The goal of this course is to provide mental health counseling students with the clinical and technical foundation needed to accurately conduct assessments, make diagnoses, provide case conceptualizations, and determine treatment recommendations in a professional setting. Using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, as our guide, we will explore not only the diagnostic criteria for each disorder, but also the biological, social, cultural, and environmental factors that contribute to its development and expression. This course will incorporate first person narratives, scholarly articles, writings from popular publications, and video to present a broad picture of the current theory and understanding of mental illness. We will also assess and critique the tools and strategies used in the differential diagnosis process, to better understand the ways that clinicians can account for cultural, racial, and gender bias in those methods, with the goal of developing the capacity to overcome these barriers to a holistic understanding of the person.