No description available.

A growing trend in counselor education in the United States is to accommodate current technological change by including more online academic opportunities. Slow to emerge in the counselor education literature is information that highlights how instructors have negotiated the move from land-based teaching to online teaching. A lack of knowledge about this transitional experience is concerning because counselor education programs might overlook important opportunities to support indeed, facilitate the transitional process. The purpose of this research study was to illuminate the experiences of counselor educators who have transitioned from land-based to online teaching. A transcendental phenomenological approach provided the framework and guided the methodology. This study highlighted the experiences of 6 counselor educators from small universities across the United States who transitioned from teaching counseling courses in the classroom to teaching them online. Semistructured interviews provided the data for this study; analysis used Giorgi's systematic process of data reduction. Four major themes of common experience emerged from the data: (a) high expectations and low support from university leaders, (b) limits to transitional enthusiasm among counseling faculty, (c) solutions for transitional success for counseling faculty, and (d) support essential for the counselor educator's transition. Results of this study confirm a need for greater attention to the transitional process. Counselor educators requested more opportunities for experience and support. When considering social change, understanding the needs of counselor educators in this transition can help inform much needed training strategies and supportive services in counselor education programs.

The purpose of this qualitative study was to describe the experiences of master’s level counseling students who have a counselor education faculty member as their mentor. Seven master’s level counseling students between the ages of 25-30, from a state university, voluntarily participated in this study. Participants were six female students and one male student. Four participants were mental health counseling majors, while three were school counseling majors. Data were collected through a demographic survey and semi-structured interviews. Three themes were developed based on participants’ experiences. They were (1) “going above and beyond,” (2) “guide you and explore options,” and (3) “provide support and encouragement.” The theme “going above and beyond” was described by participants as their mentor performing extra tasks that were not in their job responsibilities. Participants explained “guide you and explore options” in terms of their mentor guiding them in their professional development and career options. The theme “provide support and encouragement” described the participants’ mentors showing genuine interest in them and providing them with support and encouragement throughout their relationship. Based on previous literature, research, and the current study, a mentoring framework for counselor education is proposed. The framework contains three categories which are (1) guidance, (2) encouragement, and (3) above and beyond. Implications for counselor educators and recommendations for future research are provided.

Due to multiple worldviews, gender biases, and more, Transgender and Gender-expansive (TGE) individuals often face many obstacles in their career development. As ASCA calls for school counselors to address the career needs of all students, this presentation highlights the challenges of the TGE community and offers resources and practical applications for school counselors to assist TGE students with their post-secondary and career transitions.

No description available.

No description available.

The purpose of this research study was to investigate the directional relationship between college students' attachment styles and social media practices with their relationship development. This investigation tested the theoretical model that undergraduate students' (N = 717) attachment styles (as measured by the Experiences in Close Relationships-Short form [ECR-S; Wei et al., 2007]) and social media practices (as measured by the Facebook Intensity Scale [FBI; Ellison et al., 2007] and Motives for Going Facebook Official Scale [MGFBO; Fox & Warber, 2013]) contributed to their quality of relationship development (as measured by the Parks Relational Development Scale [PRDS; Parks & Roberts, 1998]). Specifically, this investigation tested the hypothesized directional relationship that students scoring in the insecure attachment range (i.e., avoidant or anxious) with higher levels of social media practices would have lower levels of relationship development quality. In addition, this investigation examined the relationship between college students' attachment styles, social media practices, and relationship development quality with their reported demographic information (e.g., age, current school level, and ethnicity). The results of the structural equation model (SEM) analyses identified that college students' attachment style contributed to the relationship development quality (96.04% of the variance explained) and their social media practices (2.56% of the variance explained). Furthermore, the results of the analyses identified that students' social media practices contributed to their relationship development quality (.4% of the variance explained). Implications of the findings from the study include (a) the inclusion of additional psychosocial intake questions for college counselors; (b) identification of current trends in undergraduate students' attachment styles, social media practices, and relationship development functioning for counselor educators to support the development of counselors-in-training; and (c) insight into the instrument development of the ECR-S, FBI, MGFBO, and PRDS.

