 21, 2027
Section preference is not guaranteed. Holmes Training Academy makes final section assignments based on availability.
06
Faculty
Professor Cheryll Holmes, PhD, PsyD, MDR
Founder and President, Holmes Training Academy LLC
primary instructor
Dr. Holmes is a psychologist, marriage and family professional, theologian, organizational psychologist, dispute-resolution professional, author, researcher, professor, and creator of Couples Therapy for One™, the Marriage Recovery ER System™, Marriage ICU™, the H.U.M.A.N. Functioning Model™, the M.A.L.E. Therapy Lens™, and the N.E.U.R.O. Behavior Shift System™.
07
Credential Awarded
Upon successful completion
Certified Relationship Strategist Level 1
Professional Educational Certification
Completion Requirements
To be awarded the Certified Relationship Strategist Level I credential, students must:
- Complete the Certified Relationship Strategist Level I course orientation
- Attend at least 14 of the 16 live instructional sessions
- Complete all required homework and Applied Evidence
- Complete all four required Module Assessments
- Complete the Final Integration Assignment
- Earn an overall final course average of at least 80%
- Participate in the Weekly Huddle, case discussions, and applied exercises
- Complete the required reading in the official course textbook
- Submit coursework by 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on the Wednesday following class unless a different written deadline is established in the official course calendar
- Satisfy professional conduct and scope expectations, including confidentiality, ethical practice, jurisdictional limits, and appropriate referral
- Satisfy all financial obligations
- Receive faculty approval for certification
The detailed grading weights are published in the Official Syllabus, Campus Edition 2026.
Certification is competency-based. Enrollment, attendance, payment, or assignment completion alone does not guarantee certification. Faculty may require revision, remediation, additional practice, or reassessment before approving certification.
08
Admissions Requirements
Certification is competency-based and subject to faculty approval.
Students must remain within the limits of their lawful professional role, training, credentials, jurisdiction, ethical responsibilities, and supervision requirements.
The course does not confer professional licensure, authorize the diagnosis or treatment of mental illness, or expand a student’s existing legal or professional scope.
Live classes are not recorded. Students are expected to attend the section in which they are enrolled and may not routinely move between sections without administrative approval.
Additional faculty, evaluators, or guest instructors may be assigned by Holmes Training Academy LLC when appropriate.
If you are uncertain whether this program fits your practice, the Registrar's Office will advise you before you commit.
Alumni
Student Success Stories
Graduates practicing across the country, in their own words.
Danielle R.
Licensed Professional Counselor
Georgia
“My intake conversations changed within a month. I can name what a couple needs first instead of guessing.”
Certified Relationship Strategist™ Level I
Terrance W.
Senior Pastor & Pastoral Counselor
Texas
“I now know when to counsel and when to refer. That single distinction has protected families in my church.”
Certified Relationship Strategist™ Level I
Yvonne P.
Organizational Leadership Consultant
Illinois
“Case conference taught me to defend my reasoning. Executives trust recommendations I can explain.”
Certified Relationship Strategist™ Level II
Institutional standing
Why Professionals Trust Holmes Training Academy
Founded
2017
Graduates
1,000+
Serving professionals nationwide
Evidence-based curriculum
Live faculty instruction
Professional community
Academic experience
Your Learning Experience
What a term at Holmes Training Academy actually asks of you — and gives you.
Weekly Live Classes
Faculty-led sessions each week of the term, not recorded modules alone.
Interactive Discussion
A cohort discussion board where your reasoning is read and answered.
Guided Practice
Applied assignments that rehearse the work before you carry it.
Faculty Feedback
Written review of your work against a published competency standard.
Professional Community
A section of colleagues who move through the program with you.
Digital Resources
Course materials and the Holmes Knowledge & Research Library™.
Graduation Recognition
Formal recognition when requirements are demonstrably met.
Alumni Network
Continued standing among Holmes-prepared practitioners.
“Preparation is an act of respect — for the work, for the profession, and for the person in front of you.”
Your cohort
Join a Community of Professionals
You will not study alone. Each section is assembled from practitioners who already sit with people in difficulty, and much of the learning happens between them.
Counselors
Pastors
Coaches
Human Services Professionals
Organizational Leaders
Helping Professionals
After graduation
Your Certification Is Only the Beginning
Completion places you inside an institution rather than at the end of a course. Graduates continue through:
Continuing Education
Ongoing institutional instruction that keeps your practice current.
Advanced Certifications
Further Holmes credentials that build on the work you have completed.
Professional Networking
Standing among colleagues through the Holmes Professional Network™.
Faculty Mentoring
Continued access to the faculty who prepared you.
Leadership Opportunities
Invitations to teach, supervise, and represent the institution.
“We do not graduate students. We release practitioners into the places where people are hurting.”