Hit back button to return to URL
Return to  main menu for Anita Thomas

This course covers three content areas: an overview of the counseling profession, ethical and legal standards, and multicultural counseling.  The course offers an orientation to the counseling profession, and ethical, legal, and professional identity issues.  Students will study the history of the profession, ethical and legal standards, preparation standards, organizations, functions, and related journals.  Students will also be introduced to the tripartite training model for multicultural competency, which includes awareness of cultural assumptions, knowledge of cultural diversity, and skills for cross-cultural counseling.

Return to syllabus menu
Return to main menu

        Neukrug, E. (1999).  The world of the counselor: An introduction to the counseling profession.  Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/Cole.

Return to syllabus menu
Return to  main menu

The objectives of this course are to help students acquire

 1. knowledge of the counseling profession, including its history, roles and functions of
 counselors, professional identity, organizations, credentialing, and related journals;

 2. knowledge of ethical and legal standards and their application to various professional
 activities;

 3. knowledge of diversity issues, including worldview, race/ethnicity, gender, social class,
 spirituality, sexual orientation;

 4. knowledge of effective characteristics of counselors;

 5. awareness of personal characteristics, beliefs that influence students' potential role as a
 counselor.

Return to syllabus menu
Return to  main menu

1. Interview with a counseling professional.  Students will interview a social services professional on the social services profession, role of professionals, and changes and important issues within the field.  (See attached list of interview questions).  Students are to write a reaction paper to the interview, indicating issues that raised salience in the student about the counseling profession, training, the role of the counselor, and current issues within the field.  The paper should reflect the students awareness of the profession and role as a counselor as opposed to a summary of the interview.  (20% of grade)

2. There will be a final examination on ethical, legal, and professional, and multicultural issues within the field of counseling.  (30% of grade)

3. Students are required to complete an autobiographical assessment paper, which will include an exploration of their role as a counselor.  Students should include in the paper:
 a) reason(s) for selecting the counseling profession;
 b) a discussion of the modalities and specializations that the student may be interested in
 pursuing;
 c) personal characteristics, skills, values, beliefs, and cultural factors that will be beneficial
 for the specialization;
 d) a discussion of strengths and limitations or areas of growth in the role as counselor.

The paper should be a minimum of 5 pages and should be formatted according to the American Psychological Association's (APA) Publication Manual.   (20% of grade)

4. 4. Students are required to complete an annotated bibliography, including at least four articles, one from the  Journal of Counseling and Development.  The annotated bibliography includes brief reviews of the article (1-2 paragraphs).  It should also contain a critique or reactions to the article, which should include but not be limited to: the relevance of the article to training issues; role as a counselor; feasibility or ease of implementation of techniques/interventions; appropriateness of research sample, methodology; generalizability of findings; questions raised/ unaddressed concerns (1 paragraph). (20% of grade)

There will be no exceptions for deadlines of assignments.

Grading scale: 90-100 A 89-80 B 79-70 C

Return to syllabus menu
Return to  main menu

Course Schedule

Week 1        Professional orientation
                    Introduction

Week 2         Professional orientation             ch.1-2
                     History of counseling

Week 3        Professional orientation              ch. 3
                    Professional standards

Week 4        Counseling approaches              ch. 4-5
                    Individual counseling

Week 5        Counseling approaches              ch. 6
                    Family counseling

Week 6        Counseling approaches               ch. 7
                    Group counseling                          Interview due

Week 7        Counseling approaches                 ch. 8
                    Consultation

Week 8        Developmental counseling             ch. 9-10
                    Human development                      Assessment paper due
                    Abnormal development

Week 9        Developmental counseling            ch. 11
                    Career development

Week 10        Research and Testing                  ch. 12-13

Week 11        Professional settings                      ch. 16
                        School counseling

Week 12       Professional settings                      ch. 17
                    Community counseling

Week 13        Multicultural counseling                 ch. 14

Week 14        Multicultural counseling                 ch.15
                                                                        Article critiques due
Week 15        Future directions                          ch. 20

Week 16  Final examination

Return to syllabus menu
Return to  main menu