I
came into the chapter about ethics thinking “Oh Crap! No one wants to talk
about ethics. I mean there’s so much that can go wrong for the counselor in
these situations.” However, after reading Chapters 3 and 14 I developed one
very strong sentiment… “If, for some reason, I don’t take anything away in the
way of skills from this program, I will at least graduate with an ethnical
understanding needed to serve as a base for school counseling upon leaving this
program.” I say this because the two chapters helped me realize just how
thorough the Millersville University School Counseling Program is. In fact, I
found it mystifying how much the tenets of those chapters lined up with the
design of our program.
I say this
because of the numerous courses we have to take before not only receiving a
degree but getting certified and how they adhere to the competencies discussed
in the chapters. For instance, we have to take Multicultural Counseling in
order to understand the importance of not generalizing one counseling/treatment
model to all of our students. This, of course, is because our student
populations will vary on numerous factors, whether it be race, gender,
orientation, or even something like socioeconomic status. This very much
presents several ethical dilemmas. Being of a different persuasion in those
background factors, can we check our biases and perceptions at the door before
offering counseling? Otherwise we’re doing more harm than good. Moreover, if
you’re unaware/untrained on differences between cultures, subcultures, etc then
can you truly empower the client to do what is best for themselves? Well, we
have a whole course aimed at teaching us this!
I also say this
because of the course Child in the Family System. Although I am not taking the
course until next semester the course is aimed at another ethical dilemma
presented within the chapter. How to best address the child and take into
consideration various family dynamics that may play a role in the child’s
thought process, actions, and behaviors. If you are not trained to look at the
child systemically but rather as an individual at all times then you could very
much be missing the function of the child’s behaviors and the root of the
issue. Again, this is an ethical dilemma as you are not empowering the client
to do what is best for themselves. Rather, you would be merely reinforcing the
school’s agenda to conform to what has traditionally been “correct” in the
setting, even if not for that particular child.
I also say this
because of the difficult situations that there is almost no way to plan for.
Well we’re presented with these dilemmas in Brief Therapy. Outrageious
scenarios in which you would never think you’d be placed are enacted and we are
to think as a cohort how to best address the problem. This not only gives us a
knowledge base to address this problem in the future, but also teaches the
value of corroborating with other counselors to best address a problem rather
than blindly barging in to arrive at what your background or school deems as
the “best” solution. Again, I want to hint back to that reoccurring them of
this will help us to empower the client to do what is best for themselves in
situations like that, rather than to fit some form of agenda.
In Addition, in
Orientation to Special Education you develop a background on various types of
classroom settings for special education. You learn various “handicaps” that
exist amongst children that might require them to land in special education.
You learn about 504 plans(at a basic level), team meetings and the like. You
learn about how to address issues that may occur with an ES student or an AS
student or an MR student. This again, is aimed, not only to teach you about
these aspects but to make you ethnically ready to interact with these students and
empower them to do what is best for themselves. If I so wanted to I could even
make that argument for the “Classroom Discipline” course as well.
Appraisal obviously
teaches us appraisal techniques in that we can competently use them. Ethically
speaking, administering and interpreting a test that you’re not properly
prepared to do
Finally, Chapter
14 essentially talked about taking time for yourself. After all, if you cannot
take time for yourself how can you take time to help others. This, at least I
believe, is the purpose of the course Study of the Individual. Much of what we
read in the required text for that course corresponded with the findings in
Chapter 14 and I definitely think it could have helped the counselor in the
vignette at the start of the chapter if she had done so PRIOR to feeling
overwhelmed.
Regardless of
all of that, these chapters made a “light bulb” go off so to speak. I
definitely now see how this is a complete program that attempts to make you
feel very competent in numerous situations which you are going to encounter. As
we’re going through the courses sometimes we may think “I know this already”,
“I learned this already in another course”, or “how does this relate to
counseling” but I think these chapters definitely made me feel in touch with
the entirety of the program.
