No End to Equality

John White argues that 'egalitarianism, in education as elsewhere, is a will-o'-the-wisp'.¹ He claims that recent defences of egalitarianism, among which he kindly includes my own along with those of Thomas Nagel and Kai Nielsen, have failed to answer the basic question of why a more equal society should be regarded as valuable. I shall try to show that the positive philosophical commitments contained in his argument may point the way to an answer.     

A SCALE FOR MEASURING CAMPUS MORALE

A campus morale scale, based on 22 items selected from Pace's College and University Environment Scales, is described.     

The Effects of Mental Practice on Counseling Behaviors

Neophyte counselors trained in the use of their own imagery to practice counseling interviews were compared with a similar group not receiving the training. The mental practice was hypothesized to have experiential value for neophyte counselors resulting in positive effects upon selected behaviors commonly found with counseling experience. Results indicated that the ability to discriminate differing levels of empathic responses, the ability to evaluate accurately one's own performance, and the amount of preinterview confidence were significantly higher for the mental practice group. However, the communication of empathy and the subjective evaluations of the counselors during the interview did not prove significantly higher. This article discusses the potential value of mental practice as a supplementary experiential training technique and some considerations for its use and further study.     

Following the ACES Standards on Preparation of Secondary School Counselors in Career Guidance

Standards for counselor training have been a topic of concern since the 1930s. More recent accomplishments toward quality in counselor education were the adoption of ACES standards at the 1967 Dallas convention and the special issue of Counselor Education and Supervision, “Up-Grading Guidance Practices” (Hill & Munger 1968). This article concentrates on the career guidance and occupational information aspects of the 1967 ACES Standards. In this context, the degree to which some counselor education programs seem to emulate practices contained in the standards and some suggestions for facilitating such emulation are discussed.     

Generalization of Microcounseling Skills from Training Period to Actual Counseling Setting

This study attempted to measure the generalization of the counseling skills learned via the microcounseling paradigm to the actual counseling setting. Twenty practicum counselors were assigned to two groups: (a) experimental group, training focused on the microcounseling skills of attending behavior, reflection of feeling, and summarization of feeling and (b) control group, no training. Measurements of the microcounseling skills were obtained at four intervals: (1) pretraining, (2) posttraining, (3) counseling session I, and (4) counseling session II. Results indicated that experimental subjects evidenced greater learning and retention of skills in reflection of feeling and summarization of feeling. There were no significant differences between subjects on attending behavior skills. Results are discussed with implications for training counselors via the microcounseling paradigm.     

A Look at Counselor Education Programs in Light of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973

The fundamental objective of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 is to prohibit discrimination against all handicapped individuals attempting to participate in any program or activity that receives federal financial assistance. Therefore, this act has had a major impact on most institutions of higher education. Counselor education programs at these institutions are specifically affected in areas related to admission and treatment of handicapped students. A recent U.S. Supreme Court case is helpful in establishing guidelines for the application of Section 504 to these counselor education programs.