This study elaborated on the development of school counselor's feelings of self-efficacy in working with students with special needs and how self-efficacy affects school counselor's roles with students with special needs. More specifically, this study addressed a number of topics in researching the impact of pre-service training, experience and in-service training for Professional School Counselors (PSCs) on their feelings of self-efficacy in working with students with special needs. This study will present a historical review of the development of Professional School Counselor roles. In addition, an analysis of the development of comprehensive developmental guidance programs in schools and suggested frameworks was conducted including students with special needs. Also, conducted were reviews of studies conducted with Professional School Counselors (PSCs) regarding their roles with students with special needs, their feelings of preparedness, and their training; and reviews of several studies of counselor education programs in the area of special needs training and experiential opportunities offered. Lastly, the pragmatic and theory base for self-efficacy found in the literature was explored. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between experience with special needs, pre-service education and in-service training regarding students with special needs and counselor's self-efficacy and roles they perform with students with special needs. The research for this study was conducted by survey at the Georgia School Counselor Association's fall conference in Atlanta, Georgia; the South Carolina School Counselor Association's fall conference in Columbia, South Carolina; the North Carolina School Counselor Association's fall conference in Greensboro, North Carolina; and Florida School Counselors on Survey Monkey. The participating states counselors also had access to the survey via the internet based survey service Survey Monkey. 410 PSCs from Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Florida completed the survey. 372 of the surveys met completion criteria and were included in the survey results (N = 372). Results of a factor analysis, a descriptive statistical analysis and a multi-step regression indicated the relationship between the five of the ratings and their combinations of self-efficacy and time spent in performing roles with students with special needs had a statistically significant relationship as measured on the survey. The two types of experience and in-service quality had a statistically significant relationship with the combination rating of self-efficacy as measured on the survey. The research question is: Does pre-service training, in-service training and experience have an impact on professional school counselor's self-efficacy and whether or not they perform a role with children and adolescents with special needs. The following statements are the hypotheses for this research: There is a relationship between the two types of experience as measured by rating on the survey, pre-service training and in-service training as measured by quality and quantity on the survey, their self-efficacy in working with students with special needs as measured on the survey, and the roles that PSCs perform as measured by the frequency that they perform roles on the survey.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ucf.edu/oai:stars.library.ucf.edu:etd-5216 |
| Date | 01 January 2010 |
| Creators | Lewis, Sally |
| Publisher | University of Central Florida |
| Source Sets | University of Central Florida |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | Electronic Theses and Dissertations |
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