Communication Between College Counselors and Academic Faculty When Supervising Graduate Student Trainees

College counseling centers play an important role in the training and supervision of counselor trainees. This article addresses the importance of communication between college counselors and academic counseling program faculty when college counselors supervise graduate students from academic counseling programs. As the authors discuss, effective communication contributes to positive and productive training experiences for graduate student trainees. Suggestions are offered for successful communication between counseling center staff and program faculty.     

A Guide to Setting Up a College Bereavement Group: Using Monologue,Soliloquy, and Dialogue

Childhood grief disrupts and reshapes a developing child’s primary attachments, emotional regulation system, and identity formation. Bereft college students have to build their grief identity simultaneously with their social, academic, vocational, and sexual identities. This article describes a bereavement group to help students work on these developmental tasks. Providing long-term conversationally structured grief groups in a college counseling center provides support for college students’ adjustment and identity development.     

The Case for Comprehensive Counseling Centers at Community Colleges

This article addresses the need for a comprehensive counseling center to be housed on each campus of community colleges. Counseling helps to improve student academic success and retention, transfer, and graduation rates. Current research also illustrates an increase in psychological and emotional disturbances among college students across the nation, which, at times, results in acts of campus violence such as those that have occurred at Virginia Tech, Northern Illinois University, Henry Ford Community College, and the University of Alabama at Huntsville. This paper discusses the needs of the 21st century student body that result in the case for comprehensive college counseling centers. Recent legislation related to counseling at institutions of higher education is examined, recommendations are given, and components of a comprehensive counseling center are described.     

Research: Students' Perceptions of Need for Personal Counseling Services in Community Colleges

Although the need for personal counseling services is on the rise across college campuses in the United States, many community colleges do not offer personal counseling services on campus. Instead, community college counseling services focus primarily on academic and career advising. The purpose of this study was to survey community college students in North Carolina to determine their interest in and need for a personal counseling center on campus. Participants were 134 men and 202 women, 18–68 years of age. Of the participants, 70% indicated that having a personal counseling center on campus would be “very helpful” or “helpful.” Results are discussed, and recommendations are made for college counselors working in community college settings.     

Counseling and Connecting with the Military Undergraduate: The Intersection of Military Service and University Life

The majority of military undergraduates at universities are National Guard and Reserve personnel and prior-service military veterans, all difficult to identify on campus. These students face unique cultural challenges. Though the academic literature primarily addresses disability services and administrative programs often focus on “wounded warriors,” most military undergraduates are not physically or psychologically disabled and can be stigmatized by the “wounded warrior” stereotype. Minimal literature exists on the intersection of military culture with student life and on counseling center services for military undergraduates. This article offers a review of the literature, three core principles of care, and three vignettes of military undergraduates who received support from a counseling center provider, helping them manage both university and military life.     

The Role of Counseling Services for Students in Academic Jeopardy: A Preliminary Study

This study examined the impact of an academic counseling approach implemented by counseling center staff for students in academic jeopardy. Participants were 414 undergraduate students placed on academic warning and probation. Students who participated in counseling demonstrated significantly greater increases in grade point average than did students who had not received counseling.     

The Counseling Center: An Undervalued Resource in Recruitment,Retention, and Risk Management

A primary responsibility for directors of college and university counseling centers is to explain to various audiences the multiple ways such units are of value to their institutions. This article reviews the history of how counseling center directors have been encouraged to develop and describe the work of their centers. Often overlooked are the contributions that counseling centers make to institutional recruitment, retention, and risk-management activities. Research that demonstrates the relationship between counseling centers and each of these functions is reviewed and some recommendations for counseling center directors are offered.     

Do Cultural Attitudes Matter? The Role of Cultural Orientation on Academic Self‐Concept Among Black/African College Students

The authors explored the relationship between academic self‐concept and noncognitive variables (i.e., Africentric cultural orientation, academic class level, gender, and involvement in culturally relevant school and community activities) among Black/African college students. Results indicated that Africentric cultural orientation and academic class level were significantly related to academic self‐concept. Female students had higher scores on the Academic Self‐Concept Scale ( Reynolds, Ramirez, Magrina, & Allen, 1980 ) compared with their male peers. Implications for counseling practice and future research are discussed.     

Responding to the Increased Needs of College Students: A Case Study of Case Management

The psychological needs of college students lead to overwhelming demand on college counseling centers’ resources. In this article, we review models of case management in Higher Education including the administrative, behavioral intervention, and counseling center models. We also present a case study of the 3-year development of a counseling center case management service. Initial data suggest that expanding the role of a counseling center case manager to allow for frequent appointments/follow-up and standardizing counseling center case management procedures led to improved appointment attendance and increased communication with students following referral. A vignette and suggestions for other centers are also presented.     

Equalizing Opportunity: Training Indigenous Personnel as Mental Health Counselors

Traditional counseling and clinical programs have been reluctant to train lay counselors. The innovative program described in this article was designed to assist disadvantaged adults in obtaining credentials to qualify for a professional position. Unlike traditional students, TIP (Training Indigenous Persons) students were admitted to graduate level courses in mental health counseling on criteria other than their past academic record. Results supported the recent focus on variables related to candidates' success as counselors, rather than on their previous academic performances.     

Student Counseling Needs

Abstract

Three hundred forty-three students at a small urban northeastern college rated their needs for counseling assistance on fifty-three personal, learning and career issues. Strongest areas of concern included financial stresses, academic perfonriance, career development, relationship skills, bereavement and the fear of getting AIDS. Gender and racial groups are compared and implications for counseling center service delivery are discussed.     