Previous research has found meditation to be effective in reducing practitioner stress, improving emotional functioning, and increasing pro-social emotions, such as empathy and compassion. In addition, research examining the effects of meditation on student counselors has shown that it increases counselor self-efficacy, reduces distress, and increases cognitive empathy. Therefore, it behooves counselor educators to discover methods of integrating meditation into counselor training. The meditation practice investigated in the current study is new to the counseling and psychology literature. The majority of the current research has examined transcendental and mindfulness-based practices. However, recent research has shown that spirituality has the ability to potentiate meditation. Jyoti mediation (JM), the practice used in this study, is a spiritually based practice used for spiritual and personal growth for over 500 years. This study examined whether student counselors, after participating in a JM group, would have a significantly different level of emotional intelligence, stress and daily spiritual experiences than a comparison group who received a psycho-educational curriculum. Moreover, I investigated if the frequency of meditation related to the treatment outcomes. I conducted a six week randomized controlled trial where participants (n = 60) completed self-report assessments on the first, third and sixth week of the intervention. In addition, the participants in the meditation condition were asked to complete a daily journal reporting their experiences with the meditation treatment and their frequency of practice. Participants were required to meditate once a week in the group, and requested to meditate at least ten additional minutes each day. In order to analyze the data, I conducted a repeated measures multivariate analysis of variance (RM-MANOVA). The RM-MANOVA revealed no significant difference between the two groups. However, because the range of time spent meditating was so wide, I conducted a second RM-MANOVA using only participants that meditated in group and an additional 60 minutes over the six weeks. The second RM-MANOVA approached significance in the main effects (p = .06); and revealed a significant univariate between group effect for stress. Likewise, I conducted two Pearson moment correlations to investigate the relationship between the study outcomes and meditation frequency. The first correlation revealed no significant relationship between meditation frequency and any of the independent. However, the second correlational analysis revealed a significant relationship between stress and meditation frequency. Also, both correlational analyses revealed a significant relationship between stress and emotional intelligence. In order to gain a better understanding of how the independent variables effected stress over time, I conducted a growth curve analysis (GCA). I used PROC Mixed in SAS and nested the measurement points into each individual. The GCA revealed significant non-trivial variance between individuals at initial status. In addition, the GCA revealed that emotional intelligence accounted for 27% of that variance, and when controlling for emotional intelligence there is a significant interaction between time and group. The implications and limitations of these findings are discussed.

A primary goal of clinical supervision in counselor education programs is to develop trainees who express a level of self-awareness, competence, and self-efficacy from which to further develop as a counselor. A vital component of this process is for supervisees to disclose their thoughts and feelings about their clients, their self as a person, their work as a counselor, and experiences with their supervisor. However, current research suggests that it is common for supervisees to hold back personal and professional information from their supervisor leading to missed learning and growth opportunities. Through self-disclosure, trainees receive positive and negative supervisor feedback. It is important to examine how this may influence trainee confidence. It is hypothesized that self-efficacy will be threatened by low levels of supervisee self-disclosure. This study explored the relationship that exists between supervisee self-disclosure and supervisee self-efficacy, and what role the working alliance plays in the relationship. A total of 71counselor education students at three CACREP accredited institutions in Florida participate in the study. All participants had experienced at least one full semester of practicum or internship. A sub-sample of the 71, comprised of 32 participants, was also selected based on their responses to an abridged version of one of the three instruments used in the study. Both samples received equal statistical analyses. Overall, the results suggest that counselor education practicum or internship student self-disclosure was not able to explain their self-efficacy. Furthermore, when the participants' perception of the supervisory working alliance was added to their level of self-disclosure, the statistical results were mixed depending on the sample used.

Counselor education programs strive to promote the personal development and wellness of counselors in addition to cognitive, skill, and professional competencies. The purpose of this study was to examine trends in self-reported levels of wellness of master's level counseling students. The cross-sectional study investigated the influence of time in a counselor education program on the wellness levels of counseling students. Students were surveyed at three points in their counselor education training: the beginning, middle, and end. Participants included 204 master's level counseling students enrolled in three CACREP-accredited counselor education programs located in the southeastern United States. Each participant completed the Five Factor Wellness Inventory (5F-Wel) and a demographic questionnaire. A monotonic trend analysis was conducted in SPSS Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) to answer the question of whether master's level counseling students report higher levels of wellness as they advance through a counseling program. Additional univariate analyses of variance (ANOVAs) were performed in order to answer questions related to the influence of demographic variables. Results of the study yielded no significant trends in self-reported levels of wellness by students as they progressed through their counselor training. Furthermore, gender, cultural background, and a requirement for personal counseling were not significant in accounting for differences in the wellness levels of students. However, those students who reported that their counselor education program offered a wellness course reported statistically significant higher levels of wellness. Responses to an open ended question on the demographic questionnaire, 'What, if anything, have you learned in your counseling coursework that has helped you develop knowledge and skills regarding your personal wellness?" were included in the discussion to provide insight into the results of the study. The findings suggested that, while counselor education programs may not increase levels of wellness in students, evidence from the demographic questionnaire indicated that personal development and wellness were emphasized. Perhaps systematic procedures for teaching and evaluating student wellness could be implemented in counselor education programs to insure that goals regarding personal development and wellness are being met.