Inducting the transformed school counselor into the profession

Theory Into Practice, Summer, 2002 by C. Marie Jackson, Brent M. Snow, Susan R. Boes, Paul L. Phillips, Rebecca Powell Stanard, Linda C. Painter, Mary Beth Wulff

Practicum and Internship

Practicum

Bradley and Fiorini (1999) assessed the status of practicum in counselor education programs. These researchers provided an overview of practicum in regard to curriculum content, assessment of quality, and the competencies required for completion of a beginning-level practicum. The results of their study indicated that the requirements for prerequisite coursework were similar among most programs. The content areas most likely to be prerequisites to practicum were theory and practice, professional orientation, human growth and development, and group work. When reviewing prerequisites, the researchers noted that there was no uniform requirement of a multicultural counseling course prior to practicum. In the reported data, 70% of the counselor educators stated that such a course was not required in their program, and yet 88% reported holding the expectation that practicum students would have the ability to work with clients from diverse cultures. The 2001 Council for the Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP) standards do require that students in clinical experiences have the opportunity to counsel diverse clients. The skills necessary to meet the needs of diverse students are essential to the implementation of the new vision for school counseling (House & Martin, 1998; Jackson, Snow, Phillips, Boes, & Rolle, 1999; Snow, 2000).

Bradley and Fiorini (1999) reported as a concern that only 61% of the counselor educators surveyed in their study held the expectation that practicum students would be competent to demonstrate the ability to facilitate a group. Since CACREP defines practicum as including group work, this competency seems essential. Their study underscored the need to establish specific competencies for practicum students to achieve a readiness to assume the role expectations in internship and in the real world.

Results of a national survey (Perusse, Goodnough, & Noel, 2001) of counselor education programs with a clinical experience component supported that most programs require students to complete 100 hours of clinical experience in a school setting for practicum. However, there was a wide variation among all programs surveyed; only 55.9% provided prepracticum clinical experiences in a school setting prior to practicum, such as job shadowing, classroom observation, interviews with professionals, and various other projects. The TSCI vision supports the value of prepracticum in-school experiences for expanding the opportunity to practice the various skill components foundational to practicum and internship.

Internship

A review of the literature revealed little research relative to internship or clinical supervision of school counselors in training. Internship as a clinical experience component is defined more broadly than practicum. CACREP (2001) has defined it as a 600 clock-hour experience under the supervision of a certified school counselor. It is further designated to be "a distinctly defined, post-practicum, supervised `capstone' clinical experience in which the student refines and enhances basic counseling or student development knowledge and skills and integrates and authenticates professional knowledge and skills appropriate to the student's program and initial postgraduate professional placement" (p. 103).