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Article Excerpt
School counseling literature indicates that school counselors experience isolation and frustration and that partnership projects between counselors and counselor educators are potentially valuable. The author describes the school counselor alumni peer consultation group, which provides (a) support and networking opportunities for new counselors and (b) a forum for studying counseling issues and for developing strategies to solve problems. This innovative strategy for professional development and collaboration has implications both for counselor educators and for school counselors.
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Some researchers might argue that the responsibility of counselor educators toward their students ends when students graduate from their training programs, whereas others would say that counselor educators should be committed to helping students not only to develop the skills they need to become excellent counselors but also to make a successful transition to the workplace. Counseling programs highlight the importance of making connections with others and supporting them as essential skills of the counselor; however, new professionals may struggle with finding and maintaining helpful resources for connection and support for themselves during the induction process. Isolation is a specific cause of concern for new school counselors because the norms in K-12 schools include working alone without asking for help or without discussing professional practices with others (Little, 1990; Lortie, 1975; Sarason, 1982). Matthes (1992) and Stickel and Trimmer (1994) have pointed out the specific difficulties faced by new school counselors because of the vagueness of the induction process and the lack of support they receive. The induction process has been extensively studied with regard to teachers (Hollingsworth, 1989; Lortie, 1975; Yarger & Smith, 1990; Zeichner & Gore, 1990), but not as much attention has been given to professional socialization as experienced by counselors (Thomas, 2001).
School counselors can benefit from networks and collaborative activities to reduce the isolation commonly felt by individuals within the profession (American School Counselor Association, 1981; Hayes, Dagley, & Horne, 1996; Hayes, Paisley, Phelps, Pearson, & Salter, 1997; Logan, 1997; Robertson, 1998). The counseling profession offers support in the form of associations; local, statewide, and national conferences; and journals. Nonetheless, many new counselors may find that they are too overwhelmed with the demands of their jobs to attend conferences or too burned out from graduate school to commit to reading journals regularly. Because the induction experience poses a variety of problems, including the serious issue of professional isolation, efforts on the part of counselor educators to improve this transition may alleviate unnecessary suffering and even enhance the efficacy of new counselors. Counselor educators' involvement with alumni can be mutually beneficial because it reduces the isolation of new professionals and increases educators' awareness of the realities of everyday practice in the field; this information can be used by educators as a basis for making appropriate changes to their curricula.
There is support in recent literature on counselor professional development for a collaborative approach, which often takes the form of a partnership project between counselors and counselor educators (Beale, Copenhaver, Leone, & Grinnan, 1997; Clark & Horton-Parker, 2002; Fall & VanZandt, 1997; Hayes et al., 1996; Hayes et al., 1997; Logan, 1997; Robertson, 1998). For example, Hayes et al. (1997) recommended that practicing school counselors and counselor educators work in teams to develop a counselor training program to provide opportunities for both direct services within the school and community as well as research on program development. Clark and Horton-Parker (2002) described the use of professional development schools (PDS) in the training of school counseling interns. The PDS model involves a partnership between the school district and the university and focuses on making more relevant connections between theory and practice. School counselors have complained that their training programs did not adequately prepare them for the realities of school-based practice (Barret & Schmidt, 1986; Beale et al., 1997; Paisley & Borders, 1995); therefore, these collaborative endeavors may appeal to both counselors and counselor educators.
Peer group supervision has been cited as another way to improve the clinical supervision experience of interns (Agnew, Vaught, Getz, & Fortune, 2000) because supervision in this field has often proven inadequate or even inappropriate if conducted by someone who has not been trained in counseling (e.g., an administrator; Agnew et al., 2000; Barret & Schmidt, 1986; Borders & Drury, 1992; Paisley & Borders, 1995). Kaplan, Geoffroy, Pare, and Wolf (1992) found that a systematic and structured professional development plan, involving a team of members of the school system, was also beneficial to school counselors. The model described by Kaplan et al. does not involve a partnership with an institution of higher education, but it does reflect a commitment to collaboration within the K-12 school setting.
The Counselor-in-Residence Program (Beale et al., 1997) is a creative strategy in which a school counselor joins the faculty of a counselor education program and spends 1 year teaching classes, supervising interns, and presenting workshops on special topics. In this way, school counseling students are taught by an instructor who is currently working in the field of school counseling, which gives them access to a wealth of practical information they might not otherwise receive while in school. The program has been very successful and represents a direct form of collaboration between practitioners and educators.
Another form of collaboration involves consultation groups in which professionals work together on relevant issues in their field. Teacher research groups have proven to be effective in helping teachers develop curriculum and teaching strategies; such groups also foster teacher collaborations and ongoing support networks (Castori, 2002; Papale, Castori, & Wilson, 2002). Logan (1997) described the use of consultation groups as a way of providing guidance, feedback, and support, as well as improving the professional skills of counselors. The members in her group developed a useful method for case presentation and consultation. In...
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