Conflict Resolution Strategies Adopted From Parenting Coordination: Assisting High‐Conflict Coparenting Students

This article examines the challenges faced by nontraditional college students who are coparents as a result of divorce. The need for college counseling centers to have counseling options designed to assist this special population in successfully completing their academic pursuits is presented. Conflict resolution techniques based on the Parenting Coordination model are offered to help these students deal with the challenges of coparenting responsibilities.     

Curriculum Infusion as College Student Mental Health Promotion Strategy

This article describes efforts to increase faculty involvement in suicide prevention and mental health promotion via curriculum infusion. The participants were faculty, staff, and 659 students enrolled in classes of a large eastern university from Fall 2007–Spring 2011. Counselors, health educators, and medical providers recruited faculty from a variety of disciplines to develop mental health promotion programs in their courses. This article describes seven such collaborations, illustrating how faculty was able to encourage students to see connections between their academic content and real world college experience, and the implications for mental health. As a result of these collaborations, faculty had a deeper understanding of mental health issues and resources on campus and an appreciation for the opportunity to collaborate in novel ways. After curriculum infusion was introduced to the campus faculty referrals to counseling did not noticeably increase, but there was increased faculty engagement in mental health programs and promotion.     

Utilizing Partnerships to Maximize Resources in College Counseling Services

Research indicates an increasing number of college students are experiencing severe psychological problems that are impacting their academic performance. However, many colleges and universities operate with constrained budgets that limit their ability to provide adequate counseling services for their student population. Moreover, accessing off-campus mental health services can be difficult for college students, in particular community college students, for a variety of reasons. This article describes a partnership between a community college and university that utilizes a graduate training program to provide on-campus counseling to both student populations enabling both institutions to maximize their resources.     

A Counseling Liaison Model of Academic Advising

This article describes an alternative method of academic advising, as opposed to the traditional faculty‐student model. The objective of the counseling liaison model is to increase the retention and graduation rates of students through linking counseling intervention strategies with developmental academic advising.     

College Counseling Today: Contemporary Students and How Counseling Centers Meet Their Needs

There is evidence that today’s college and university students are struggling with emotional and behavioral health problems at higher rates than in past generations. This article explores the various ways, utilizing a range of models, that college and university counseling centers have mobilized to respond to these challenges. We examine literature about the characteristics and concerns of the current student generation along with what counseling centers are doing to respond to the challenge of student needs. We describe a survey (N = 408) of members of the Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors (AUCCCD) and American College Counseling Association (ACCA) that elicited the kinds of services, functions, structures, and organizational relationships found in today’s counseling centers. In addition to confirming the core mission of providing counseling and psychotherapy, the survey revealed widespread counseling center collaboration and consultation activities beyond the counseling room. The survey also indicated a variety of administrative and structural arrangements in the way counseling centers are placed on their individual campuses. Finally, we suggest a framework for planning, executing, and evaluating counseling center and campus initiatives.     

Facebook: Maintaining Ethical Practice in the Cyberspace Age

Current technology provides counseling center clinicians regular and immediate access to the students they work with via social networking. Focusing on Facebook in particular, this article discusses the opportunities and challenges this access creates and specifically explores how utilization of ethical, clinical, and cultural lenses might affect decisions about Facebook use, with particular emphasis on consideration of appropriate ethical principles and standards. The authors encourage counseling center staff members and trainees to consult with one another regarding use of Facebook and offer specific scenarios for engaging in discussions about this topic. The article concludes with guidelines for making decisions related to social networking.     

Field Supervision of Counselors in Training: A Survey of the North Atlantic Region

Most of the research on supervision has focused on supervisors in academic institutions (faculty members or doctoral students). In this article the authors describe a study in which they examined supervisors in community agencies where master's level counselors were assigned for practicum and internship training. The survey suggested that agencies were heavily invested in supervising graduate level counseling students and providing them with a rich clinical experience. Respondents typically had a master's degree, used various models of supervision, and provided feedback by means of self-report and audiotape or videotape review of counseling sessions. Results suggest that these supervisors had little contact with the concurrent academic supervisor and may have had little formal training in supervision. Implications of this survey include a need for more training for supervisors in graduate counseling programs and a need for more liaison between campus and field supervisors.     

Small College Counseling Centers:

College counseling centers have experienced continued change and development in roles and functions since their inception in the 1930s. Recent shifts include a focus on personal counseling, the broadening of services, and an increased severity in student problems. Administrative policy, restricted staffing, and limited budgets particularly impact small college counseling centers. This article explore these issues through a case study format and discusses the concurrent philosophical and training implications as challenges for the small college counseling center of the 1990s.     

Participant leadership in adult basic education: negotiating academic progress and leadership responsibilities

This article examines the conflicts and challenges that student leaders in adult basic education and literacy programs experience in balancing their leadership responsibilities with academic endeavours. Based upon a case study of an adult basic education student leadership council in New York City, the article shows that leadership activities can both support and impede academic progress. The mediating factors were time requirements for implementation of leadership activities and the perceived priorities of the participants, who used various strategies to manage their academic and leadership responsibilities. Council involvement also supported and changed their academic, vocational and personal aspirations. This study alerts adult educators to the ways in which leadership activities can complicate learners’ academic pursuits, the need both to respect student leaders’ choices and to provide guidance on balancing their multiple responsibilities, and the importance of cultivating literate capabilities through leadership activities.