Although
given at the end of class I do have to say I enjoyed the ethics quizzes as
well. I also thoroughly enjoyed that for the first one, I actually did very
well only getting two aspects wrong. Even moreso I only got them wrong because
I was on the fence and I still believe I offered a logical point that bordered
on the actual answer. Narrowing it down to three choices was hard however.
From the options
presented from the Romley & Huey (2002) article I thought the most
interesting options were 4,5,7,8, 11,12, 15,16,17, 19, and 20. From the
Froeschle & Crews (2010) article I thought the most interesting options
were 5, 7, and 8. I chose to pick at least one from each article in order to be
fair and unbiased. Narrowing it down to just 3 was interesting and helps
further point out the need for this program and it’s courses to further point
out and pre-emptively address the ethical dilemmas that we will face.
Romley & Huey #7:
I
do not believe that the counselor acted ethically. I say this because in this
particular case they put the needs/desires of the teacher before those of the
students. Our primary role is to advocate for students and by worrying about
how the teacher feels about the “correct” selection method versus the one
currently used they ignored the several students that may be ignored via
aptitude testing which we all know isn’t a end-all/be-all measurement whether
you’ve taken appraisal or not. The use of appraisal and testing methods and
doing so ethically/appropriately is covered in the following standards; ASCA
[section]A.9.c. & ACA [section] E.4.a. This was touching for me based on my
own personal history with this. I had the exact same situation occur to me in
high school where my counselor erroneously relied heavily on aptitude tests
rather than my motivation and abilities for classroom placements and college
applications. So perhaps this was just in my bubble.
Romley &
Huey #20:
I disagreed with this one. I
disagreed primarily under the premise that we’ve been talking about similar
situations during Brief Therapy. We’ve been told about practicum experiences in
which counselors were doing clearly erroneous things – and even admitted to
doing so in retrospect – but did so due to school policies, personal
friendships with teachers, etc. For instance (and maybe this is just because of
the vagueness of the vignette) perhaps the student was doing what fell in line
with what his teacher informed him to do whereas the counselor could have
potentially been the individual in the wrong. If there were contact with the
Practicum Supervisor and they were in agreement with the counselor then I
agree. However, we don’t know that. But if the counselor is employing this line
of thinking due to following the school’s policies rather than adhering to
ethical mandates that maybe the student is better aware of due to still being
in school and taking a class about it then I definitely disagree. According to
the article the mandates are… 1.g., F.1.h., & F.3.a. Perhaps the reason
this is most personally challenging to me is because I have been in both
positions. As a TSS I understood that my job may tell me one thing
contradictory to the school’s policy only to be reprimanded by the school –
whom I had no official affiliation – and they would try to get me in trouble.
Likewise, now I see visitors/student teachers and understand they might be
getting told something else than school policy from their supervisors. So I don’t
know if I’d terminate based solely on school policy… I’d have to worry about
WHY they’re doing it first.
Froeschle
& Crews #5
I
believed the school counselor could indeed work on managing the stress of the
teachers. However, I also felt this way contingent on the fact that the stress
was primarily, if not solely, being provided by the students. In that way, I
was looking at it in a manner of consultation rather than counseling. And as
even laid out in the Dollarhide & Saginak (2012) text the lines between the
two can very much be blurred but we need to make sure they’re not. So in that
case, I definitely felt it was ok given I looked at it as consultation.
However, if you employ the counseling standard you’re in violation of the ASCA
standard of avoiding dual relationships, not only with clients but with
coworkers as well. Personally challenging me there, however, is that I have the
notion that if you are close “friends” with your coworkers they will be more
open to consultation, more open to letting you run in-class facilitations, and
just more open to the counselor in general.
Dollarhide, C.T., & Saginak,
K.A. (2012). Comprehensive school counseling programs (2nd
Ed.). New York:
Pearson, Inc.
Romley, T. P. & Huey, W. C. (2002). An ethics quiz for school
counselors. Professional School
Counseling, 6, 3-12.
Froeschle,
J.G. & Crews, C. (2010). An Ethics Challenge for School Counselors. Journal
of
School
Counseling, 8(14)
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