Preparing School Counselors
This article looks into how to prepare school counselors for the unprecedented responsibilities and challenges they are required to take on, school counselor education programs must be dramatically transformed. In urban educational settings, the needs for effective school counselors are even more perceptible (Shoffner & Briggs 2002). For instance, urban schools tend to be larger with fewer resources and located in areas with higher poverty rates. The student populations in urban schools are more likely to be comprised of people of color or of students whose first language is not English. In addition, children in urban areas are more often exposed to conditions that endanger their health and well-being, such as limited access to medical care and increased exposure to violence and crime. Each of these preceding factors influences the academic development of students. Students who attend urban schools are less likely than their suburban counterparts to complete high school. And, those who do graduate are more likely to be unemployed or living in poverty this is where the role of counselors and school leaders come together to work for academic success. According to the article the focus on career, personal and social achievement is the key to working together on helping students reach their goals. In order to make school counselor education programs more selective and diverse, the selection process must take into consideration not only test scores (e.g., GRE scores) but key dispositions that lead to effective, equity-focused, and data-driven urban school counseling. They tested the interactive CD-ROM it gave an example of a students, each intern had to choose all aspects of the students life in order to get a perspective of the best way to help the student achieve his future goals. In simple terms “putting you in the student’s shoes.” Students come from different backgrounds culture, language, social economics and many other differences. According to
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Shoffner & Briggs 2002 becoming the future counselor’s one must continue to educate and collaborate with administrators, teachers, students, and parent. As a counselor I can learn from these practices however, I believe internship and supervision would be the best way a counselor can learn. The use of the CD-ROM may not be useful in all situations. This article lacks more detail on the CD-ROM usage. It only mentioned one student’s situation and it did not express what the counselor solution was.
New Opportunities for Training School Counselors
Professional Development Schools (PDS) have different goals from one another they tend to have and share some of the goals. According to Clark & Horton-Parker 2002 the goal is to enhance school achievement in PDS by preparing educators, administrators and counselors to attend to social, emotional, and careers developments needs of students. In this study it was intended for the collaboration of the teachers and the counselors to work in urban setting to prepare effective administrators, counselors and teachers. Professional Development Schools provide valuable opportunities for collaboration among university faculty and public school professionals and offer the promise of enriched educational experiences for children and enhanced training for preserves and in-service teachers and counselors. In this article new ways that school counselor interns can receive valuable training and counseling experience through their work and supervision in PDS. I strongly believe that it is important for the counselor, educator and administrators to have collaboration with one another in order to be effective in
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their responsibilities. They only did a